Evening dress

Madame Grès (Germaine Émilie Krebs)

fall/winter 1974–75 · silk · Costume Institute

Madame Alix Gres' career spanned nearly five decades and throughout them all she excelled in her ability to manipulate fabric and use its innate characteristics to enhance her designs. Inspired by Greek dress, she experimented with silk jersey, draping and gathering it to produce fluid, body-skimming evening gowns, which she first introduced in the 1930s. It was a style she would return to over and again. Here, forty years later, she uses silk crepe to create soft drapery; the center front panel falls in an eye-catching cascade of folds; or if desired, the panel can be wrapped around the body in the style of a himaton, an ancient Greek shawl-like cloak worn by women, similar to the chlamys worn only by men.

Artist

Madame Grès (Germaine Émilie Krebs)

Date

fall/winter 1974–75

Medium

silk

Culture

French

Department

Costume Institute

Credit line

Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of the Brooklyn Museum, 2009; Gift of Mrs. William Randolph Hearst, Jr., 1986