From: Sokar949@msn.com   
      
   JOHN GALLIANO is one of the most influential fashion designers of our time.   
   Born in Gibraltar, he grew up in London and launched his own label before   
   becoming chief designer of France's haute couture flagship, Christian Dior,   
   in Paris.   
      
   John Galliano has created the most spectacular fashion shows of our time.   
   Since his 1984 degree collection, Les Incroyables, which metamorphosed his   
   London art school into a French Revolutionary street scene, he has   
   transported his privileged audiences to more exotic and sartorially blessed   
   places than they could possibly have imagined or experienced.   
      
   Whether he chooses to transform the Opéra Garnier in Paris into a party   
   thrown by the Venetian socialite, Marchesa Luisa Casati, or the none-too   
   salubrious platforms of Gare d'Austerlitz into a Moroccan souk - complete   
   with guest appearance from a couture-clad Princess Pocohontas - Galliano   
   never fails to convince. This despite the fact that his references come from   
   a dizzying array of rarely connected times, people and places. But then,   
   John Galliano's life has been rather richer than most - more often than not,   
   the vivid colour in his shows have been experienced at source first hand.   
      
   He was born in Juan Carlos in 1960 in Gibraltar, his father's homeland. His   
   mother is Spanish and he first went to school in Spain, reaching it via   
   Tangiers. "I think all that - the souks, the markets, woven fabrics, the   
   carpets, the smells, the herbs, the Mediterranean colour, is where my love   
   of textiles comes from," Galliano has said. In 1966, the family moved to   
   Streatham in South London, where John's father worked as a plumber. They   
   then moved to Dulwich, which remains the family home to this day. Galliano   
   attended Wilson's Grammar School for Boys where his academic performance   
   was, by all accounts, unremarkable. The same cannot be said of his   
   appearance. The young John and his sisters, Rosemary and Immacula, were   
   always dressed in immaculately pressed and starched clothes, even for trips   
   to the corner shop.   
      
   "I don't think people here understood where I was coming from," he said of   
   his early days in South London. "And I certainly didn't understand where   
   they were coming from. It was quite a shock coming from that sort of family,   
   that sort of colour. My mother brought it with her on the plane. You know,   
   the religious aspect and all that was still with us when we were at home."   
   It wasn't until the 16 year-old Galliano moved to City and East London   
   College to study design, that he discovered the arts and people "a bit more   
   like me". From there, he went on to Central Saint Martins art school and a   
   star was born. "I worked very hard. I was always in the library - sketching   
   endlessly."   
      
   The inspiration for his first collection came from Danton, a National   
   Theatre production on which he worked part-time as a dresser. There were   
   jackets worn upside down and inside out - this was the early 1980s,   
   deconstruction wasn't yet part of the fashion vernacular - and romantic   
   organdie shirts, accessorised with everything from magnifying glasses,   
   smashed and worn as jewellery to rainbow-coloured ribbons sewn onto the   
   insides of coats. "I was just so into that collection. It completely   
   overtook me. I still love it. I love the romance, you know, charging through   
   cobbled streets in all that amazing organdie. There are a lot of things in   
   that collection that still haunt me."   
      
   Fashion retailer Joan Burstein was so impressed that she immediately gave   
   the window of Browns, her London store, to the fledgling designer. The   
   clothes flew off the rails. Despite the universal acclaim - even   
   hysteria -in the next decade, not one, but two backers pulled out on   
   Galliano. For several seasons, he couldn't afford to show. In the early   
   1990s, disillusioned by the difficulties of running a fashion business in   
   Britain, he moved to Paris. There, Anna Wintour, powerful editor-in-chief of   
   American Vogue, took him under her wing and used her influence to secure him   
   a backer (PaineWebber International) and a venue (São Schlumberger's chicly   
   crumbling mansion).   
      
   The invitation was a rusty key. The supermodels of the day - Kate Moss,   
   Christy Turlington and Naomi Campbell - modelled for friendship rather than   
   their customary five-figure fees. There were only 17 outfits put together at   
   the last minute - all in black. (A few bolts of black fabric was all   
   Galliano could afford.) But what outfits. The show was a monumental   
   success - John Galliano had sealed his reputation as one of the great   
   designers of his time.   
      
   One man who clearly understood Galliano's genius was Bernard Arnault,   
   chairman of the luxury conglomerate LVMH. By the mid-1990s, Galliano had   
   reinvented the 1930s-line bias-cut dress and made it modern, as well as   
   creating narrow, very feminine tailoring which was the envy of those less   
   gifted. Yet it was still brave of Arnault to decide, in October 1995, to   
   install John Galliano as chief designer of Givenchy. To the French fashion   
   establishment, he seemed like a young upstart. The media was apoplectic and   
   Givenchy hit the headlines. "I really couldn't tell anyone about it,"   
   recalls Galliano. "Not even my mum and dad. If I told one person, that was   
   it."   
      
   It wasn't long before more rumours surfaced. Fellow British designer,   
   Alexander McQueen, was to take over at Givenchy, leaving Galliano to move to   
   the much larger and wealthier house - also controlled by Arnault - Christian   
   Dior. Today, John Galliano designs a dozen collections a year. Dior's   
   flagship boutique in Paris is a veritable superstore where customers queue   
   for everything from couture wedding dresses to shoes, and fragrances:   
   ever-anxious to buy into the image of the house that Galliano has   
   re-created.   
      
   This is not surprising because John Galliano is fashion's great romantic.   
   From his fantastical clothes, to his colourful background, Galliano's   
   charmed rise to fame reads not unlike a fairy tale. His genius is his   
   ability to communicate this through his clothes. He also has immense   
   ambition. Behind his gentle aesthetic, John Galliano is a powerhouse, a man   
   whose ambition to go down in history as one of fashion's great is awesome,   
   even intimidating. His long-time creative collaborator Amanda Harlech once   
   described disagreeing with him thus: "I did only once and I can only compare   
   it to being hit by a massive surfing wave. His indifference was absolute."   
      
   © Design Museum   
      
   BIOGRAPHY   
      
   1960 Juan Carlos Antonio Galliano is born in Gibraltar.   
      
   1966 The family move to London: living in Streatham, then Dulwich. Attends   
   Wilson's Grammar School for Boys, then City and East London College.   
      
   1981 Enrols at St Martins School of Art to study fashion design. Discovers   
   the Soho club scene. Works as a dresser at the National Theatre and as an   
   assistant to the tailor Tommy Nutter.   
      
   1984 Graduates from St Martins with a first class degree. His degree show -   
      
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