Daniel Roseberry’s appointment in 2019 as creative director of Schiaparelli sparked a sartorial French Revolution. Ninety-two years after its founding, the historic maison was on the brink of obscurity. Fortunately, its resuscitation under Roseberry was swift. The first American designer ever to lead a French couture house, he transformed it into a favorite of consumers and critics alike. Diving headlong into the brand’s heritage of Surrealist iconography and audacious craftsmanship, Roseberry made avant-garde the style du jour. This influence informs both the haute couture and ready-to-wear collections, as evidenced by this bijoux-button wrap dress from Spring 2023.
Among the many celebrated signatures of the revived Schiaparelli, Roseberry’s figurative brass accents are a standout. “The bijoux buttons punctuate the black surface of this dress like miniature works of art,” says Mario Margelist, of LUX, who is offering the dress on 1stDibs.
With a plunging V neckline, blouson sleeves and wrap-style skirt, the garment has an archetypal silhouette. But the bijoux buttons elegantly distort its classic form with icons embedded in Schiaparelli’s DNA. A padlock, a heart, a nautilus seashell, a human eye, the letter S and a female torso adorn the sleeves and sides of the dress with a captivating shine. “They transform a simple wrap silhouette into a piece of sculpture,” says Margelist.
This kind of metamorphosis was fundamental to Elsa Schiaparelli, the house’s founder and namesake. Schiaparelli, a seminal figure of French haute couture, was born and raised in Rome within an affluent academic family. In 1922, she moved to Paris and rooted herself firmly in the era’s Dadaist and Surrealist circles, quickly becoming a leading force in French fashion. In contrast to her deep rivalry with Coco Chanel, she had a fruitful, collaborative friendship with Salvador Dalí. Together, they concocted absurd, pioneering designs, like the Lobster dress and Shoe hat, most of which now reside in prestigious museum collections.
The house of Schiaparelli closed in 1954 and lay dormant for almost 60 years. Relaunched in 2012, it was overseen by two creative directors before Roseberry took up the mantle.
The crux of Elsa’s aesthetic was her alluring combination of the unsettling and the sublime. One need look no further than the sleeve of this dress to see this alchemy in action. The eye button, in particular, rendered with startling realism in resin encased in brass, is a beguiling oddity. Peering out, it draws viewers closer to discover its weird, wonderful secrets.
According to Margelist, the dress hails “from a moment when Schiaparelli reentered the cultural conversation as an art form rather than a fashion trend.” Roseberry has wielded Elsa’s cryptic visual vocabulary to sensational effect season after season, making the house’s creations coveted collectibles. When fashion this clever exists, why stop at wearing just a heart on your sleeve?
