Who is your favourite male designer? There are so many amazing male designers today; however we have to admit that unfortunately we do not have much time to keep up to date with what is going on in the fashion world. We just put our heads down and work tirelessly. However one designer who did impact us greatly from the very beginning is Charles James. He is still with us in our thoughts and minds today and we perceive him as a true master. Unfortunately he did die poor and was almost forgotten, and clearly not a household name. Yet, all designers out there know who he is, and truly adore, admire, and are humbled and inspired by the man. The right people know that Charles James is a true Master. Your gowns are remarkably flattering for women’s figures. How did you develop such an understanding of how to enhance a woman’s shape? Is it instinctual or is it a learnt skill? It’s both. Clearly our heritage has a lot to do with it, as Italian’s we are master fitters! No one can fit like an Italian, as you have so many body shapes to deal with, and Italian’s love their food! We have had the best clients from a very young age; our mothers, grandmothers and aunts. We were 16 and of course they all wanted to look like Sophia Loren; so we did the impossible from very young. They were hard years pleasing these women who knew so much about the industry; however we were a new generation wanting to experiment with boning and heavy tailoring in ladies wear. People forgot it was not a generation that wore corsetry so they did not know how to construct corsets, as that was a generation before them. When they were young the war had started and fashion had changed dramatically. Rationing started and women had to take on male jobs as men had gone to war. Fashion changed dramatically and became almost survival and practical. There was no such thing as evening gowns with boning back then. So when our generation came along and started experimenting with strapless gowns and a new construction that had not been seen for many decades, as much as it was new and exciting it was not embraced by all and a lot of people did not love it. As male designers we were wrapped experimenting with this undeveloped way of construction, and we had to learn how to make these corsets the hard way. There were no books to guide us, or teachers providing instruction on these techniques back then We have always been into architecture so for us it was true engineering and we developed our own ways of construction. We were changing the female form, making the waist smaller than a girl could ever imagine, through trial and error methods. Today we have our own specific method of construction because of all the research. Women back then thought strapless dresses with such construction were vulgar and ridiculous; however the younger generation embraced it. Madonna had arrived and fashion was taking a dramatic turn as lingerie and corsetry became outerwear. We (J’Aton)
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