Céline Dion Just Made Her Boldest Fashion Move Yet by Going Naked for Vogue

Céline Dion is having something of a style renaissance in 2017. At the tender young age of 49, the singer attended her first ever Met Gala and has been taking some major style risks as of late, like with her iceberg-shaped sleeves at the 2017 Billboard Music Awards. But Dion may have just made her boldest fashion move yet by taking it all off for Vogue.

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Here's a little naked fact to ponder while Celine Dion changes looks between shows: for the past five years she has worn haute couture near exclusively for her own performances (in Las Vegas and on her current "mini-tour" of Europe). She performs a minimum two hours a night, five or six nights a week, dancing and curtseying and generally gesticulating sans abandon, in handmade, hand-beaded delicacies designed solely to walk a catwalk or a carpet (and often with handlers). For Celine's orders, the houses send teams to Nevada for typically three fittings, before the garments are ultimately finished in her local, private atelier. Armani Prive, Schiaparelli, Giambattista Valli, Versace...only a partial list. Everyone, basically. In Vegas, Velcro panels are added to allow for her ribcage to expand or for a quick outfit change. Micro straps of elasticized chiffon prevent a slit from becoming a sloppy situation mid-squat. Shoes—always heels, never platforms—are ordered one size smaller (she is normally a 38) and refitted with metal shanks. Says Celine, "We have to make haute couture industrial." And, more enigmatically: "The clothes follow me; I do not follow the clothes." Which is to say: the haute couture, with all its fragility and handcraft, has to perform professionally for Ms. Dion. And privately as well. Years ago, Celine bought a classic little black dress from the Christian Dior atelier when the house was overseen by John Galliano. It is simple, falling to mid calf, and narrow as can be with just a hint of stretch. It requires a minimum of jewelry, a statement bracelet or perhaps one of the major diamond rings she designed with her late husband Rene Angelil: two pear cuts set in a wide pave band, or two hearts of diamond and emerald abstractly interlocking, on a cushion of yet more diamonds. This LBD forces you to walk one foot in front of the other. This is a dress Celine knows well and clearly loves, the simplest evocation of the private luxury of couture and the total antithesis of the red carpet hoopla that attends the union of fashion and celebrity. It is also the dress she wore to Rene's funeral. #CelineTakesCouture Photo by @sophfei.

A post shared by Vogue (@voguemagazine) on Jul 3, 2017 at 10:25pm PDT

In the provocative photo posted on Vogue‘s Instagram account, the My Heart Will Go On singer dared to bare for her new magazine shoot shot by Sophia Li. As the mag’s caption revealed, it was a freeing break for Dion, who has been rocking haute couture onstage for her Las Vegas show for the last five years, including Armani Privé, Schiaparelli, Versace, and Giambattista Valli, to name a few.

Apparently, Dion regularly undergoes three fittings to get the performance looks just right, and her costumes are often fitted with Velcro panels and elasticized chiffon to give her freedom to change quickly and move about onstage. “The clothes follow me, I do not follow the clothes,” Dion quipped.

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Celine Dion is frustrated by fashion's current revolving door policy, the relentless firings and hirings at the top (amen to that!). She is concerned that "the dream" of elegance is disappearing, for as much fun as she had in her beloved Vetements Titanic sweatshirt (and we have Law Roach for that brilliant post-ironic gesture!), she believe in the magic of hats, gloves and total looks, of a world in which Lisa Fonssagrives could step from the pages of Vogue and through the doors of today's Ritz. Mostly she laments the red carpet hordes with the incessant questions about whose clothes and jewels one is wearing. "Mine" is her answer. Fashion is public for Celine; jewelry is personal. Sometimes, when she is at home in Las Vegas and missing her partner Rene, she slips on a caftan and all her jewels, and quietly retreats to her bath, sans children, sans fans, sans circus. #CelineTakesCouture Photo by @sophfei.

A post shared by Vogue (@voguemagazine) on Jul 4, 2017 at 7:38am PDT

And she’s not joking about the clothing following her. She has a massive closet of SHOES, all of which are ordered one size too small and fitted with metal shanks to ensure durability — after all, when she’s performing, she can’t have her footwear loosening or breaking. “We have to make haute couture industrial,” Dion said.

With her show outfits created to be so utilitarian, it’s no wonder the Canadian chanteuse just wants to have fun with fashion when she’s not performing.

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"They see me; I don't see them," is Celine Dion's line on the great blob of paparazzi and fans that follows her everywhere. She gives them any picture they ask for, plus a great many more. Consider an appointment with at the house of Schiaparelli, where she poses for the creative director Bertrand Guyon on a window sill overlooking the Place Vendome. She wears a tiny whimsical dress of Swarovski chainmail re-embroidered with yet more crystals and high sparkly Victorian boots--a little Twiggy, a little Tina Turner. Says her dancer Pepe Munoz: "That's a rockstar!" Says Libby Hahn, who handles public relations for the house: "I am fairly certain she was a rockstar before she put on the dress." Says Celine's own longtime photographer Denise Truscello (a Canadian cinephile with her own rockstar style), thinking of the long lenses poised on the place below: "Is the dress pulled down in the back?" Says Celine Dion: "They might see my butt, but I don't think they mind." #CelineTakesCouture Photographed by @denisetruscello

A post shared by Vogue (@voguemagazine) on Jul 4, 2017 at 5:35am PDT

Aside from stripping bare for her photoshoot, she also got cheeky on a Paris balcony for a fitting at Schiaparelli, asking the publication, “Is the dress pulled down in the back? They might see my butt, but I don’t think they mind.”

#VIDEO | @KatyPerry stalking Celine Dion via Instagram stories 👀 pic.twitter.com/Uzu2iLoRbH

— Katy Perry Activity (@KatyActivities) July 3, 2017

In fact, Katy Perry, who spied Dion in the midst of her photo shoot, certainly didn’t! The “Witness” singer posted an Instagram story with the caption: “Caught @celinedion living her best life in Paris!”

You are a GODDESS, Celine, and we don’t deserve you.

What do you think of Céline’s risqué shoot? Tell us over @BritandCo.

(h/t US Weekly; photo via Jesse Grant/Getty)