Brigitte Bardot, with her skin-deep sensuality, her freedom and her sense of style, has become a global legend that continues to inspire designers.

The birth of the B.B myth

She is one of the most famous French actresses and yet Brigitte Bardot was destined for a career as a dancer. In 1948, she passed the entrance examination for the Paris Dance Conservatory. Despite her amblyopia (she can only see out of one eye), the young girl turns into a lovely teenager quickly noticed by Hélène Lazareff, director of Elle magazine. At 15, Brigitte Bardot has made the front page of the weekly many times. She landed her first role in 1952 in Jean Boyer’s film Le trou normand. The following year, for the Cannes Film Festival, she decided to lighten her hair… the golden blond she displayed on the Croisette attracted all eyes and made it possible to obtain financing for Roger Vadim’s film. Et dieu…créa la femme was released a few months later and made her an international star (the first French film to be ranked at the American box office) and helped to launch the B.B myth.

Serge Gainsbourg’s muse

In 1963, she agreed to shoot in London alongside Anthony Perkins, A Ravishing Idiot, by Edouard Molinaro. At the same time, she became Serge Gainsbourg’s muse, who composed several famous titles for her (Harley Davidson, Bonnie & Clyde, Je t’aime moi non plus, Comic Strip). The actress with the face of Lolita and the curves of a femme fatale becomes the fantasy of men and the target of the leagues of virtues, who see in her a greater danger than a simple « sex symbol ». Because Brigitte Bardot displays in life the same freedom as her character, « a girl of her time, who has freed herself from all feelings of guilt, from all taboos imposed by society », in the words of actor Roger Vadim. Invited to the Elysée by Charles de Gaulle, she arrives in trousers and a brandenburg jacket, while only skirts and dresses are authorized for women. She freed herself from the codes of the bourgeoisie in which she was raised and presented herself long before 1968 as a « bohemian », aligning husbands (four in total) and lovers and inventing a style that was the opposite of sophistication of Hollywood stars.

She stopped her career at 40

The world is captivated by the personality of the actress: As a teenager, Bob Dylan devotes his very first song to her, John Lennon swallows LSD to calm his stage fright before meeting her. Simone de Beauvoir is captivated. She had a monster celebrity, then the myth was reactivated by the fact that she stopped her career when she was not 40 years old. Brigitte Bardot begins a new life, far from the media turmoil from which she suffered during her career, and has since devoted herself exclusively to the defense of animals. First spokesperson for the SPA, in 1977 she launched a vast media campaign off the polar ice caps of Canada to denounce the massacre of animals and the fur trade. In 1986, she created her association, the Brigitte Bardot Foundation, to carry out her fights; fight against seal hunting, whaling, commercialization of fur…