Balenciaga, Cristóbal (krĭstō`bäl bälĕnthyä`gä), 1895–1972, Spanish-born French fashion designer. He established houses of couture in Spain (1919–31) and Paris (1937–68) and quickly became couturier to Europe's royalty and aristocracy. He was noted for his huge evening coats with dolman sleeves; long, full skirts; tunic and chemise dresses; fitted dressmaker suits; pillbox hats; perfumes; scarves; the seven-eighths coat; and for the development of the fabric gazar, a heavily sized loosely woven silk.

Bibliography

See biography by L. E. Miller (1993); memoir by M.-A. Jouve (1989, repr. 2004).

Balenciaga, Cristóbal

(born Jan. 21, 1895, Guetaria, Spain—died March 23, 1972, Valencia) Spanish-French fashion designer. He studied dressmaking as a child and was inspired to become a couturier by a visit to Paris. By age 20 he had his own firm in San Sebastián. Over the next 15 years Balenciaga became the leading couturier of Spain. In 1937, when the Spanish Civil War disrupted his business, he moved to Paris. For the next 30 years his collections featured sumptuously elegant dresses and suits. Balenciaga helped popularize the trend toward capes and flowing clothes without waistlines in the late 1950s as well as the use of plastic for rainwear in the mid 1960s. He retired in 1968.