With a neckline named after her (an off-the-shoulder swoop that exposes the wearer’s clavicles), iconic bikini power moments, mini-skirted flare, and that messy, yet sexy updo, Brigitte Bardot would have surely been comfortable in any of the latex couture she might have found in our catalogue. The ultimate ‘sex kitten,’ who died at the age of 91 two days ago, was a symbol of free-flowing pouting sexuality in an age that was surely aching for her.
Born Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot in Paris in September 1934, Bardot began her modeling career, appearing on the cover of Elle Magazine in 1950, at the age of 15. Although invited to audition for director Marc Allégret’s film Les Lauriers sont coupés, which she did not get, she met Roger Vadim at that audition. She would marry Vadim in 1952 and four years later star in his, And God Created Woman. Although the film died in France when it opened, a year later it premiered in the US, and Bardot became an international star.
Her performance in that film gave rise to the term “sex kitten.”
The world would go on to catch the young blonde running across a Saint Tropez beach barefoot, sporting mini dresses, as she does swimmingly in the film Two Weeks in September, or a navy marinière, and a thick hair band in Jean-Luc Godard’s Contempt. Very soon, the young woman came to epitomize what has now become known as French chic.
It was that beach style Bardot was surely known for early on, wearing a bikini specifically on the beach during the Cannes Film Festival. But she became just as synonymous (and comfortable) in what came to be called the “French girl style”—pleated skirts, cropped trousers, ballet flats, and scarves.
Certainly earning some controversy between 1997 and 2008, Bardot was convicted and fined on five occasions for inciting racial hatred. Ironically, she had left the international sex symbol scene decades before to devote her life to animal welfare.
There is no denying Brigitte Bardot’s iconic status and her influence on fashion, movies, and culture. We wish her a fond farewell.
