N°36 : The Wittamer-De Camps and fashion

Through their boutiques ‘Valens’ and ‘Jane d’Anjou’, Louis Wittamer and Berthe De Camps brought out designs that had been purchased, reproduced or adapted from Parisian haute couture houses. This was a widespread way of working in Belgium from the 1950s onwards, but Valens and Jane d’Anjou stood out for the originality of their creations, especially wedding dresses and ball gowns for débutantes.

To mark the new Studio exhibition, The Wittamer-De Camps and fashion, its curators, Nicolas Lor and Mathilde Semal, give us an insight into the research they carried out to document the collection pieces. The speakers retrace their quest – taking in Brussels and Paris, patterns and design registrations, clients’ recollections and archives – to tell us the story of a fashion house.

By Mathilde Semal, curator of historical collections at the Fashion & Lace Museum, & Nicolas Lor, curator of the exhibition Diane von Furstenberg, Woman Before Fashion, and of contemporary collections at the Fashion & Lace Museum