Well, Charles James, whom I previously only knew for his famed ball gowns, turns out to be quite the innovator (the puffer jacket, the strapless dress, zip on and spiral around "taxi" dress) and quite controversial. He had clear ideas of who should be allowed to wear his clothing and designed clothing based on his idea of how women's bodies ought to look, that's as if he were the creator not of the couture but of womankind itself. He preferred extremely thin models and then his own designs would give her, with sculptural draping, what a terrific book I have (mini Fashion Book) terms "fictive hips."
This sentence puts it more charitably than other pieces I have read:
"The point of all this complicated construction was indeed to make a
woman look magnificent—not a magnificent version of herself, but like
the magnificent ideal in James's mind."
http://www.harpersbazaar.com/c.....ofile-0214
Here's the puffer jacket illustrated. Invented but not popularized because actually too expensive to reproduce.
http://collections.vam.ac.uk/i.....les-james/
ETA: what I'm trying to say is that it interest me because he is not only the precursor of the Dior New Look, etc, but perhaps he is the precursor of the idea that to look "better" you have to look taller, thinner, younger, more hour-glassy... i.e. you have to strive after looking like you have a body you don't.