Native to the cool temperatures of the Northern Hemisphere, the bell-shaped, porcelain petals of the lily-of-the-valley have become an emblem of the House of Dior. Known as muguet in French, the flower has been accredited as a symbol of good luck since the sixteenth century. As a man who was highly superstitious, Christian Dior frequently tucked a handful of sprigs into the lapel of his suits. The lily-of-the-valley also held sentimental value to Dior, as it was among the perennials he and his mother would grow in the garden of his childhood home at Les Rhumbs, Normandy. This period of his life had a great impact on Dior and once he founded his own fashion house in 1946, would greatly influence the aesthetic of his designs. In his autobiography of 1959 Christian Dior et moi, the designer is quoted, ‘I would even say that my life and my style owe almost everything to its site and architecture’.
The lily-of-the-valley perfectly embodied the ‘New Look’ of his Corolle collection which was presented in Paris in 1947, shortly after the brand’s launch. Dior used the romantic, feminine nature of the flower to cast away the austere, boxy forms which were prominent in fashion during World War Two. A symbol of happiness, the flower was perfect in capturing the mood of the post-war period, as Corolle was described to be ‘Youth, hope, and the future’. The collection was inspired by the Victorian and Edwardian eras and focused primarily on an hourglass silhouette, much like the curved petals of the lily-of-the-valley. An emphasis was placed on rounded shoulders and a cinched waist above a full, bell-shaped skirt. In preparation for the show, Dior also fastened the flora to the hems of each couture gown as a good luck token. Subsequently, the collection proved a grand success, gaining Dior the acclaim the House still holds today.
With a sweet and delicate scent, the lily-of-the-valley evokes the cool freshness of the woodlands in which in grows. Dior was enchanted by this unique fragrance, prompting him to create his first fragrance Miss Dior in 1947 as he said, ‘For a perfume to have lasting hold, it needs to first hold the heart of its creator’. Diorissimo, which was later released in 1956, towards the end of his life, would become one of the brand’s most iconic fragrances, blending lily-of-the-valley with jasmine and ylang-ylang. The perfume was sprayed liberally around his salons before a show and was further mixed with scent of the fresh lily-of-the-valley bouquets decorating the room.
Today, House Dior continues to bear the emblem of its founder in a number of designs. Victoire de Castellane, recreated the lily-of-the-valley into a necklace for her first Dior High Jewellery collection of 1999, while more recently, Raf Simons paid homage to the floral tradition in his Dior Homme Fall collection of 2014 by printing lily-of-the-valley onto suits and gathering bunches into jacket pockets.
