亮红色的头发、窄鼻梁、娇小的骨架……自涉足时装行业伊始，Sonia Rykiel本人即是她所开创的时装世界的精髓所在。

她设计的针织套衫短小合身，对宣扬“烧毁文胸”的六十年代女性而言，，拿来直接裸身套上再合适不过。她的设计始终主张男女平等，然而其中弥漫的那种“难以名状”的性感氛围又极富法国风情。

Sonia Rykiel的经典造型以二十世纪为核心，但同时也拥有对未来社会的敏锐嗅觉和创意视角。

1993年，Sonia Rykiel与HelenaChristensen（左一）、电影导演Robert Altman（右二）、以及Christy Turlington（右一）共同登台谢幕。在观看了Sonia Rykiel的秀后，Altman深受启发，创作了1994年上映的电影《云裳风暴》（Pret A Porter）

究竟谁才是以自然之态展现时尚的第一人？Sonia和她离经叛道的内缝线外翻设计当之无愧。又是谁启发了“标语T恤”的诞生？还是Sonia和她的“口号”针织衫。此外，Sonia还通过在巴黎圣日耳曼德佩区（SaintGermain-des-Prés）开设专卖店，推动了“左岸”文化意识形态的建立，而圣日耳曼德佩区日后也成为了巴黎先锋艺术的重镇。我永远忘不了在那间拥挤得水泄不通的小店里看秀的情形，Sonia朗诵着自己的诗歌作为秀场背景音，而那热闹非凡的氛围令得店内更像是人头攒动的巴黎文化沙龙。

关于在86岁高龄辞世的Sonia Rykiel有太多可说，而重要的是我们须牢记她所开创的Sonia Rykiel时装王朝，这正是法国硕果仅存的家族时装品牌之一。

Sonia打下的江山由其女Nathalie接手，并由其孙辈悉心打理以确保其品牌的家族性质，新千年来临后，该品牌最大份额的股份被卖给了一家香港财团。

2000年，Sonia Rykiel与女儿Nathalie（左）在位于巴黎的工作室内办公。Sonia患病后，Nathalie Rykiel接手了品牌的管理与艺术总监工作

我还记得八十年代中期，有次与Yves SaintLaurent共进午餐时，他曾向我坚称，若论通过衣着推动女性进步力量方面的贡献，Sonia要远大于他。

这位时装设计大师所言非虚。尽管Yves自己亦是在1960年代助推女性裤装风潮的大功臣，然而Sonia早在十年前便已经令得战后淑女风日渐式微，并预见性地开启了假小子中性风的时代。她设计的风格轻松从容的成衣代表了女性解放的真髓：将女性从限制行动的衣着和社会陈规之中彻底解放。

Sonia Rykiel的风格被定义为“男孩子气”是有原因的。她本人始终坚持担当职场女性与母亲的双重身份，而她所设计的性感时装还填补了由于避孕药的发明而产生的时尚空白，这意味着她是位遥遥领先于时代的设计师

Rykiel营造的那些大胆又叛逆的时装时刻，正好与1968年在法国街头爆发的青年学潮不谋而合。上街示威的青年到了七十年代或许不会穿Sonia设计的奢华嬉皮风，不会青睐那些层层叠叠的及踝长裙、标志性的条纹毛衫、色彩斑斓的皮草与顽皮的贝雷帽，但Rykiel风格中那股叛逆不羁的劲头却传承至今。

直到最后，身患帕金森氏症的Sonia也从未向传统低过头，也从未让那头亮红色的头发晦暗下来。

The carrot-red hair, the narrow nose, the tiny frame… From the beginning of her career, Sonia Rykiel herself was the essence of her fashion world.

Her sweaters were shrunken, the better to pull over bare flesh in the bra-burning Sixties. Her clothes were feminist, yet quintessentially French in their sensual "Je ne sais quoi".

The Sonia Rykiel look was of its 20th-century era, yet also inventive and perceptive about society in the future.

Sonia Rykiel takes a bow in 1993 with, from left, Helena Christensen, film director Robert Altman, and Christy Turlington. Altman was inspired to write his film, Pret A Porter (1994), after watching a Rykiel show.

Who was the first to show fashion in the raw? Sonia, with her inside-outside seams. Who foreshadowed the slogan T-shirt? Sonia, with her "statement" sweaters. And it was Sonia who helped found the Paris "Left Bank" ideology, by opening a store in Saint Germain-des-Prés, which then had an artsy underground scene. I will never forget sitting squashed up in the small store that seemed more like a salon, as the designer recited her own poetry to create the background to the fashion show.

There are many things to say about Sonia Rykiel, who has died at age 86, but it is important to remember that she started a dynasty that was one of the last of the French family fashion brands.

Sonia's work was embraced by her daughter Nathalie and served by her grandchildren to keep her brand in the family until the lion's share of the company was sold to a Hong Kong consortium in the new millennium.

Sonia Rykiel in her Paris studio in 2000 with her daughter Nathalie, left, who took over as managing and artistic director of the label following her mother's illness

I remember Yves Saint Laurent insisting to me, over lunch in the mid-Eighties, that Sonia had done more than himself to promote the power of women through what they wore.

The great couturier was not wrong. Even if Yves made women in trousers acceptable in the late 1960s, a decade earlier Sonia had deflated the ladylike grandeur of the post-war era and anticipated the boyish, unisex period. Her easy, ready-to-wear clothes were the essence of women's liberation - from constricted clothing and from social tropes.