Nautical but nice: Gaultier opens Rotterdam show

(AP) Paris fashion's enfant terrible, Jean Paul Gaultier, has inaugurated his first international exhibit at Europe's largest port: the Dutch city of Rotterdam.

The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier at Rotterdam's Kunsthal gallery traces about 35 years of the designer's avant-garde creations.

More than 140 original creations are in the mix, from the 60-year-old Gaultier's haute couture line to his ready-to-wear selections. Also included, on loan, are Gaultier designs such as Madonna's post-feminist conical bra, long the stuff of fashion legend, as well as movie costumes for Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodovar.

Though Rotterdam is far from Paris, Gaultier brought it a little nearer to home by adding his famed fashion signature, nautical stripes, to a Thalys train that links the French capital with the Dutch city 442 kilometers (275 miles) away.

Inaugurating the show Friday, Gaultier joked about his fixation with stripes, because when I was a child I used to have a striped T-shirt.

The exhibit opens to the public Sunday and runs until May 12.