EIGHTEEN, ON THE chubby side, my feet compressed in high-heeled pumps a size too small (my mother always believed that small feet were a sign of class), I waited for my older sister who was taking me to the roof of the Semiramis Hotel for my first grown-up outing. The door of her room opened and she appeared dressed to kill, but this was not what took my breath away. The dress was gorgeous, no doubt about it, but it was her perfume that assailed me, as fresh and exciting as a mysterious burst of crystalline laughter heard on a clear summer night. Light and enveloping, flowery yet voluptuous and at once cheeky and clever, it was like nothing I had smelled before.

My mother’s perfume, Femme, was rather heavy and too womanly for my taste, never mind that Mum had not offered to let me use it. Instead, for this occasion, she dabbed a little lavender cologne behind my ears and on the back of my wrists, wondering aloud if it wasn’t too early for such frivolities. Inebriated by my sister’s heady scent, I realized that the smell of lavender was vulgar and decided to wash it off at the first opportunity.

“What’s the name of your perfume?” I whispered breathlessly to my sister as if just knowing the name was going to open up the world I was aspiring to live in.

“Diorissimo,” she said. “Want some?”

“Oh no, of course not,” I replied in awe, not imagining how a heavy creature like me could be associated with such a divinely delicate fragrance.

By the time my senses had been dazed by my first Dior experience, the man had been dead for several years. Unlike many other maisons de couture, however, which fold when their creators disappear, Christian Dior’s has continued to thrive by remaining rigorously faithful to his spirit.

Back in the day — the first ever Christian Dior fashion show.

Dior led a charmed childhood shared between Granville in Normandy and Paris. His parents were well off and doted over their only son. One day in 1919, at the fair in Granville, a fortune teller read his palm: “You will find yourself moneyless, but women will bring you luck and through them you will succeed and reap large profits. You will also have to cross many seas to realize your destiny.” This last prediction amused Dior’s parents: The young boy was prone to fussing and fretting whenever he had to spend a night away from home. Dior himself doubted the prophecy: He had neither interest in women nor in travel, satisfied with his career as a fashion designer at Lelong, an excellent couturier that had more interest in workmanship than in the limelight. For 10 years, Dior was perfectly content to produce the sketches that were demanded of him.

In 1946, Dior met Marcel Boussac, the most prominent cotton textile manufacturer in France. He showed him some drawings and Boussac knew he had discovered a genius. His reaction blew the designer’s mind away — Dior was to create his own Maison de Couture and have carte blanche in the launch of his first collection.

Dior promptly rented premises on the ‘Haute Couture street,’ Avenue Montaigne (no. 30), and launched his first collection on February 12, 1947. On that day, he was an unknown 41-year-old rookie in the most competitive field in the world. On February 13, he was famous: His new collection, called the “New Look,” had bulldozed the world of fashion.

His initial success was not enough. He kept producing one stupendous collection after the other, sometimes more than one a year. In 1955, he launched his first Dior lipstick, a smashing success whose popularity seemed to increase with time. In 1965, a Christian Dior perfume factory was opened and in 1969, for the first time a maison de couture was offering a complete line of make-up baptized explosion de couleur.

French women were mesmerized by the allure of Dior’s models: His models had even been transformed. They were pushing their hips forward, throwing back their shoulders or hunching them coyly, tightening their buttocks, emphasizing their breasts and hiding their legs underneath huge expanses of stunningly colorful material. France was just recovering from the war and from the sight of uniforms and military women with the demeanor of boxing champions. Schiaparelli, the most important couturier of the period, had a ball with surrealism, designing evening dresses in the shape of a lobster and hats resembling a veal cutlet. Anything was acceptable if it used as little fabric as possible in these times of restriction.

And here was Christian Dior deploying 80-some meters of brilliant white taffeta flowing down to the model’s ankles. The women screamed, complained that their legs, their best asset, would no longer be on display, and then promptly went all out, ready to kill just to own one of these fabulous dresses (or at least a copy). Not a single Parisian woman would have been seen dead showing flesh above the ankle after that fateful February 12.

For the next 10 years Dior was able to dress women in anything he cared to dream up. Women choked at the first sight of the season’s fashion, trembled at the thought of looking like a fruit, a vegetable, a fan or a tree — and hurried to their dressmakers to have the models copied. They shrank or increased their busts, tightened their belts to the point of bursting or else minced downtown in shapeless shifts. It did not matter as long as they followed Monsieur Dior.

America loved his dresses and movie stars could not imagine life without at least a couple of his creations in their wardrobes. Here in Egypt, for women living in a country that had not suffered from the privations of the war and whose strong currency allowed the elite to keep itself at the very tip of French fashion, 80 meters of pure silk was no problem.

Egypt was so in tune with French fashion at the time that when socialite Salha Aflatoun found herself in financial trouble due to family circumstances, her first thought was to turn to French fashion for a solution. With her two small daughters in tow, she went to Paris where as Madame Monique, she was hired in a Maison de Couture not far from the address that was going to be made famous a couple of years later by Dior. On her return, she met Egyptian cotton tycoon Talaat Harb who offered to finance her.

Not only was Egypt already on the circuit of the great couturiers who displayed their collections around the world — it was a favorite destination. Aflatoun soon had her own faithful clientele who swore that the quality of her workmanship was equal, if not superior to French haute couture with the added advantage of having their more oriental tastes and shapes catered for.

When Dior suddenly died in 1957, Egyptians were still reeling from the events of 1956, and France’s regrettable participation, to notice. The French left Egypt en masse taking with them their culture, their fashion, and the frivolities to which certain Egyptian women were addicted. And no one was allowed to travel to France to reconnect with old loves. So while the death of the king of French fashion hit the rest of the world like a bomb, it barely elicited a whimper here.

In France, the sudden absence of Dior could have left a serious void in the world of haute couture. This, however, did not happen. The challenge of keeping the Dior spirit alive was taken on by Yves St. Laurent, then Marc Bohan followed by Gianfranco Ferré and finally John Galliano.

With its beautiful grounds, Dior’s childhood house in Normandy has been transformed into a fashion museum, the only one in France dedicated to a couturier to have been consecrated by the Ministry of Culture. Last May marked the sixtieth anniversary of the opening of Maison Dior at 30 Avenue Montaigne, which was celebrated with the exhibition Dior: 60 années hautes en couleurs (60 Colorful Years). The exhibit, running until September 23, recalls the Dior collections since 1947 that underlined the evolution of fashion and revolves around his use of colors.

“Colors are marvelous,” wrote Dior in 1954 in the Petit Dictionnaire de la mode. “They add to women’s attraction but they have to be used with caution.”

This is exactly what this year’s Autumn-Winter collection is illustrating.

A select Cairene audience viewed the Christian Dior Ready-to-Wear 2007–2008 Autumn-Winter collection last month thanks to the combined efforts of Brigitte Lefebvre, Dior’s representative to the Middle East, the Right to Live Association for the Intellectually Disabled and the management of the Ramses Hilton. Artistic Director John Galliano, who in his own right is celebrating 10 successful years with the House, took advantage of the occasion to introduce his “New New Look,” strikingly associating the Dior signature suit and the perfection of Japanese Origami.

Galliano’s decision to come to Cairo was only natural. His last visit inspired his acclaimed 2004 spring collection, the idea for which came to him while floating half-a-mile high above the Valley of the Kings, Cairo, Aswan and Luxor in a hot-air balloon. The Ancient Egypt-themed collection raised many an eyebrow, with its daring Pharaonic designs in metallic fabrics and lavish gold embroidery.

The daring designer’s New New Look featured models that actually looked like women with normal body parts, a welcome change from the stick figures slinking down the catwalks in previous years. The suits and dresses, beautifully tailored and adorned with fur, sequins and embroidery are made to fit any woman with a good enough body.

For the day, the fabrics are sturdy herringbone, hounds tooth and tweed, delicate cashmere and fine wool. Those who have no moral objections to wearing fur can rejoice in the renewed appearance of fox, chinchilla, mink and astrakhan. Similarly, exotic leathers such as crocodile, python and ostrich have pride of place.

Evening wear consisted of gorgeous long and short gowns made of satin, silk, chiffon, taffeta and tulle hand embroidered and richly enhanced with stones and pleats, huge bows and origami details. Dramatic plumed hats, bold jewelry, platform shoes and plissé bags completed the look. Dior’s favorite colors — lilac, pink, black, gray, white and red — were as present as ever. One striking dress in bright yellow and another in deep green mark a departure from the Dior color palette but not the design, which is totally in tune with the Dior spirit. Four bold and absolutely breathtaking haute couture evening dresses were included in the collection, a testament to Galliano’s creative genius et