Miss Dior: A Story of Courage and Couture

This book is a must read. It opens up a whole new chapter to the Dior brand. This book clearly shows what a heroine Catherine Dior was. She was a spectacular lady. It changes the way I look at Dior products even though now the brand was acquired by a different company. A great book for anyone looking to learn more about a dark chapter in the world’s history.

Fascinating and exquisitely written.

Great read, I gave it four stars instead of five because the author veered off subject to relate her own loss and I found that distracting. This book does cover as much as can be known, I think, about Catherine Dior. The research is very detailed, and illuminates a period of history that seems to be forgotten now.

Catherine Dior was a very private person which makes this book all the more remarkable because the author did a tremendous amount of research on her life, her work as a spy for the French resistance and her subsequent journey through the hell of Nazi concentration camps and its aftermath on her body and soul. I devoured this books as did my mother. We both found the mixture of haute couture, the Dior family, including Christian and most heartbreakingly, Catherine, to be a masterful and entertaining biography.

This exhaustively research biography is seriously hampered by the fact that Catherine Dior never wrote about her own life nor did she speak of it. She preferred anonymity. And she died before the author began writing this biography. But the author provides a fascinating and somewhat horrifying insight into the couture industry of Paris and how it thrived during the German occupation and the years that followed. All things considered this is a dark and somewhat depressing read. But certainly respectable and it stands as a testament to the writers diligent research and dedication. I would highly recommend this book to those who want to know what life was like in Paris during World War II.

This book is packed with thorough research, so you'll learn so much, but it's written beautifully and takes you into the emotion of human behavior. Though it was absolutely heartbreaking to read the accounts of the atrocities of WW2, it showed the power of the human spirit. I couldn't put this book down and would highly recommend it!

The story of Catherine Dior (much loved by brother Christian) is amazing: how she fought the war as a Resistant, was interned, and came out stronger than ever. Retiring to the south of France after the war to grow roses and peonies, she said “Aime la vie,” love life.” The perfume, Miss Dior was created for her and named after here.e

The book is well written however it is only tangentially about Catherine Dior. She appears at most on every fourth page, although while reading the book it felt like every 12th page. The best part of the book is parts drawn from Christian Dior's autobiography the worst is the detailed descriptions that appear throughout the book of the horrors visited on those, like Catherine, who were captured and tortured by the Nazi's. The horrific descriptions stayed with me several days later. I wanted to read about a woman who was part of the life of Christian Dior, NOT the horrors of the Nazis. I admit that perspective of how traumatized the French were by the Germans and their occupation informed the joy of Dior's "New Look," so I can see why it was included. However, there are other ways for an author to get there. The images in general could have been far better. Postage stamp size images should have been spread over more pages so they could have been larger and visible. The lengthy description of Dior's Miss Dior dress was accompanied by only a black and white image, whereas the image does appear in color in recent exhibition catalogs. I gave this book two stars because the author is a good writer. I'd really love to read a story about Catherine Dior, which this was not. She is a ghost on the pages, which admittedly may be all that the author could tease out about her from the remaining written records. Perhaps better would have been a nice long article about her.

El libro llegó en perfecto estado. Me ha impactado el relato de la vida de Catherine, muy bien situado en su contexto histórico. Aparte de la admiración profunda que despierta la vida de Catherine, nos enteramos de los entresijos de la couture de París en esas épocas. Tan pronto como empecé a leerlo no pude dejarlo.

كتاب جميل وأنيق، سأحتفظ فيه في مكتبتي.

Vacker och spännande historisk bok

Chegou em perfeito estado novo como no anuncio , entrega rapido adorei a compra

Into the life of his sister over him, refreshing read.