This book is not just a history of fashion. Its ambition is to be the story of the creation, the evolution, and the implosion of the fashion related professions. Didier Grumbach walks you down the runways of fashion history and unfolds the secrets of the industry with stories by participants from the 1920s to the present. With informative, entertaining text and stunning photography, he offers us an illustrated history of fashion like no other - a saga, a family business, with noble fathers, prodigal sons, enthusiasms, passions, hatreds, strokes of genius and, of course, failures. From haute couture to the boom in ready-to-wear, and accounts by the designers who characterize the industry, we witness the evolution in techniques, the shifting trends, how an art matures and a culture changes. A must for fashion lovers, professionals, and students, this book will also enlighten the curious reader who wishes to go behind the scenes of this most seductive of performance arts.In 1966 Grumbach co-founded Saint-Laurent Rive Gauche, with Yves Saint-Laurent and Pierre Bergé. Grumbach would then go on to help establish Givenchy, working on the Givenchy Nouvelle Boutique with Hubert de Givenchy for five years, between 1968 and 1973. During this time he founded Créateurs & Industriels, a company intended to promote relationships between production companies and designers.Créateurs & Industriels would go on to play a key role in developing the careers of Jean-Paul Gaultier, Issey Miyake, Jean Charles de Castelbajac and Thierry Mulger. Grumbach would found and become chairman of Mugler, where he remained until his appointment as chairman of Yves Saint Laurent.