Cover Behind the scenes of UBS House of Craft x Dior. Photo: Marie-Laure Dutel
Behind the scenes of UBS House of Craft x Dior. Photo: Marie-Laure Dutel
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For its Singapore edition, UBS House of Craft × Dior offers a renewed encounter with the maison’s heritage. The exhibition traces Dior’s foundational line from early sketches to contemporary interpretations, shaped by curator and fashion visionary Carine Roitfeld, and photographer Brigitte Niedermair
Christian Dior famously described a dress as “a piece of ephemeral architecture, designed to enhance the proportions of the female body”, an understanding that underpins every creation that issued from his singular hand. His earliest sketches, preserved in the Dior Heritage archive, reveal a world governed by instinct and a quest for harmony, long before any fabric graced the mannequin. These beginnings, captured on paper, comprise pencil-drawn lines, carefully notated swatches and initial patterns, each one tracing the embryonic structure of an idea. They illustrate a philosophy anchored in meticulous attention and a refined set of principles that have guided the maison since its inception.
It is this spirit that animates UBS House of Craft × Dior’s Singapore edition, brought vibrantly to life through the distinct sensibilities of curator and fashion icon Carine Roitfeld and acclaimed photographer Brigitte Niedermair. Their collaborative vision reveals new facets of Dior’s legacy: through curation and image, garments become not only artefacts but living vessels of internal character and meaning.
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Above A room featuring the iconic Dior Bar Jacket opens the exhibition. Photo: Marie-Laure Dutel
A room featuring the iconic Dior Bar Jacket opens the exhibition. Photo: Marie-Laure Dutel
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At the core of the exhibition lies a space dedicated to Monsieur Christian Dior himself, where visitors are invited to engage with his original drawings, studies, and annotations that illuminate the foundational framework of the house’s rich heritage. The exhibition’s opening act centers on the Bar Jacket—an emblem of sculptural mastery and exacting tailoring. This silhouette stands as a prologue to the logic and elegance that define Dior’s visual language. From this seminal point, the exhibition gracefully traverses the creative epochs shaped by his six successors, unveiling each era through a thoughtfully curated assembly of garments, moodboards, and archival documentation that chronicles the maison’s evolving lexicon.
The collaboration between Roitfeld and Niedermair embodies this curatorial vision with profound insight. Roitfeld reflects, “Of course you know the name Christian Dior, but you don’t really know [about] his life. I never met Mr. Dior, but I now understand him better. [For example, I now understand that] his sister was so important to him,” alluding to Catherine Dior, who inspired the couturier profoundly. She also expressed the transformative experience of tracing the unique imprint of each designer’s tenure, noting, “Each of them had their own quality.”
Niedermair characterises this journey as a temporal encounter, acknowledging the challenge his successors faced: “They had to get in conversation with Christian Dior, with a person who is not alive anymore, and find an access to the heritage of what he left. It wasn’t easy for them.”
Their discourse naturally turned to Jonathan Anderson’s advent at Dior. Roitfeld observed how the exhibition reshaped her perception of his debut women’s show: “Because of this knowledge that we both have from working on the exhibition, we understood where he got the ideas for the bag, the shoes, the hat, of a high waist.” She added, “It’s one of the first times I looked at a show and understood immediately the idea behind it.”
Niedermair highlighted Anderson’s subtle yet deliberate emblematic gestures, such as a look intensified by two bows. “It’s a complete reference to an [archival] dress,” she explained, emphasizing how some originals survive only through drawings or photographs. “He pulled pieces out of the archive and [portrayed] them in a new way.”
Above Carine Roitfeld and Brigitte Niedermair. Photo: Marie-Laure Dutel
Carine Roitfeld and Brigitte Niedermair. Photo: Marie-Laure Dutel
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The Singapore edition deepens the ongoing dialogue between past and present by foregrounding archival materials that reveal Dior’s enduring connection to the region. Sketches referencing Singapore stand alongside design studies infused with Asian influences, showing why Singapore—with its vibrant creative ecosystem, reverence for heritage, and cultural stratification—serves as an especially fitting venue for the Asian premiere.
Here, UBS’s role takes on palpable significance. The House of Craft initiative embodies a conviction that mastery flourishes through rigorous study, meaningful dialogue, and open access. As Jin Yee Young, Co-Head UBS Global Wealth Management Asia Pacific and Country Head UBS Singapore, articulated, “Singapore’s intersection of heritage and innovation provides a distinctive backdrop for celebrating craftsmanship at the highest level, sparking dialogue and discovery. We are delighted to partner with Dior and Carine Roitfeld to present the expanded exhibition, paying homage to the heritage of Dior and UBS as well as showcasing the precision, dedication and artistry that define our own craft.”
The exhibition unfolds as an ongoingconversation. Dior’s origins resonate not only through his foundational sketches but also in the meticulous reinterpretations by Roitfeld, Niedermair, and the atelier, who engage with his legacy through playful props and inventive editing. A 2004 Galliano ensemble of turquoise snakeskin embroidery is whimsically transformed by a headpiece inspired by the ancient Egyptian god Anubis. Meanwhile, Richard Avedon's iconic 1955 photograph of American model Dovima in one of Saint Laurent’s earliest Dior creations, posed with circus elephants, is reimagined with subtle nuance: Niedermair miniaturises the elephant, placing it on the tip of the model’s finger, thus altering scale and narrative.
By the final gallery, the exhibition’s argument resonates with subtle clarity: Dior’s legacy transcends history, living on through those who continue to interpret it. The archive becomes a dynamic source, the atelier a space of continuity, and the photograph a medium of reflection. This Singapore edition, shaped by the converging sensibilities of curator, photographer, artisans, and institution, offers an intimate, nuanced view of couture’s evolving narrative, sustained by those who study it with care.
UBS House of Craft x Dior
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Beyond the atelier's meticulous craft, the exhibition is profoundly shaped by the longstanding collaboration between Carine Roitfeld and Brigitte Niedermair—a partnership that has matured over years and found renewed expression in this project. Their creative tempos and instincts diverge: Roitfeld's spontaneity contrasts with Niedermair's disciplined preparation, a dynamic that imbues their images with remarkable depth and nuance.
When asked what they learned from each other, Roitfeld answered without hesitation: “Passions.” She described the intensity required for certain images, recalling a shoot that demanded hours of precision. “At one time, it took hours to see the hair dancing on the model. I think the girl was almost dying of exhaustion. So was I. But [the result] was fantastic,” she said. “I’m a very spontaneous person … so to work with Brigitte is different.”
Niedermair offered a complementary view, describing the discipline of shooting with a four-by-five-inch camera. “The camera is not flexible. You stage the camera,” she explained. “You need to know what you want to get out it. You need to figure this out beforehand.” Working with Roitfeld changed her approach. “With her, I learned to think out of the box. This collaboration gave me another way to do photography. And this photography that I do with her, I do it only with her. Our way of working together is unique.”
The duo’s is that the exhibition creates space for this kind of work to be seen, understood and valued. “You’re driven by this constant experience of what you want to do,” Niedermair said. “But you need a playground to express this.”
The success of the New York edition revealed how strongly this resonated with audiences. “Honestly, I did not know it would be such a success,” Niedermair admitted. Roitfeld agreed, concluding: “I hope that the Singapore edition will be successful too.”
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Nafeesa Saini is the Features Editor at Tatler Singapore, where she shapes long-form stories on culture, business, philanthropy, wellness, and the people driving change in Asia. With a deep interest in storytelling that intersects meaningfully with identity and impact, she has profiled a diverse range of visionaries, from scientific pioneers in AI and health to creative trailblazers and literary minds.
Nafeesa’s writing includes cover stories and profiles that spotlight influential voices, alongside commentary on the trends reshaping our world.
Off the clock, Nafeesa unwinds with fiction, a good thrift hunt, and ‘brainrot’ TikTok scroll—while always keeping one eye on her next cultural getaway, usually to Indonesia.
