The Dior Family's Strange Wartime H

The Dior Family's Strange Wartime History
15,350

Jenna Sauers
Filed to: IN FASHION 3/14/11 6:58pm
The Dior Family's Strange Wartime History

Ten days ago in Paris, just before the most recent Christian Dior fashion show, company C.E.O. Sidney Toledano took the highly unusual step of getting up on the runway to make a speech. The circumstances that led Toledano to take this action were, too, abnormal: Dior's creative director of fifteen years, John Galliano, had been arrested days before for allegedly harassing two strangers with an anti-Semitic and racist diatribe. Another, similar, criminal complaint had just been made by an alleged second victim, and there had also been the release of that now notorious cell phone video of Galliano telling a third group of people, "I love Hitler. People like you would be dead. Your mothers, your forefathers, you'd all be fucking gassed."


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Dior suspended Galliano after his arrest, and fired him almost as soon as the video, brokered by a paparazzi agency, hit the Internet. But before the fall Dior collection — the last Galliano work that will sell under the Dior name — Toledano felt the need to explain himself. And to limit any damage to a brand that realized revenues of over $28 billion last year. Toledano's speech read, in part:


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So now, more than ever, we must publicly re-commit ourselves to the values of the House of Dior. Christian Dior founded his House in 1947. His family had been ruined in the Crash of 1929 and his own beloved sister had been deported to Buchenwald. In the aftermath of the dark years of the war, he sought to free women, to give them back their sparkle and joyfulness.
There are a number of inaccuracies in that paragraph. (The very least of which is that Christian Dior founded his fashion house in 1946.) The most remarkable piece of news — that Dior had a sister who was deported by the Nazis — is so vague as to be suspicious. Who was this "beloved sister"? What was her name? For what alleged crimes was she arrested? Was she Jewish? Did she survive the war? Why isn't this episode mentioned in any major Dior biographies or company histories? Also encouraging of skepticism is the fact that this Holocaust-victim sister, of whom we had heard nothing before, appears in the Dior narrative just as the company image could most use a little burnishing on the racial-sensitivity front.

But as it turns out, what is perhaps most interesting where Christian Dior's youngest sister Catherine is concerned is that her real story is, if anything, actually far more impressive than the version from Toledano's speech.

Dior's sister Catherine Dior was was not, in fact, sent to Buchenwald, which was (primarily) a men's camp. She went to Ravensbrück, where women were held. The journalist and historian Gitta Sereny's collection of writing about the Holocaust, The Healing Wound, describes Dior's crime: she had been a member of "the section 'Massif Central' of Polish intelligence in France," a Resistance network focused on gathering and transmitting intelligence about German troop movements, production, and weaponry.

This élite organization of more than 2,000 agents — which suffered enormous losses — was later credited as one of the most dynamic intelligence movements in Europe. By the end of 1942, most of its leaders had been killed by the Gestapo.
One fashion biography that mentions Catherine's role in the Resistance is Marie France Pochna's Christian Dior: The Man Who Made The World Look New. Pochna's tone during her sole discussion of Catherine Dior's activities makes resisting the Nazis sound kind of like a boarding-school prank that had the side effect of putting some of Christian Dior's élite friends at risk:

"During one of her visits, in June 1944, Catherine used [her brother's] apartment for her underground work. Christian was away, but [composer] Henri Sauguet and [artist] Jacques Dupont were staying there following a bombing alert for the Batignolles neighborhood where they lived...They landed in the midst of a bizarre situation — Catherine and her underground contacts coming and going at all hours, and Dior's Martinician cook quite beside herself with irritation. It did not dawn on Sauguet just how dangerous the whole episode had been until he learned that Catherine had subsequently been arrested by the Gestapo. 'It was a very close shave,' he was to write in his memoirs. 'How would we have explained to the Gestapo that we were just spending the night there, far from home, at Christian Dior's invitation?'"
How, indeed. Sereny's account of the network in which Catherine Dior worked is probably a much more accurate reflection of the stakes involved. Sereny writes of one wartime chicory date with Catherine Dior's close friend and fellow resister, Liliane Dietlin:

She had come to the café on her bicycle — the bicycle on which she virtually lived during those years. She wore wool stockings, a straight dark skirt with one seam undone to give her space for riding her bike, a short fur jacket that had seen better days, passed on to her by her mother, and a knitted cap that hid her dark hair. She was twenty-nine then, but looked eighteen, and there wasn't a male eye that didn't follow her when she came through that terrace door and hugged me, rather tightly I thought.

(Thirty-five years later, recalling that occasion, she told me that day had been quite terrible: she had carried four messages, three to individuals in the morning and one to a group meeting that afternoon; eight people had been arrested that day, two in the morning and the six others that afternoon, just as Lili had turned into the streets on her bicycle. All would be executed, mostly hanged after being tortured. 'A bad day,' she remembered. Were there many like that? She shrugged. 'Ah oui.')
Pochna writes that Catherine Dior joined the Resistance shortly after her brother, who had been demobbed from the army following France's defeat, returned to Paris in late 1941. Catherine, who was then 25 years old, carried out her work right up until June of 1944, when she was arrested by the Gestapo. She was put on one of the last trains out of Paris, which departed on August 15, just days before the liberation of the city began. Toledano's mistake may stem from the fact that the men on that train were sent to Buchenwald. Around 2,600 people were packed into the cattle cars of that train. Eight-hundred and thirty-eight would survive.

It is not known if Christian Dior knew about his sister's activities, but between the time of her arrest and the time of her deportation, he did try to seek her release, both via the Nazi contacts he made at his job — Dior was a designer at the couture house of Lucien Lelong, which necessarily counted some prominent Nazi and collaborator clients — and with Raoul Nordling, the Swedish consul-general who was known for trying to mediate on behalf of prisoners and the Red Cross during the Nazi occupation. On August 18, Nordling secured a promise from the Nazis that Catherine Dior would be placed under the protection of Sweden if she was still on French soil. But the train had already entered Germany.

The writer Prosper Keating shared a detailed account of Catherine and Christian Dior's wartime associations and activities at the Fashion Spot. Though forced to work under atrocious conditions at various German munitions factories, Catherine Dior survived the war and was liberated near Dresden in April, 1945. She returned to Paris that May. She was awarded the Croix de Guerre — "which was rare," notes Keating, "for a resistance member as it was usually reserved for regular armed forces" — as well as the Combatant Volunteer Cross of the Resistance, the Combatant Cross and, in the U.K., the King's Medal for Courage in the Cause of Freedom. She was named a chevalière of the Legion of Honour. Her brother Christian also had her in mind in 1947, when he named his first perfume Miss Dior. She died in 2008.

Like many people who lived through the Second World War and the Nazi occupation of France, Christian Dior had both relatives who were Nazi sympathizers (his niece Françoise, who became a full-fledged neo-Nazi later in life, counted hearing an occupying SS officer call her "What a beautiful little Aryan girl" as one of the "sweetest" memories of her childhood) and relatives who actively resisted the occupation. Christian Dior's own choices — to work in an industry that was on the one hand suppressed by the Nazis, who placed many restrictions on French fashion houses, and closed several, with a view to eventually dismantling the French fashion industry and making Berlin a fashion center, but which on the other hand necessarily depended, at least in part, on wealthy occupiers and collaborators for its clientele — were obviously equally complicated. The challenge today lies in seeking to accurately understand these choices, and the circumstances in which they were made.

Resultados (español) 1:

Guerra extraña historia de la familia Dior15.350Jenna SauersArchivado en: de moda 14/03/11 18:58Guerra extraña historia de la familia DiorHace diez días en París, justo antes del más reciente desfile de Christian Dior, empresa Director Sidney Toledano tomó la medida altamente inusual de levantarse en la pista para hacer un discurso. Las circunstancias que llevaron Toledano a tomar esta acción fueron, también, anormales: el director creativo de Dior de John Galliano, de quince años, había sido detenido días antes por acosar supuestamente a dos extraños con una diatriba antisemita y racista. Otro, similar, penal queja sólo había sido hecha por una segunda víctima y también había la versión de ese vídeo de teléfono celular ahora notorio de Galliano diciendo un tercer grupo de personas, "I love Hitler. Gente como tú estaría muerta. Sus madres, sus antepasados, todos ser de mierda gaseados. " Reloj Dior diseñador John Galliano dicen "I Love Hitler".Lo que sucedió a Dior detención del diseñador John Galliano el jueves por la noche en París para...Leer másDior suspende a Galliano tras su detención y lo despidió casi tan pronto como el video, intermediado por una agencia de paparazzi, golpear el Internet. Pero antes de la caída colección de Dior: el último trabajo de Galliano que se venderá bajo el nombre de Dior — Toledano sentía la necesidad de explicarse. Y para limitar cualquier daño a una marca que se dio cuenta de los ingresos de sobre $ 28 billones el año pasado. Lee discurso del Toledano, en parte: Incendios de Dior John Galliano para racista RantJohn Galliano ha sido despedido de Christian Dior. Empresa Director Sidney Toledano, que es judío...Leer másAsí que ahora más que nunca, debemos públicamente volver a comprometernos con los valores de la casa de Dior. Christian Dior fundó su casa en 1947. Su familia había sido arruinado en el Crash de 1929 y su querida hermana había sido deportada a Buchenwald. Tras los oscuros años de la guerra, buscó a las mujeres, para devolverles su brillo y alegría.Hay un número de inexactitudes en ese párrafo. (Por lo menos de los cuales es que Christian Dior fundó su casa de moda en 1946). La pieza más notable de las noticias — que Dior tenía una hermana que fue deportada por los Nazis — es tan vaga como para ser sospechosas. ¿Quién era este "querida hermana"? ¿Cuál era su nombre? ¿Por qué presuntos crímenes fue arrestada? Era judía? Sobrevivieron a la guerra? ¿Por qué no se menciona este episodio en grandes biografías de Dior o historias de la empresa? También fomento del escepticismo es el hecho de que esta hermana de la víctima de Holocausto, de los cuales habíamos escuchado nada antes, aparece en la narrativa de Dior justa como la imagen de empresa más vendría pulir un poco en el frente de sensibilidad racial.Pero resulta que, lo que es quizás más interesante donde hermana menor de Dior Catherine le preocupa es que su verdadera historia, si acaso, realmente mucho más impresionante que la versión del discurso de Toledano.Hermana de Dior que Dior Catherine fue no, de hecho, fue enviada a Buchenwald, que era (sobre todo) campo a los hombres. Ella fue a Ravensbrück, donde se realizaban las mujeres. Colección de la Gitta Sereny periodista e historiador de la escritura sobre el Holocausto, la curación de heridas, describe el crimen de Dior: ella había sido un miembro de "la sección «Macizo Central» de la inteligencia polaca en Francia," una red de resistencia centrado en la recopilación y transmisión de inteligencia sobre movimientos de tropas alemanas, producción y las armas.Esta organización de élite de más de 2.000 agentes, que sufrió enormes pérdidas, más tarde fue acreditado como uno de los movimientos más dinámicos de la inteligencia en Europa. A finales de 1942, la mayoría de sus líderes había sido asesinada por la Gestapo.Una biografía de la manera que menciona el papel de Catalina en la resistencia es Christian Dior de Marie France Pochna: el hombre que hizo el mundo buscar nuevo. Tono de Pochna durante su discusión exclusiva de actividades de Catherine Dior hace resistiendo los Nazis sonidos como una broma de Colegio de internos que tenía el efecto secundario de algunos de los amigos de élite de Dior pone en riesgo:"Durante una de sus visitas, en junio de 1944, Catherine utiliza apartamento [su hermano] para su trabajo subterráneo. Christian estaba ausente, pero [compositor] Henri Sauguet y [artista] Jacques Dupont permanecían allí tras una alerta de bombardeo del barrio de Batignolles, donde vivían... Aterrizaron en medio de una situación extraña, Catherine y su metro contactos que viene y va a todas horas y cocinero de Martinician de Dior muy al lado de ella con irritación. No amanecer en Sauguet lo peligroso que había sido el episodio entero hasta que supo que Catherine posteriormente había sido detenida por la Gestapo. 'Era un afeitado muy de cerca', iba a escribir en sus memorias. "¿Cómo nos habría explicado a la Gestapo que apenas pasábamos la noche ahí, lejos de casa, a invitación de Dior?'"¿Cómo, de hecho. Cuenta de Sereny de la red en la que Catherine Dior trabajó probablemente es un reflejo más preciso de los desafíos. Sereny escribe sobre una fecha de achicoria durante la guerra con el amigo de Catherine Dior y su compañero resistente, Liliane Dietlin:Ella había llegado a la cafetería en su bicicleta, la bicicleta en la que prácticamente vivió durante esos años. Llevaba medias de lana, una falda recta oscura con una costura deshecha para darle su espacio para montar su bicicleta, una chaqueta corta de piel que había visto mejores días, pasados a ella por su madre, y un casquillo hecho punto que ocultaba su cabello oscuro. Ella era entonces veintinueve, pero miró a dieciocho años, y no había un ojo masculino que no seguirla cuando ella entró por esa puerta de la terraza y me abrazó, bastante bien pensé.(Treinta y cinco años más tarde, Recordando aquella ocasión, me dijo que ese día había sido bastante terrible: ella había llevado cuatro mensajes, tres personas en la mañana y una a un grupo, reunión por la tarde, ocho personas fueron detenidas ese día, dos de la mañana y los otros seis por la tarde, igual que Lili había dado vuelta a las calles en su bicicleta. Todo iba a ser ejecutado, colgado sobre todo después de haber sido torturado. Un mal día, recordó. ¿Hubo muchos como ese? Ella se encogió de hombros. oui.')Pochna escribe que Catherine Dior se unió a la resistencia poco después de su hermano, quien había sido demobbed del ejército después de la derrota de Francia, regresada a París en finales de 1941. Catherine, que tenía entonces 25 años de edad, llevó a cabo su trabajo hasta junio de 1944, cuando fue arrestada por la Gestapo. Ella se puso en uno de los últimos trenes de París, que salió el 15 de agosto, pocos días antes de la liberación de la ciudad. Error de Toledano puede provenir del hecho de que los hombres en ese tren fueron enviados a Buchenwald. Alrededor de 2.600 personas fueron llenos en los coches de ganados de ese tren. Sobreviviría ocho - novecientos treinta y ocho.It is not known if Christian Dior knew about his sister's activities, but between the time of her arrest and the time of her deportation, he did try to seek her release, both via the Nazi contacts he made at his job — Dior was a designer at the couture house of Lucien Lelong, which necessarily counted some prominent Nazi and collaborator clients — and with Raoul Nordling, the Swedish consul-general who was known for trying to mediate on behalf of prisoners and the Red Cross during the Nazi occupation. On August 18, Nordling secured a promise from the Nazis that Catherine Dior would be placed under the protection of Sweden if she was still on French soil. But the train had already entered Germany.The writer Prosper Keating shared a detailed account of Catherine and Christian Dior's wartime associations and activities at the Fashion Spot. Though forced to work under atrocious conditions at various German munitions factories, Catherine Dior survived the war and was liberated near Dresden in April, 1945. She returned to Paris that May. She was awarded the Croix de Guerre — "which was rare," notes Keating, "for a resistance member as it was usually reserved for regular armed forces" — as well as the Combatant Volunteer Cross of the Resistance, the Combatant Cross and, in the U.K., the King's Medal for Courage in the Cause of Freedom. She was named a chevalière of the Legion of Honour. Her brother Christian also had her in mind in 1947, when he named his first perfume Miss Dior. She died in 2008.Like many people who lived through the Second World War and the Nazi occupation of France, Christian Dior had both relatives who were Nazi sympathizers (his niece Françoise, who became a full-fledged neo-Nazi later in life, counted hearing an occupying SS officer call her "What a beautiful little Aryan girl" as one of the "sweetest" memories of her childhood) and relatives who actively resisted the occupation. Christian Dior's own choices — to work in an industry that was on the one hand suppressed by the Nazis, who placed many restrictions on French fashion houses, and closed several, with a view to eventually dismantling the French fashion industry and making Berlin a fashion center, but which on the other hand necessarily depended, at least in part, on wealthy occupiers and collaborators for its clientele — were obviously equally complicated. The challenge today lies in seeking to accurately understand these choices, and the circumstances in which they were made.

Resultados (español) 3:

El Dior familia extraña historia de guerra
15350

Jenna Sauers
presentó a: en la moda 3 / 14 / 11 6:58pm
la Dior familia extraña historia de guerra

hace diez días en París, justo antes de la más reciente Christian Dior Fashion Show, company director Sidney Toledano tuvo el inusual paso de levantarme en La pista para hacer un discurso.Las circunstancias que condujeron toledano a tomar esta acción fueron, también,Anormal: director creativo de Dior, John Galliano, de quince años, había sido detenido días antes para acosar presuntamente a dos extraños con una diatriba antisemita y racista.Otro similar, denuncia penal había sido hecha por una supuesta segunda víctima, y también había sido la liberación de ese ahora famoso Cell Phone Video de Galliano diciendo a un tercer grupo de personas, "Amo a Hitler.La gente como tú, estaría muerto.Sus madres, sus antepasados, estaríais jodidamente gaseados ".


reloj Dior diseñador John Galliano decir" Amo a Hitler. "
lo que le pasó a pronta diseñador de Dior John Galliano es arresto el jueves por la noche en París...
leer mas
Dior suspendió Galliano después de su detención, y lo despidió casi Tan pronto como el video, mediado por un paparazzi Agency, golpear el Internet.Pero antes de la caída de Dior Collection - el último trabajo que se venden bajo el Galliano Dior - Toledano sintió la necesidad de explicarse.Y para limitar los daños a una marca que realiza unos ingresos de mas de $28 millones de dólares el año pasado.Toledano es el discurso leído, en parte:


DIOR John Galliano para incendios racista rant
John Galliano fue despedido de Christian Dior.Company director Sidney Toledano,Quién es judío...
leer mas
así que ahora, más que nunca, debemos volver a comprometernos públicamente a los valores de la casa Dior.Christian Dior fundó su casa en 1947.Su familia había sido arruinado en el crash de 1929 y de su amada hermana había sido deportado a Buchenwald.En las postrimerías de los años oscuros de la guerra, trató de liberar a las mujeres, para devolverles su brillo y alegría.
Hay una serie de imprecisiones en ese párrafo.(el menos importante de los cuales es que Christian Dior fundó su casa de moda en 1946.) la más notable pieza de noticias - que Dior tenía una hermana que fue deportado por los nazis - Es tan vago como para sospechar.¿Quién era este "amada hermana"?¿Cuál era su nombre?¿Por qué los presuntos crímenes fue arrestado?¿Ella era judía?¿Sobrevivió a la guerra?¿Por qué no es este episodio mencionado en cualquier gran empresa Dior biografías o historias?También alentador del escepticismo es el hecho de que esta victima del Holocausto hermana, de la que no había escuchado nada antes, aparece en el Dior narrativa como la imagen de la empresa podría utilizar un poco mas pulido en la sensibilidad racial frente.

pero resulta que,