Deco Darling

She met fellow artist Lili Elbe – then known as Einar Wegener – at art school. They married in 1904, when Gerda was 18 and Lili was 22. They travelled through Italy and France, eventually settling in Paris in 1912. The couple immersed themselves in the Bohemian lifestyle of the time, befriending many artists, dancers and other figures from the artistic world, often attending carnivals and other public festivals.

During this time Elbe began to wear female clothing, and adopted her female name and persona, becoming Gerda Wegener's favorite model, in paintings of beautiful women with haunting almond-shaped eyes dressed in chic fashions. In 1913, the art world was shocked when they learned that the model who had inspired her depictions of petite femmes fatales was in fact her husband.