PatternVault

For Mother’s Day, this post is dedicated to Christa Fiedler-Marant, the high-fashion model, talent agent, and mother of designer Isabel Marant.

Born in Munich, Christa Fiedler was a prominent model of the 1960s who went on to co-found a Paris modelling agency, Models International, with fellow model Simone D’Aillencourt. She married Claude Marant, a French advertising executive. The Paris Match photo below was taken one week before she gave birth to their daughter, Isabelle. Decades later, mother and daughter collaborated on a knitwear line before the launch of the Isabel Marant label.

Christa Fiedler can be seen on a handful of Vogue designer patterns and catalogues from the mid-1960s. If you were out pattern shopping, you might have browsed these Vogue Patterns catalogues with Fiedler on the cover.

Here she models Vogue Paris Originals from Heim and Laroche:

This Balmain suit pattern is in the collections of CoPA and FIT:

Fiedler travelled to Madrid to pose in two Elio Berhanyer ensembles, including this rare pattern for an evening dress and coat:

Isabel Marant doesn’t seem to have done any pattern licensing, but recently, Vogue Patterns released a blouse design after Isabel Marant Resort 2020:

Happy Mother’s Day, everyone.

(For more photos see Sophia on Flickr and the Helmut Newton Foundation on Instagram.)