Showtime for Henri

MEXICO Showtime for Henri

When a prim group of elderly American women visited his Mexico City salon a few weeks ago, plump Dress Designer Henri Chatillon disappeared into a dressing room, rustled out a few seconds later in a flowing black gown and a big hat. "I shocked hell out of them," he tittered, "but I did have a good time."

Chatillon has made customer-shocking a million-peso-a-year business. For half an hour before the opening of his annual fashion show last week, the Packards and Cadillacs of traditionally tardy Mexico City society matrons tied up traffic in front of his combined atelier and home on the Paseo de la Reforma. Inside, they sipped cocktails and critically eyed U.S., French and Mexican mannequins in a display of 60 new models ranging from simple afternoon dresses to bare-top evening gowns at from 1,500 to 5,000 pesos each.

Son of a British father and a French mother, Monsieur Henri was born Henry Hutchinson in Paris 42 years ago. He came to Mexico in 1942 and set up shop as Henri de Chatillon, hatmaker, in the Reforma mansion that had once housed Emperor Maximilian's mistress. His first hats were as fantastic as they were expensive, and sold like hot cakes. Often they really were hot cakes: Chatillon found that steaming Mexican tortillas, molded to the head and well-shellacked, made salable chapeaux. He made other hats from zacate, the maguey fiber Mexicans use instead of steel wool, and the cheap woven straw strips used to cinch saddles under horses' bellies. Among his clients: Magda Lupescu and Dolores del Rio.

In 1947 Chatillon expanded into the dress field, has now become Mexico's arbiter of fashion. He has 78 workers and turns out an average of 1,000 dresses a year. Some of his inspiration comes from Mexican sources (his materials are made by Mexican weavers), but his designs are mainly Parisian.

Next month Chatillon plans to start exporting dresses to leading shops in the U.S., including Dallas' famed Neiman-Marcus and others. They will be copies of his expensive models, priced to sell at $40 to $50. What with his expanding business, Bachelor Chatillon is too busy to think much about social activities. "I am married to my hats," he says.

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