Couture at the Club

To the historic University Club for a coffee table tome launch and talk on the late Spanish couturier Cristóbal Balenciaga, whose name is enjoying a resurgence of late.

The book Balenciaga – Kublin: A Fashion Record by the Hungarian photographer’s daughter, Maria Kublin andfashion curator and lecturer Ana Balda – records the photographer’s close relationship with Balenciaga, who died in 1972, aged 77.

The designer, who was also associated with Courrèges, Hubert de Givenchy, and Emanuel Ungaro, was notoriously camera-shy, but felt at ease with Tom Kublin who snapped him in his post-war heyday in Paris in the 1950s and ‘60s.

Maria flew in from her home in Amsterdam for the occasion, organized by the new Couture Pattern Museum on State Street, having lectured at London’s Victoria and Albert a few days before.

The beautifully presented book features more than 140 photo images and video film stills from Kublin, who worked with Balenciaga for 19 years until the photographer passed away in 1966, aged 42. 

Founder of the two-year-old museum, Cara Austine-Rademaker, says Santa Barbara is similar to Balenciaga’s hometown Getaria, Spain, with its Spanish and rural influences.

So far the museum has held six exhibitions, including a recent one on James Galanos – a favorite of the late First Lady Nancy Reagan – who would have been celebrating his 100th birthday.

The institution concentrates on the “golden age of couture” from the late 1940s, through the ‘50s and ‘60s.