But she falls in love with the best friend of her husband-to-be, the fashion designer Philippe Clarence (Raymond Rouleau).

He is an impenitent Don Juan who seduces her when he feels the need for some creative inspiration and then drops her just as quickly when he comes to devote himself to a new collection.

Film critic Manny Farber in The New Republic, December 16, 1946, wrote: This is the only movie I have ever seen in which a posturing, narcissistic personality is shown in the full run of everyday situations and is handled with a matter-of-fact understanding that makes it into a sad, creative, extremely curious and complicated character.

[2]Farber adds: “With the efficiency of a good documentary but in a charming, casual, offhand manner, Becker acquaints you with the complicated, caste-ridden business of dress designing…the nicest group of people I have seen in current movies are the friendly, loyal, unaffected seamstresses whose characters are so different from the dresses they make.”[3] Jean-Paul Gaultier told the New Yorker that seeing Falbalas made him want to go into fashion.

The story, about a Parisian dressmaker who seduces his best friend's fiancée, provided a detailed look at the fashion industry of the time, and shaped Gaultier's ideas of what that world would be like.