Designer creates shock waves

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33912, 4 August 1975, Page 6

Designer creates shock waves

Rudi Gernreich. who will he the guest judge of this year's Benson and Hedges Fashion Design Awards in Wellington in (Jctober. has created more shock waxes in the fashion world in the past decade than most designers achieve in a lifetime.

An Australian-born American. Gernreich. aged 53, is the man who set the fashion world talking with his topless swimsuit. His no-hra bra, which now has an established place in fashion, and his latest release, the thong—described as the next best thing to nothing in uni-sex swimwear — have brought him praise and notoriety.

But his work in fashion has ranged wider than these world trend-setting highlights. His list of award successes includes recognition from England and Italy, as well a-> his homeland, the United States In 196" he received the Hall of Fame Award from the Coty American Fashion Critics, making him only the sixth American designer to receive the honour that is: regarded as the fashion world's “Nobel Prize" He became the first to receive the Coty Award two years running, and was the subject; of a "Time" magazine cover] story. He has made his mark tn every section of the fashion trade fp m childrenswear to sportswear, from lingerie tot

..attan-like robes tor senior . citizens. When “Life” magazine asked him to design predicted clothes for the year 2000. Gernreich developed the unisex concept which became a sensation of the Osaka Expo ’7O, and a fact ' O' contemporary life. Fled Europe* Gernreich who pronounces his name Americanised: Gern-rick) spent the first 16 years of his life in Vienna. He planned to study fashion design in Paris, but I in 1938 he and his mother | fled Europe with other Jewish refugees. They had friends in California. so that state became their new home. Gernreich • plunged into being an

American He read magazines. saw lots of movies] and learned the language well. For a time he drifted, to. college in Los Angeles,' through various art schools,; as an errand boy in adver-l tising agencies. Rejected by] the Army because of a phyr-i ical disability, he was at-j tracted to modem dance and; .danced professionally for: several years. His early involvement in] |ifashion design in New York' ; was “unhappy.” In his own] .|words: “Its very necessary' ■ for a designer to learn the basics, to get used to the; discipline. But that side of it! was terribly difficult for me! Two years later he re-] turned to Los Angeles and teamed up with a manufacturer named Walter Bass. [They joined Jax. a California [store, then as unknown as I Gernreich. Eight years later ' the Bass-Gernreich partnership dissolved. Gernreich i says his designs were too [“way-out” for Bass. There was no looking back. His name became known with his trademark of simplicity of line, the use of unusual fabrics in “knock-’em-dead” colour: combinations, unexpected! glimpses of bare skin in | dresses as well as swimwear! and a fluid look that sug-' gested that a woman might] be wearing nothing underneath.

Threats. proposals He made world headlines! in 1964 with his topless;! swimsuit. He never sug- [ gested that it should be; worn in public, he says, but; the ensuing publicity led to big sales. In 1969 he announced that . i he was taking a year’s sabI batical from designing and turned his hand to a different field — he produced a play that was performed on Broadway. , He drives a Bentley because "I consider it a really very good car. It just also happens to be a status sym-i bol,” he says. “I live a quiet] and regulated life. I don’t go out much. I don’t stay up all hours. Do I wish I did? t Absolutely not at all. What’siS the point running around the] i clock like an idiot.” e A frequent visitor to the I 1 fashion capitals of Europe, c and North America, this will i a be his first visit to this part lof the world. q He will be bringing some o ’of his own creations to New;o Zealand, and he has shown aiC keen interest in seeing some 17 of the work of our own ill leading and up-and-coming;! [fashion designers. |F