One can enjoy a little Paris, everyday, simply by dabbing a little French perfume on your neck, wrists, and décolletage. In fact, it is one of my 25 suggestions in an earlier post, Finding Your Frenchness. Have a signature perfume. If one signature scent is not enough for you, have one for daytime and one for evening, or one for spring/summer and one for fall/winter.
Miss Dior was my signature perfume in high school that I loved to wear. I loved the fresh floral scent, yet never knew all of the fascinating history behind this fragrance. Rekindling my love for this fragrance came from two recent events. The first, was watching the Apple TV+ series, The New Look (2024), which tells the story of Christian Dior’s couture journey during Nazi Paris, opening his own couture house, and his famous debut of “The New Look” his ultra-feminine collection for women in 1947 that gave hope, beauty, and spirit once again to the world. The second, was reading the book, Miss Dior (2021) by Justine Picardie, specifically about Christian Dior’s younger sister, Catherine.
Catherine Dior’s story is fascinating. Christian and Catherine Dior were always very close. Catherine Dior was Christian Dior’s muse, and whom the fragrance, Miss Dior, is named after. She was the only member of their family to be at his couture house the day his “The New Look” collection was presented to Paris and the world. The fragrance of Miss Dior had been created, but not released yet on the market. His couture house was filled with a preview of Miss Dior fragrance scent wafting in the air that momentous day.
Christian Dior’s inspiration for his fragrance, “Miss Dior” was remembering his mother’s garden full of roses and exactly how it smelled. Lily of the Valley scent is prominent in the fragrance too, as he thought of it as his “good luck” flower. Each of his designs had a small Lily of the Valley discreetly sewn into the garment.
Christian Dior and his couture designs became world famous virtually overnight. At one point in his career, he was responsible for 50% of France’s exports. Catherine Dior’s life was humble, courageous, and always tied to flowers. She joined the French Resistance during World War II, was captured by the Nazi’s, tortured, and survived years in a concentration camp. She was honored and recognized by France for her service and bravery. After the war ended, and after she had time to heal physically, socially, and spiritually, for a few years she had a cut flower business in Paris. Preferring to be a rose cultivator, she moved to South France near Grasse, Provence, and lived in the rustic family home she inherited from her father, where he had lived later in his life. She helped Christian Dior cultivate the specific roses he needed for his fragrance. She still tended her beloved roses, close to age 90, and up until shortly before her death.
Christian Dior had an untimely death of heart failure in Italy at age 52. He left everything to Catherine Dior. Although Christian Dior was very successful, he employed 1,000 people at that time and was one million “1957” dollars in debt. He had bought a lovely huge estate in Provence he was renovating, as well as a new apartment in the Paris 16th arrondissement. Catherine Dior took on the task of selling the properties to pay off his debts, ensure his name and business would endure, and started the first Christian Dior museum in Normandy on the property where the entire Dior family had once lived and prospered before their father went bankrupt and fell onto hard times.
There is a Christian Dior museum in Paris called La Galerie Dior, at 11 Rue François 1er, Paris France. It is part history, and part testament, to Christian Dior and his six successors, and their visionary Parisian haute couture. It is closed on Tuesdays, and you must get tickets in advance. It is on my list for next time I am in Paris.
With all of the incredible history behind the Miss Dior fragrance, it makes it so much more special wearing it. I love knowing that it is so garden-oriented, so rose-oriented, and really so love-oriented.
