l'enfant terrible of french fashion

From natural to cultural to art museums, poring over meticulously placed glass-covered displays and reading the subsequent description placards are endlessly fascinating to me. Needless to say, when the de Young Museum announced "The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk," I was intrigued. Widely known as l'enfant terrible of the fashion world because of his dynamic and extremely provocative designs (as well as collaborating with Madonna for her tour costumes), Gaultier's contribution to haute couture started in the 1970s and continues to innovate, inspire, and challenge the very idea and scope of fashion as we know it.

Of course, photographs don't do proper justice. The following are some of the displays of Gaultier's one hundred and forty haute couture and prêt-à-porter designs from the 1970s to 2010, all of which are startlingly magnificent in their abstractness and specific ideas behind them. This entry is photo-heavy, but check out the intricate attention to detail, innovative use of then-unusual materials, the spectacular use of reworking gender ideas in fashion through androgyny, and the emphasis on unconventional beauty. As I walked through the exhibit on the last day, I felt a deep sense of reverence and appreciation, and it's clear to see just how pervasive and influential Gaultier's designs are in today's trends.