And the Show Went On: Cultural Life in Nazi-Occupied Paris Read Online Free PDF Page A

had Christian Dior and Pierre Balmain as his principal designers. In haute couture’s first postoccupation shows in October 1940, the industry aimed to hold on to its wealthier and show business clients, imagining what clothes would be suitable for taking the last métro after attending the opera. Some designers helped Vichy’s propaganda effort by printing scarves portraying Marshal Pétain in uniform and others showing him being acclaimed by cheering crowds. *
    Nazi officers with money in their pockets were also important clients. But the designers did not ignore working parisiennes . The bicycle, for instance, was now the most practical and best way of moving around town and, while some younger women were happyto wear short skirts, the more modest could soon choose from a range of different jupes-culottes , or divided skirts. The importance of turning heads while riding along the Champs-Élysées was underlined by a fashion show in October 1941 in which designers nominated bicycle outfits for three titles, Élégance pratique, Élégance sportive and Élégance parisienne . Dressing for all weathers was still more important for those riding bicycles or tandems known as vélotaxis , which pulled one- and two-seat carriages, usually no more than baskets precariously attached to two wheels. Since this rustic form of transportation offered no protection, passengers, too, had to dress for the elements.
    Other changes were imposed by shortages. Wood replaced leather for the soles of shoes, adding close to one inch to women’s heights and spawning inventive designs for heels and colorful strips of cloth for appearance. The loud clack that shoes made on sidewalks even inspired Chevalier to serenade the wooden soles in “La Symphonie des semelles de bois.” Similarly, since silk stockings were almost impossible to find, women feigned wearing stockings by staining their calves with a special lotion, marketed by Elizabeth Arden; some even painted a vertical line down the backs of their legs for verisimilitude. Furriers could no longer obtain mink and half of France’s sheepskins were being shipped to Germany, but they did their best with the skins of seals, rabbits and even cats. For some of the many Paris furriers who were Jews, their profession even became a lifesaver: the Wehrmacht so badly needed fur for winter combat uniforms that it released some 350 Jewish furriers from the Drancy concentration camp in Paris and exempted others from arrest so they could continue working “without contact with the public.”
    Women’s magazines were full of articles suggesting ways of beating restrictions and rationing—by, for example, giving old clothes a new look, turning a blanket into a child’s overcoat or transforming men’s trousers into warm dresses. (And with so many Frenchmen in Germany as prisoners of war or forced laborers, there was no shortage of unused trousers in wardrobes.) At the same time, because of the growing shortage of traditional textiles—not only wool and silk but also velvet, satin and lace—designers began experimenting with artificial fibers, notably rayon and fibranne, which could be extracted from cellulose. In fact, long before it was known that the Nazis were using hair taken from their death-camp victims, there was an attempt to mix hair with fibranne to make fabric.
    Yet for all this, haute couture survived, with spring and autumn shows amply covered in women’s and fashion magazines. The first chance prosperous Parisians had to wear tuxedos and long dresses under the occupation was for a gala organized at the Paris Opera on December 20, 1940, for Pétain’s charity, Secours National–Entr’aide d’Hiver. And while occasions to dress up were less numerous than before the war, receptions at the German Institute for visiting German dignitaries, as well as other charity galas, invariably brought out the finery.
    Perhaps the easiest—and cheapest—way for a woman to draw attention to herself,