[Heritage] Maria Grazia Chiuri and Justine Picardie unpick the multilayered heritage of Dior to reveal some surprising synchronicities

This latest episode in the ‘Dior Talks’ podcast series broaches the topic of heritage. In it biographer and journalist Justine Picardie speaks with Maria Grazia Chiuri, Creative Director of Dior women’s collections, about the parallels between Monsieur Dior’s burst of creativity brought on by his emergence from the trauma and privations of war and the moment in history through which the world is currently living. The importance of the founding couturier’s relationship with his younger sister Catherine - coincidentally the subject of Picardie’s new book ‘Miss Dior: A Story of Courage and Couture’ - is explored as more than simply a familial relationship. Instead, the pair discuss how so many aspects of Monsieur Dior’s creativity and the long-established House codes that resulted can trace their source to this sibling bond. The fortune-telling and tarot cards that would shape so many of Monsieur Dior’s decisions - and inspire the House’s various creative directors, right up to Maria Grazia Chiuri today - grew from an initial fascination with the divinatory arts to a key source of comfort and hope when Catherine was imprisoned during WWII and all contact with her vanished. After she was freed and found, these emotions would be translated into the New Look, a sartorial reflection of optimism that produced extraordinarily architectural clothes that balanced an idea of protection with one that celebrated feminine and floral beauty. A keen gardener, Catherine would go on to cultivate flowers in the south of France, near her brother’s summer estate, that would provide ingredients for several of the House’s famous fragrances. This fascinating exchange, delving into the overlapping and layering of occurrences and inspirations, pulls back the curtain to plumb the hidden and unnoticed depths of the Dior heritage story.Hosted by Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Om Podcasten

Dior Talks* is delighted to introduce its latest podcast series dedicated to the Dior Lady Art project. Tune in to hear the stories and inspirations behind a new round of artist interpretations of the House’s iconic Lady Dior bag. An iconic object of desire with an extraordinary destiny that continues to be shaped by concepts and events forever transcending the boundaries of innovation and inventiveness. Thus, since 2016, for the Dior Lady Art project, the house has given international artists carte blanche to revisit this exceptional bag, which is then transformed into a dream canvas onto which they transpose their vision, their universe, their singularity. For this ninth edition, Sara Flores, Jeffrey Gibson, Huang Yuxing, Liang Yuanwei, Danielle Mckinney, Duy Anh Nhan Duc, Hayal Pozanti, Faith Ringgold, Vaughn Spann, Anna Weyant and Woo Kukwon each take their turn in appropriating the Lady Dior as a fascinating emblem of poetic metamorphosis. An alchemical combination of Dior’s heritage and creative freedom, resonating like an ode to passion and the world’s cultures. *An exceptional series hosted by the Paris-based fashion journalist Katya Foreman. Hosted by Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.