Leonor Scherrer, designer, heiress (the youngest daughter of couturier Jean-Louis Scherrer), and model – and I mean that in the nicest way – thinks mourning is tacky. Well, at least the way it’s done today. She grew up visiting her father’s Avenue Montaigne boutique and admires the codes and character of traditional Parisian grieving. But widows weeds went the way of the ice box and the English empire. Something about black netting, jet necklaces, and wearing curls swiped from corpses just didn’t seem to find it’s place in the space age, and the archetype was ruthlessly recycled down to its current variant: the Dolce & Gabbana Sicilian merry widow, all underwire and overripe anatomy. Scherrer would like to pack all of that into a glass coffin and send it off to the catacombs. Her mission is anything but commercial, motivated, as she’s said repeatedly in interviews (notably in last November’s French Vogue), by the lack of decency, taste, and thought that attends mourning today. She’s also producing funeral music and a perfume, Maximilia (named after the Polish cleric who chose to be murdered at Auschwitz to spare another prisoner). Scherrer is still looking for an investor for these projects (if you know anyone), but her unique universe has already caught the attention of Riccardo Tisci at Givenchy, whose been featuring her as muse in recent campaigns (that’s her lying on the bed):
www.leonorfuneralcouture.com/
