‘Azzedine Alaïa - Thierry Mugler’: new Paris exhibition puts two fashion greats in conversation

With just 70 lean mannequins, one brief CNN news report and two xeroxed press releases, curator Olivier Saillard gets to the heart of something fashion has forgotten: it’s about clothes. ‘You can make images of course, but, first, you make clothes,’ he says.

His show at the Fondation Azzedine Alaïa in Paris, where he has been director since 2018, focuses on the kinship between two of the most potent talents of the 20th century: Azzedine Alaïa and Thierry Mugler. ‘It is also about this idea that you can do the same work. You are friends, you can do something together. It is fashion with four hands,’ Saillard says.

‘Azzedine Alaïa - Thierry Mugler: 1980-1990 Two Decades of Artistic Affinities’ at Fondation Azzedine Alaïa, Paris

A ‘smoking’ tuxedo jacket and pants in black barathea from Mugler’s A/W 1979 ‘Spirale futuriste’ collection opens the exhibition. The look was designed by Alaïa. It has a wide, flat shoulder and a triangular lapel that peels down the front of the body. Mugler was so pleased with the jacket he included Alaïa’s name within the show notes, a copy of which is framed and on display. Next to it, Saillard places Alaïa’s 1988 jumpsuit in black wool knit with a velvet collar; where Mugler’s design is straight, Alaïa’s is curved, what was flat, now swoops.

On 10 September 1982 Alaïa staged his first ever fashion show of body-fitting leather, jersey and chiffon clothes upon invitation by Bergdorf Goodman. Mugler travelled to New York to help translate his interviews with journalists, build the runway and set the rhythm for the show. Together, they shaped the look of the 1980s.

Mugler’s legacy is one dripping in extraterrestrial glamour but his quieter, more rigorous day clothes are rarely placed into the spotlight. From his A/W 1988 ‘Les infernales’ collection, the hem of a suit jacket in black wool peels up at the hips. Then, as if in some sort of response, hems become unfurled and cut longer in Alaïa’s black wool twill suit three years later.

Saillard says: ‘Today we are always thinking about opposites, opposing one designer over another, but I love this idea that they share something. Azzedine and Thierry were two artists who admired the same things.’

The exhibition presents a selection of different costumes, coats, eveningwear and tailoring as a guessing game – you cannot see who designed what. ‘I had the impression that Thierry had an influence on Azzedine, but I didn't know to what extent. We have a few of Azzedine’s collections before the 1970s when he worked as a much more intimate, traditional couturier and it's very far from this. Thierry gave the key to Azzedine to become a fashion designer,’ Saillard says.

Speaking to Laurence Benïam in 2020, Mugler said about Alaïa: ‘He was a trouble-maker magician, he had the eye and the technique. I was amazed by what he was doing. His extraordinary passion for couture, and his total freedom. He had the childlike aspect of an artist. Originally, he was a great academic cutter. He followed the great tradition.’

Although their tastes might have evolved as the decades went on, their work clearly shared a dialogue. Alaïa was the minimalist, perhaps more in line with Balenciaga. There is a sharpness and clarity in his line that Mugler isn’t as concerned with. Mugler’s pleats in a daytime ensemble from S/S 1988’s ‘Eté africain’ collection add volume to the body where Alaïa’s silk dress from the same season turns the pleats into something more sinuous and supine.

The purity in the staging at Fondation Azzedine Alaïa intensifies the absence of imagery. Although so much of both designer’s legacies are memorialised in photographs, Alaïa – as a label – didn’t produce its own campaigns. ‘No, no, no! He never did publicity! Fantastic photographers like Peter Lindbergh, Paulo Roversi, William Klein and even Mugler himself photographed his designs enthusiastically and made some beautiful images, but Azzedine considered these as the work of someone else – not his. And I love this attitude,’ Saillard says. ‘There is a time for doing clothes, and a time for doing images. And that’s perhaps not the same now.’

‘Azzedine Alaïa - Thierry Mugler: 1980-1990 Two Decades of Artistic Affinities’ runs until 29 June 2025 at Fondation Azzedine Alaïa, 18 Rue de la Verrerie, 75004 Paris