Goodbye Sonia Rykiel, The French Designer Dies At 86

2024 Author: Steven Freeman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 08:15

Goodbye Sonia Rykiel. We will never forget your passion for stripes, your role in women's liberation and your well-deserved title of knitting queen.

The French designer Sonia Rykiel, founder of the firm that bears her name, has died this Wednesday at her home in Paris, at the age of 86, as a result of Parkinson's disease that she suffered for two decades.

French President François Hollande published a statement highlighting that Rykiel was “a free woman, a pioneer who knew how to trace her path” and recalled some of the milestones of her life, stressing that “she invented not only a fashion, but an attitude, a way of living and being, and offered women freedom of movement”.

Their designs, starring colored stripes, black, lingerie and knitwear, have been worn by stars such as Audrey Hepburn, Brigitte Bardot, Catherine Deneuve and Françoise Hardy. But the role of the dressmaker went far beyond dressing celebrities.

Sonia Rykiel Fall-Winter 2016 Collection.

When she became pregnant at the age of 28, she realized that the maternity clothes sold in Paris were neither comfortable nor practical, nor did they fit her. So she knitted an oversized knit sweater, known as the “poor boy,” which was so successful among her friends that she started selling it in the boutique she managed with her husband, inherited from his parents. That sweater, the brand's flagship since then, has become the cover of fashion magazines such as Elle or Women's Wear Daily.

With the creation of her sweater, she was the inventor of démodé fashion, encouraging women to define their own style and designing clothes that fit women, and not the other way around. Rykiel argued that women should not submit to the dictates of fashion and created comfortable pieces that defended their stylistic freedom with more fluid materials.

In 1968, the year of the student revolts in Paris, and after divorcing her husband, she founded her own company and opened her first store on the mythical Saint Germain de Prés street in the French capital.

Sonia Rykiel Fall-Winter 2016 Collection.

In the 70s, along with the rest of Parisian designers, he opted for the creation of the Prét-á-Porter, collections of practical, but sophisticated clothing, which distanced itself from the exclusive custom creations typical of the time. She was also one of the first to create garments with a message and a pioneer in filming a video of one of her shows.

She was also a visionary businesswoman when deciding to expand her empire creating in 1987 collections for men and children, a line of perfumes, accessories and shoes.

In 1995, due to his illness, he handed over the reins of the company to his daughter Nathalie. Since then, different young designers have been behind the creations of the firm, which maintains its adventurous and bold spirit, being one of the first major fashion houses to make a collection for the H&M chain in 2009. One of the last collaborations before Her death was the makeup line for Lancôme, which has just gone on sale.