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Enterprise and talent
was established: casts, feathers, drawings, sequins, and obviously paper patterns. A true gold mine. Eloïse Gilles and Raphaëlle de Panafieu bought the company. It was 2010: Sleeping Beauty was waking up. But at first they had to cope with the harshest proof: technique. Raphaëlle had studied Political Science, Eloïse ESSEC (the renowned Business School in Paris). Thus they were designers, not artisans: it was necessary to learn and understand how a fan works, dissecting and analysing it. But by luck they could count on the fundamental help of Maison Duvelleroy’s heir. “We made our first paper patterns drawing inspiration from the drawings reproduced in the Encyclopédie Universelle, for the ‘éventailliste’ headword,” so Raphaëlle. “Thus we understood all the geometry in a fan.” Then it was necessary to learn the craftsmen’s lexicon, get acquainted with their language and find good workers. Eloïse and Raphaëlle are now fully legitimized: some ten artisans (sculptors, engravers, embroiderers, fabric ennoblers, specialists in pleating…) work to manufacture the “haute-façon” fans by Duvelleroy. The acknowledgments are many: in 2012 the small enterprise got the “Entreprise du patrimoine vivant” acknowledgment from the French government, as well as the “Talents du Luxe” award acknowledged by Centre du Luxe et de la Création in Paris. For the legendary “Moulin
Rouge” they designed fans using the same feathers of red ostriches worn by the dancers on the stage. And the revival of the fan is going on. As a matter of fact, artisan skills and know-how aren’t missing now. What’s really missing is the usage of the fan. “Now women’s hands are never free. They hold mobiles and cigarettes, bags… A free gesture has turned into a luxury: it’s the case of using fan.” Thus what they offer is pure luxury: mother-of-pearl with pheasant feathers, horn and ostrich feathers… Duvelleroy proposes two collections every year. Amongst the latest models is “Brush”: a sheet of hand-painted silk organdie with gold and silver leaf, as well as ebony mounting. And for themselves? Raphaëlle has a 112-year-old fan in her bag: a mother-of-pearl and sequins specimen she bought at an auction in Drout just before purchasing the maison. “It was really expensive, but I carry it always with me: in summer and in winter.” Since these ladies are also modern women, as well as marketing experts, they got fans to enter Colette, style temple in Paris. Their ingenious idea: a co-operation with designers to create simple paper fans, each conveying a message, like “Air Conditioning” by Jean-Charles de Castelbajac, afterwards always present in the front rows during fashion shows in Paris. Pure artisan luxury for a timeless object.
REFINED MANUAL SKILLS Below, Duvelleroy workers make all the complex procedures to create a fan by hand. Above, the Mask model. On the previous pages, the fan of red feathers created for the Moulin Rouge.
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