A Big Year For Dior

 A Big Year For Dior: Maria Grazia Chiuri Takes the Reigns

Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli

The House of Christian Dior announced less than three weeks ago that Maria Grazia Chiuri would be taking over as creative director for the brand. The house was turned upside down when Raf Simons announced that he would be leaving the company back in November 2015.

 Since the departure of Raf Simons, the ateliers were run by a duo of designers to keep the house afloat while Bernard Arnault, the chief executive officer of the LMVH group which also owns Christian Dior, picked the new creative chief.

 On July 8th, the fashion world was rocked when Dior announced that Maria Grazia Chiuri would be the new creative chief--the first woman creative director in the history of the company.

 Though womenswear is worn by, well, women, most of the designers are men. Karl Lagerfeld is the creative head at Fendi and Chanel. John Galliano is head at Maison Margiela. Gucci is run by Alessandro Michele. Miuccia Prada is one of the sole couture designers that are women.

 Maria Grazia Chiuri has been at Valentino for the past sixteen years working alongside Pierpaolo Piccioli in an array of jobs including accessories designer and creative director.

 Personally, I am interested to see what Maria does with her first collection alone since 1999. I also think she has huge shoes to fill. I am a die hard Raf Simons fan. A photo of him blowing a kiss at the end of his final show for Christian Dior is the background on my laptop. I cried when I heard he was leaving Dior and wore all black in mourning the next day. His Spring/Summer 2013 haute couture show inspired my intense love for Christian Dior (as a house) and threw me into the fashion deep end. I am highly anticipating her show in September and can’t wait to see what’s next for Raf Simons’ menswear brand. Maybe he will surprise us and design womenswear under his own brand!