born Sept. 10, 1890, Rome, Italy
died Nov. 13, 1973, Paris, Fr.
Italian-born French fashion designer.
After working in the U.S. as a film scriptwriter and translator, she settled in Paris and opened her first shop in the 1920s. By 1935 she was a leader in haute couture and was expanding into perfume, cosmetics, lingerie, jewelry, and swimsuits. Her designs combined eccentricity with simplicity and a trim neatness with flamboyant colour. She introduced the padded shoulder in 1932; designed fur bed jackets and rhinestone-trimmed lingerie in the 1940s; and in the 1950s popularized "shortie" coats in vivid reds, golds, and chartreuses. Her use of "shocking pink," the sensation of the 1947 season, is still regularly revived. With Christian Dior , she was instrumental in the worldwide commercialization of Parisian fashion.