French label Guy Laroche has raised eyebrows by celebrating prostitution in its Paris fashion week show just a day after police in the city raided a modelling agency linked to the Epstein scandal. Designer Richard Rene defended "cocking a snook" at political correctness by lionising the notorious French pimp, Fernande Grudet, known as Madame Claude, and the band of sexually "free girls" she ran during the s and s.
Detectives searched the offices of Karin Models, which was formerly owned by French tycoon Jean-Luc Brunel, who has been accused of procuring young girls for disgraced US billionaire Jeffrey Epstein. The New York financier committed suicide last month in jail while facing charges of sexually trafficking minors.
Madame Claude operated a high-class call girl agency in Paris in the s and s that counted several heads of state among its clients. She claimed to have helped the French government by passing secrets revealed under the sheets to its intelligence services. Rene told AFP that the show was a reaction to what he felt was a growing atmosphere of uptight puritanism. I find that troubling. MeToo is about sexual aggression, and people being forced.
These were people who decided to sell their bodies. It was a free choice," he added. Rene was inspired to do the show because the label's founder, Laroche, designed the clothes for the French film, "Madame Claude", based on Grudet's bestselling memoirs.
With US actress Eva Longoria of "Desperate Housewives" fame watching in the front row, Rene sent out a collection of often tight white and brown s-inspired power dresses and jackets with large shoulders, often decorated with prints of the label's logo from the time.
