Haute Couture

The true definition of haute couture is "fashion that is constructed by hand from start to finish, made from high quality, expensive, often unusual fabric and sewn with extreme attention to detail and finished by the most experienced and capable sewers, often using time-consuming, hand-executed techniques." An example would be Chritian Dior's 2007 Fall/Winter collection: 

  Haute Couture actually refers to fashion designers and fashion houses that create the looks. Two of the criteria fashion houses have to meet in order to qualify as "haute couture" is have 20 full-time technical people in one workshop and every season there must be a collection of 50 original pieces (day and evening)  presented to the public. This collection should be presented in January and July each year. Now a question that might occur is : "How long does it take to make a "Haute Couture" piece?". Well, it can take from 100-700 hours to create one couture dress so you can imagine how long a whole 50 piece collection could take! Price also occurs very expensively ( around 10,000 to 100,000) but it is understandable because a handmade, high quality piece of clothing should be. The market is expensive but also extremely rare because even though 2,000 women purchase haute couture, only 200 are regular buyers.