Jean-Paul Gaultier (born 24 April 1952 in Arcueil, Val-de-Marne, France) is a French haute couture fashion designer and previous host of television series Eurotrash.

Life and career

Gaultier never received formal training as a designer. Instead, he started sending sketches to famous couture stylists at an early age. Pierre Cardin was impressed by his talent and hired him as an assistant in 1970. Afterwards, he worked with Jacques Esterel in 1971 and Jean Patou later that year, then returning to manage the Pierre Cardin boutique in Manila for a year in 1974.

His first individual collection was released in 1976 and his characteristic irreverent style dates from 1981, and he has long been known as the enfant terrible (bad boy) of French fashion. Many of Gaultier's following collections have been based on street wear, focusing on popular culture, whereas others, particularly his Haute Couture collections, are very formal yet at the same time unusual and playful. Jean-Paul Gaultier produced sculptured costumes for Madonna during the nineties with her infamous cone-bra for her Blond Ambition Tour and designed the wardrobe for her Confessions Tour in 2006, as well. Gaultier has also worked in close collaboration with Wolford Hosiery. He promoted the use of skirts, especially kilts on men's wardrobe, and the release of designer collections.
Gaultier caused shock by using unconventional models for his exhibitions, like older men and full-figured women, pierced and heavily tattooed models, and by playing with traditional gender roles in the shows. This earned him both criticism and enormous popularity.

At the end of the 1980s, Gaultier suffered some personal losses, including his lover and business partner Francis Menuge, who died of AIDS-related causes.
Gaultier designed the wardrobe of many motion pictures, including Luc Besson's The Fifth Element, Pedro Almodóvar's Kika, Peter Greenaway's The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover, and Jean-Pierre Jeunet's La Cité des enfants perdus (The City of Lost Children). He currently designs for three collections: his own couture and ready-to-wear lines, as well as the newly relaunched clothing line for Hermès, a French leather goods company well-known for their equestrian background, scarves, and expensive and difficult to obtain handbags.

Gaultier has designed a number of the costumes and outfits worn by rocker Marilyn Manson, including the outfits for Manson's Golden Age of Grotesque album. In France the costumes he designed for singer Mylène Farmer gained much attention. In spring 2008 he signed a contract to be again the fashion designer for her tour in 2009.

He's also well-known for his exhibit in New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art known as Bravehearts — Men in Skirts.
Has designed the costumes for Kylie Minogue's international KYLIEX2008 tour. The late iconic Hong Kong singer Leslie Cheung hired Gaultier to design eight different costumes for his last concert tour before his death.

Collections and labels

Besides his ready-to-wear collection, in 1988 Gaultier expanded his brand to include the label Junior Gaultier, a lower-priced line designed for the youth market with a heavy nautical influence that he began to carry throughout all of his collections. This was replaced in 1994 with JPG by Gaultier, a unisex collection that followed the designer's idea of fluidity of the sexes. Gaultier Jean's, a similar line comprised mainly of denim and more simply styled garments with a heavy street influence, followed in 1992, which was then replaced with Jean's Paul Gaultier in 2004.
What brought Gaultier immense success was the advent of his haute couture line in 1997. Through this collection, he was able to freely express the perversity of his aesthetic, from inspiration ranging from imperial India to Hasidic Judaism. As a result of this success, Hermès hired Gaultier as creative director in 2003.

Jean-Paul Gaultier's wit and attitude would be lost were it not for his technical skill and sophistocation, shown by the success of his couture label. His looks are strong and may appear lecherous, while always remaining respectful to women's body and sexuality. As the '90s wore on and tastes began to change, his ready-to-wear followed suit, and today he is known by large as having mastered the looks of chiffon gowns, trench coats and pant suits.

Gaultier's Spring 2009 couture was influenced by the visual style of singer Klaus Nomi and he used Nomi's recording of Cold Song in his runway show.

Perfumes

In addition to being a fashion designer, Jean-Paul Gaultier is known for a popular line of perfumes. His first fragrance, Classique, a women's floral-oriental, was introduced in 1993, followed by Le Mâle for men two years later. Both were highly successful, and Le Mâle is now the number-one men's fragrance in the European Union based on sales; it also holds a strong market position in Australia and the United States. His third fragrance, the women's fragrance Fragile, was introduced in 2000; however, it is now in limited distribution due to poor sales. In 2005, the unisex "fragrance for humanity" Gaultier² (pronounced Gaultier to the power of two) was launched (except in Canada, where it was launched in January 2006, and the United States, where it was launched in August 2006). Most recently, Jean-Paul Gaultier's latest men's fragrance, Fleur du Mâle (a pun on Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du mal, literally Flowers of Evil), was launched in April 2007. Shortly thereafter, the "Eau de Cologne Fleur du Male" was released demonstrating a lighter version of the Fleur du Male. The newest in the Gaultier family of fragrances is ladies fragrance "Madame".

All Jean-Paul Gaultier perfumes are produced under a long-term license by Paris-based Beauté Prestige International, a division of the Japanese company Shiseido that also produces fragrances for Narciso Rodriguez, John Varvatos and Issey Miyake.