The last plumassier: storying dead birds, gender and Paraffection at Maison Lemarié

Abstract

Abstract:Founded in 1875, Maison Lemarié is one of the last remaining plumassiers (feather-makers) anywhere in the world. In highly concentrated and minutely detailed work the artisans at Lemarié painstakingly treat, dye, and apply fragile feathers to haute couture garments. Mindful of preserving these rarefied skills, Chanel (Global Fashion Empire) purchased the workshop in 1997 as part of "Paraffection". Paraffection, which roughly translates to "for the love of it", is a Chanel subsidiary company established to preserve and promote the heritage, craft, and manufacturing skills of highly specialised fashion ateliers. By enacting a visit to Maison Lemarié, this paper demonstrates how its heritage and skills are embodied not only in the artisans working there but also in the feathered remains used and housed in the workshop. Unravelling the stories held in human and avian bodies, we suggest, enables a series of broader geographical reflections on skill, gender and Paraffection.

Animal geographies II: Killing and caring (in times of crisis)

“…Production, circulation and consumption of fur tells of colonial expansionary capitalism and (near) extinction (Collard, 2018;Kleibert et al, 2020). Feathers, body parts and bodies preserved through taxidermy reveal the reach of human-animal relations, including in imperialism, landownership, blood-sport and fashion (Pacault and Patchett, 2016;Patchett, 2017Patchett, , 2019.…”

Geographies of Fashion and Style: Setting the Scene

“…Geographers have also challenged the expectation that the production of high-quality fashion garments, and its associated skilled competencies (Pacault and Patchett 2018), would remain in industrialized fashion centers. For example Tokatli (2008Tokatli ( , 2015 highlighted the case of fast fashion retailer Zara, which switched its sourcing of higher-quality tailoring from Spain and Portugal to Morocco, India and Turkey, to argue that the geography of skilled competencies and jobs associated with fashion was also changing to include partially industrialized countries.…”

The Biogeographies of the Blue Bird-of-Paradise: From Sexual Selection to Sex and the City

“…Today plumassiers are considered a dying breed and Benevides is one of the few people living in North America to know, and still practice, the secrets of the craft. 4 I therefore arrived at my appointment excited to have an audience with a master of the craft and to encounter my quarry -the fabled blue bird-of-paradise. Benivedes carefully unwrapped the blue bird-of-paradise from its tissue paper shroud whilst recounting the story of how he had come to acquire the bird.…”