It was meant to raise money for the restoration of the palace, and its official name was the Grand Divertissement à Versailles, but what happened more than 50 years ago at King Louis’s home is better remembered as a watershed moment for American fashion—and as the Battle of Versailles. Alva Chinn was one of the 10 black models on the American roster of more than 30. “My favorite moment,” she says, “was walking in the candlelit Hall of Mirrors after the show. I wasn’t thinking of myself as a model.I was thinking of history and how, though there was royalty present, the people were here to rebuild it.”
Chinn wore Oscar de la Renta. “When I first met him—Audrey Smaltz brought me up to take pictures forEbonymagazine—he said, ‘You remind me of home’. You can’t get past that kind of touching moment.” Signs of those times, when creative and model were connected, still appear to Chinn constantly. “I was in the YSL museum, and I was looking at this black velvet long skirt. I looked at the little picture, and of course I didn’t have my glasses on. I thought the girl looked familiar. And then I realized it was me!”
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Chinn remembers when “energy was what made things really happen. You know? Oscar put me in touch with Valentino. I didn’t know anything about him, or couture, at all. I had to go up to his hotel, and he said, ‘Walk.’ So I walked. And then he said, ‘Do you want to travel?’ ‘Yes.’ The optimal word is yes. Three letters that make so much sense. He puts me in a pink wool, and he hands me a square card with a number on it. ‘You walk and show them your number.’ I knew I had to take my jacket off to show the blouse underneath. The sign was square, and the arm round. So when I walked to the end of the room, I threw the card into the audience and took the jacket off. It got me a job that I hadn’t been booked for in ItalianBazaar. Be authentically yourself. That was an affirmation.”
This story appears in the May 2026 issue ofTown & Country.SUBSCRIBE NOW
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