The Battle of Versailles: The Night American Fashion Stumbled into the Spotlight and Made History

In microcosm, this is the story of a single event – a fashion show outside Paris in 1973 that was over in about three hours. But if you take a longer view, it’s a story of the history of fashion to that point, and its intersection with race in America.

The Palace of Versailles is where the last monarch of France lived. It’s a spectacular place (here, see for yourself), but it was in dire need of repairs in the early 1970s. An idea was hatched to hold a fundraiser there. The theme would be a “battle of fashion” – five French designers “against” five American designers.

Up to that point, France dominated fashion. The only fashion that really mattered, culturally, was the “haute couture” of Paris. American designers simply followed France’s trends, with “ready to wear” clothes that were direct, cheaper copies of everything France put out. Back in the 1970s, the idea of French designers “competing” against Americans was a bit laughable.

But what happened was remarkable. The French went first, and put on a two-hour show full of elaborate costumes and sets. The Americans went next with a much simpler show, and they were done in 35 minutes. But they unquestionably “won the night” – the audience went crazy for the Americans, with thunderous applause and a standing ovation.

The author – who is the fashion writer for The Washington Post – examines why this happened. She doesn’t think it was the clothes. More than that, it was the … attitude of the American show. The models weren’t just hangers for clothes, they were allowed to show their personalities, and the choreography of the event (which was rushed) was more energetic than the French. The audience seemed ready for something new, something fresh, and they got it from the Americans.

The author (who is Black) also delves into the unique fact that 10 of the 36 models (and one of the designers) in the American show were Black. This was ground-breaking for the time, and, she believes, also contributed to how the show was perceived by the French audience. She considers it a turning point in fashion, but she writes later that it didn’t sustain itself. It seems fashion has an on-again, off-again, relationship with Blackness.

The Battle of Versailles happened at a moment in the time, so the book spends most of its words talking about the lead-up to the show, and what happened after. Predictably, there was a lot of drama involved in getting five designers to work together on a show. There are petty rivalries and outsized personalities.

But the most fascinating part of the book is what happened after Versailles. Only one of the American designers involved – Oscar De La Renta – went on to maintain consistent fame. The others – Bill Blass, Halston, Stephen Burrows, Anne Klein – sort of fell apart due to bad management or worse (Klein died of cancer four months after the show; her protege at the time, Donna Karan, carries on).

The chapter after the show chronicles the ups and downs of the different labels and designers in the years after the show. It paints the world of fashion as capricious, arbitrary, and often mean. When you’re dealing with the aggregate opinions of the entire world, what works and what doesn’t are sometimes simply random, and designers often get carried up and down by forces they don’t really control.

I enjoy books that examine history and culture through the lens of a specific event or physical location or object. See also:

• Silent Night: The Remarkable Christmas Truce of 1914
• Broadway: A History of New York City in Thirteen Miles
• The Seine: The River that Made Paris

A lovely book. I enjoyed reading it.