Butterfly Couture A/W 2024

There appears to have been a resurgence this year of fashion designers seeking inspiration once again in the butterfly motif. I first noticed this at this years annual Met Gala Ball to raise funds for their Costume Institute. The theme of the Ball this year was "The Garden of Time" in which Jennifer Lopez dazzled, appearing in this stunning Daniel Roseberry butterfly designed gown for the house of Schiaparelli. The gown was designed to imitate butterfly wings and is an illusion tulle sheath gown featuring a sculptural bodice with plunging V-neckline, modelled after four enlarged butterfly wings. The see-through tulle dress was meticulously embroidered with over 2.5 million silver foil bugle beads, warm silver pearls, and rhinestone crystals over the course of over 800 hours, all carefully placed to conceal J.Lo’s modesty. It is a nod to Elsa Schiaparelli's obsession with the butterfly in her early fashion designs. Roseberry (creative director at the house of Schiaparelli) states, "The butterfly is a perfect articulation of a sleeping beauty. The surrealist embodiment of metamorphosis. Something that goes to sleep and wakes up beautiful, also still lives in a garden without being a flower. The butterfly and idea of metamorphosis has been part of Schiaparelli’s DNA since the beginning.” Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion, is also the title of the current fashion exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and examines how historically and presently fashion designers have incorporated the theme of Nature and its flora and fauna into their garment designs in a stunning variety of ways. Read on to see how the use of the butterfly motif in fashion still endures, and will only continue to provide a rich source material for designers in fashion for years to come.

Charles James

Charles James - Butterfly Dress

Also on display at the Met's Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion, exhibition is this stunning Butterfly gown by designer Charles James (1906-1987). James saw himself as an artist and sculptor of dress rather than a dressmaker. He manipulated fabrics into dramatic shapes using complex seaming and sometimes complicated understructures to create his singular vision of elegance in dresses which were sought after by society's most prominent women. Having personally draped and constructed the garments that bear his label, James was considered to be the only American to work in the true couture tradition. The Butterfly dress is reminiscent of the tightly fitted bustle dresses of the early 1800s, cinching the waist and emphasising the female form with with sculpted sheath bodice and enormous bustle skirt or tulle "wings" which moved seductively with the wearers movement transforming the wearer into a beautiful butterfly, similar to Christian Dior's obsession with depicting women as flowers. The dress weighs in at a weighty 18 pounds and is made from silk chiffon, silk satin, and twenty five yards of tulle.

Charles James's Butterfly Dress modelled by his wife Nancy, photographed by Cecil Beaton 1954.

Cheney Chan

A modern designer similarly taking inspiration from the butterfly form for his couture creations is Cheney Chan. His architectural designs incorporating complex folds, pleating and  layering wowed crowds in Paris at the recent Autumn/Winter 2024 couture shows. The pictures below demonstrate Chan's talents in creating striking silhouettes reminiscent of the butterfly form like the dress of Charles James above, but with added dramatic halos of butterflies. The dress is full of movement, and the "wings" formed by the dress also remind me of the billows and folds created by performer Loie Fuller when she performed her spectacular Butterfly Dance posted here and here previously.

Robert Wun

Also partially inspired by the butterfly is young Hong Kong designer Robert Wun who cut his teeth in the industry at London College of Fashion before creating his own label in 2014. Renowned for the quality of his tailoring Wun recently presented sharp silhouettes and hats adorned with 3D butterflies giving a sense of animation to his creations.

Demna Gvasalia

For the Balenciaga 53rd couture collection designer Demna Gvasalia presented models in enlarged vibrant butterfly masks which were particularly striking and added a touch of the surreal to the clothes in the collection. Although more cerebral in his approach (apart from the masks), Gvasalia took a subtle approach to Cristóbal Balenciaga's legacy controversially presenting "street wear" as couture but incorporating Balenciaga's cocoon shapes from the archive.