Hubert De Givenchy.. The Birthplace Of Givenchy

Hubert De Givenchy was and still is a visionary in the world of fashion. Born in the French city of Beauvais in 1927, he lived with his mother father and brother but was later cared for by his mother and grandmother when his father later passed away. At the age of 17 he then moved to Paris where he studied at 'Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts and after careful consideration as he originally wanted to follow a career path towards law he placed his feet firmly on the ground and decided to go forward into the fashion world. 

He began in an apprenticeship role for Jacques Fath and after this experience later went out to work for couture houses such as Lucien Lelong, Elsa Schiparelli and Robert Piguet. 

Givenchy established his house in 1952 and released his line with his very famous 'Bettina Blouse' as one of his pieces, this was named after the model at the time Bettina Graziani and soon Givenchy became a couture house known for it's Parisian chic sense of style. Later in 1954 Givenchy became the first couturier to release a luxury ready to wear line.

Cristobal Balenciaga met Givenchy in 1953 a year after opening his fashion house and together they made the famous 'sack' silhouette not sinching anything in at the waistline keeping everything quite hidden and secretive which differed from the style popular at that time, 

Audrey Hepburn was also a great friend of Givenchy's. Givenchy had been asked to dress the star for the upcoming film she would star in - 'Sabrina' but as a misunderstanding he thought it was Katherine Hepburn and politely asked if she would like to have a look at some of last seasons pieces. From this moment on Audrey Hepburn would always wear Givenchy's pieces on screen and off with his work appearing in Funny Face (one of my favourite movies) Sabrina and Breakfast at Tiffany's - a classic. They became very close and Audrey Hepburn once said that 'only in Givenchy's pieces could she ever really feel like herself, he was a creator of personalities aswell as a designer'. He later released a perfume inspired by her called L'interdit for which she appeared in an advert for, one of the first advertising campaigns to feature an actress as the model. 

Givenchy later sold his company to Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy in 1988 and then later retired in 1995 and there on after designers such as John Galliano, Alexander McQueen, Julien Mcdonald and now to date Ricardo Tisci have creative innovative ideas in Givenchy's name for the world to see.