Alla Ilchun

Ilchun was born in Harbin, China in 1926. Her father, Zhuanhal Ilchun, was a railway engineer from a wealthy family in Kazakhstan.[1] Her mother, Tatyana, was a Russian opera singer and the daughter of a White Army officer.[1][2][3] Due to political unrest in Harbin, with the city passing between the Chinese, Japanese, the Ilchun family fled to France.[1] Her father was caught and sent to the Tokyo.

As a teenager, Ilchun worked as a dishwasher in a Parisian restaurant.[1][4] During World War II, she joined the French Resistance.[1]

Ilchun attended a model casting in Paris, as a favor to a friend, and was chosen by Christian Dior to work for the fashion house.[1] She became a very successful model, and a muse for Dior, who referred to her as "his personal talisman".[5][6] She was the first Asian model in the European fashion world.[3]

While working as a model, she met the photographer Mike de Dülmen. The two married and had two children.[1] She married a second time to Russian photographer Igor Mukhin.[4]

After Dior's death, Ilchun worked closely with Yves Saint Laurent.

In 2020, a documentary film titled Alla – Dior’s Oriental Pearl was released.[3]