Long Live the Fantasy: Remembering Manfred Thierry Mugler
It has been a little over a month since the passing of legendary designer Manfred Thierry Mugler, but his legacy and impact on the world of fashion are far from fading.
Better known by the name of Thierry Mugler, this artist was born in 1948 in Strasbourg, France. With a passion for creativity that he honed from a young age, Mugler began his career in the world of fashion in 1973 with the creation of his label and the launch of his first collection: “Café de Paris.”
It is with this series of outfits that Mugler earns his label as a “man of the future,” due to his combinations of popular silhouettes of the time, wide shoulders and cinched waists with youthful and futuristic twists, and a use of materials like latex and sequins accompanied by flared hips. People were awestruck by these designs, and throughout the 1980s, Mugler was able to build his empire.
The world became obsessed with his ready-to-wear fashions and was blown away again when he began designing haute couture for runway in 1992.
Mugler’s success as a designer lined up perfectly with the supermodel era, and everyone from Linda Evangelista to Naomi Campbell dawned his designs. Mugler was indiscriminate with who could wear his pieces – something very uncharacteristic of the strict model expectations that even continue today.
Hero magazine sums up the typical cast of a Mugler runway show, writing “... the cream of the supermodel crop walked alongside porn stars, drag artists and a brilliantly diverse cast of charismatic women plucked from outside of the industry.”
The House of Mugler pushed the fashion envelope in the way that it turned the ordinary extraordinary. It reimagined typically oppressive and constrictive styles of the past, like corsets, and turned them into elements that had the ability to empower and inspire. His works of art transformed the wearer and allowed them to shine in an otherworldly light.
In 2003, Thierry Mugler retired from fashion and re-emerged as Manfred Thierry Mugler to continue a career in directing and the occasional costume creation. He had great success in directing George Michael’s “Too Funky” music video in 1992 and went on to direct and design for Beyonce’s “I Am…” tour in 2009. One might know him most recently from his “wet” dress design worn by Kim Kardashian to the Met Gala in 2019 for the “camp” theme.
Aside from fashion, Mugler’s legacy continues to live on through his successful line of fragrances. SDSU student Janessa Acuña got a firsthand experience of working with Mugler in this realm when she was given his newest fragrance “Alien Goddess” and held a photoshoot for the product.
“The prompt for the photos was to show what makes me feel like an “alien goddess,” feeling confident and my own divine self,” she said. “I had the creative freedom to express empowerment and the extraordinary through those photos. It was a fun experience.”
When asked about the legacy of Mugler’s fashion designs and how they impact younger generations of artists, Acuña offered some great insight as well.
“Younger artists that are obsessed with the idea of being superhuman and fascinated by the extraordinary truly indulge in his fashion designs,” she said. “Think of superstar fashion and you should think of Mugler.”
Thierry Mugler is most simply described as a visionary. His designs have paved the way for generations to come as they push boundaries on self-expression with their manipulation of fantasy and science-fiction elements. Long live the fantasy and here are a few words from the innovative designer himself.
Isabella Perez — February 27th, 2022
