We tend to forget it, but the bra as we know it today owes a great deal to... a Parisian woman. Her name: Herminie Cadolle, a visionary corsetière who set up shop on rue de la Paix at the end of the 19th century. In 1889, as theUniversal Exhibition drew the world to Paris, she presented a revolutionary invention: a two-part corset, the upper part of which held the bust in place with two cups supported by straps.
A liberation for women of the time, trapped in rigid, suffocating corsets! But Herminie was also a communard, a member of the Union des femmes pour la défense de Paris et les soins aux blessés (Women's Union for the Defense of Paris and Care of the Wounded), who joined the women of the Paris Commune in 1871, alongside Louise Michel. She decided to leave France in early 1887 and settled in Argentina, where many commnunards had emigrated. She opened a lingerie boutique in Buenos Aires, where she conceived the idea of the first modern bra.
After presenting her invention in France, she patented a corselet-gorge for her"Bien-être" model in 1898, which proved successful in line with women's emancipation. In 1910, she decided to set up a workshop and boutique at 24 rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin, then entrusted this Parisian location to her daughter-in-law Marie, founding Maison Cadolle, a family haute couture business that has been in existence for six generations, at 4 rue Cambon.
It wasn't until 1913 that Caresse Crosby helped create a more comfortable, underwire-free model, which evolved into the one we know today. So, the next time you pass a lingerie boutique in Paris, think of this Parisian pioneer who changed the daily lives of millions of women!
