Cutters, showmen and the quiet technicians other designers quietly copy. Ranking them is how fashion arguments start.
1Coco ChanelFreed women from the corset with jersey, trousers and the little black dress, and built a house on it.1000pts
2Gianni VersaceColour, print and unapologetic sex, plus the supermodel era he largely cast.617pts
3Elsa SchiaparelliSurrealism in clothing — the lobster dress, shocking pink — and Chanel's original rival.587pts
4Christian DiorHis 1947 New Look reset the post-war silhouette in a single afternoon.573pts
5Alexander McQueenSavile Row tailoring welded to shows that behaved like theatre and sometimes like horror.524pts
6Miuccia PradaTurned nylon and deliberate ugliness into the most intellectual label in Milan.524pts
7Yves Saint LaurentPut women in the tuxedo, the safari jacket and ready-to-wear that mattered.469pts
8Karl LagerfeldRan Chanel, Fendi and his own label at once for three decades without pausing.469pts
9Hubert de GivenchyDressed Audrey Hepburn for two decades and made restraint look like a manifesto.469pts
10Cristóbal BalenciagaThe cutter other designers called the master; the barrel line and the cocoon coat are his.469pts
11Paul PoiretThe pre-war Parisian who abolished the corset years before anyone thanked him for it.407pts
12Giorgio ArmaniDeconstructed the jacket and dressed a generation of Hollywood in soft power.407pts
13Vivienne WestwoodTook punk from a King's Road shop to the couture calendar without softening it.407pts
14Ralph LaurenSold an entire American story — prep, western, Ivy — as a global wardrobe.335pts
15Tom FordRebuilt Gucci from near-bankruptcy in the nineties, then did it again on his own name.335pts
16Rei KawakuboComme des Garçons made clothes that argue with the body rather than flatter it.253pts
17Donatella VersaceHeld the house together after 1997 and kept it culturally loud for another quarter-century.253pts
18Issey MiyakeEngineered pleats into a permanent material and made technology wearable.156pts
19Virgil AblohOff-White and Louis Vuitton menswear, and the clearest bridge streetwear ever built to couture.0pts
Comments 1
Coco Chanel called the New Look upholstery; Dior never answered her in public. Both founders here, and twelve more lists where the houses meet: https://youpick.best/articles/chanel-vs-dior-ranked
YP
ypb-teamSep 14
