MAN OF THE HOURGLASS

Fashion

Mr. Pearl's devotion to the old-fashioned whalebone corset-he not only makes them but wears them-is taking him to Paris, where couturiers such as Lacroix and Galliano still appreciate his craft

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Mr. Pearl makes corsets. He's not interested in the "smoothies" and "minimizers" of our time, tubes with (dread word) stretch. For the last five years, in his tiny London atelier, with whalebone and lacing, Mr. Pearl has made the real 19thcentury item, the kind of hourglass foundation upon which a culture could (and did!) set time. Mr. Pearl talks about the art of corsetry—an art which was almost obliterated by World War I and which only a handful practice today—in very quiet, very carefully controlled sentences. This is because Mr. Pearl, besides making corsets, also wears them. His own 18-inch waist, a nineyear effort, is one of his most amazing creations.

Don't call it drag, or even the more classical en travesti. Mr. Pearl has taken the corset as if it were the veil—at once a discipline and a metaphysical discourse. "A corset," he maintains, "is a very complicated garment. I wear a corset because I wish to really understand what it entails. I do aspire to push it as far as the body and mind will go. I believe that it can be something very beautiful. With its disappearance a lot of formality, pleasure, mystery have been lost in the way people communicate."

Mr. Pearl, 38, was born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa—but not with the name Pearl, which was bestowed on him later, by a friend. He studied classical dance, that most demanding art form, and, after joining the State Theatre Ballet Company, began to notice the corsetry in ballet bodices. Thus one calling led to another. "I became very interested in silhouettes—obsessed by this, in fact. Through the use of construction and boning, foundation can completely alter the shape of the human body. I find this forever fascinating." He's not alone in that. Mr. Pearl has provided corsets for couturiers Christian Lacroix, Thierry Mugler, and John Galliano at Dior. Indeed, in September, Mr. Pearl is moving his atelier to Paris, because "it's in Paris that what I do is still required, luckily."

But can he see the day when he might stop wearing a corset? "No," Mr. Pearl replies, and then asks gently, "Why should I? It's my armor. It's my shell. I've joined the insect world, and so why should I wish to leave that?"

LAURA JACOBS