Koché, Wanda Nylon and Y / Project - The Blueprint met with three of the main representatives of the new movement.
CHRISTEL CACHET
PARIS CHRISTEL:
PARK BUTTES CHAUMONT (DISTRICT 19) the best place to walk
TEN BELLS BREAD (DISTRICT 10) has the most delicious bread in town
FOR COCKTAILS ON FRIDAY, GO TO LE MARY CELESTE BAR (DISTRICT 3)
FOR DINNER IN RESTAURANTS DILIA (DISTRICT 20) OR ACHILLE (DISTRICT 11)
Koché
The first show of Koché took place in the fall of 2015 at the newly opened Les Halles shopping center and was available to the general public, with guest editors standing next to casual onlookers. “I wanted my show to be like a huge party! In general, I like the idea of sharing a fashion show with unknown people,”explains the thirty-nine-year-old Christelle Koschet. Needless to say, the show certainly became a sensation?
The St Martins alumni's portfolio includes work for the fashion houses Chloé (the era of Phoebe Faylo), Sonia Rykiel, Bottega Veneta and Dries Van Noten. Having gained experience and learned the secrets of craftsmanship from the best, Koshe wanted to found her brand "to express something very personal that can only be conveyed by building your own home." Christelle named him Koché. This is a play on words, her surname Kocher in French is spelled as an infinitive, and the name of the house - as a verbal adjective - Koché. And both words are pronounced in the same way: "Koshe". “I wanted to keep my name, but with a small difference: it’s me, of course, but not only that. Koché is a way of thinking that I hope goes beyond my personality and my desires."
Christelle combines her work on her own brand with the position of creative director of Maison Lemarié: for eight years she has run one of the twelve haute couture ateliers under the patronage of Chanel. Therefore, her day is divided into two parts: in the morning she can be found at the Maison Lemarié atelier in Pantan (this is the northern suburb of the city, and it is not so far from the Christelle house in the 19th arrondissement), and in the afternoon she goes to the neighboring twentieth arrondissement in studio Koché.
Maison Lemarié specializes in feathers and floral embroidery for haute couture dresses Givenchy, Dior, Yves Saint Laurent and Chanel. This is probably why Christelle so much likes to mix elements of street fashion with couture techniques in outfits for her own brand. By the way, parkas and bombers from the latest (autumn-winter) collection of Koché made a splash: under the waterproof transparent fabric, multicolored feathers were noticed on them under closer examination. “Today we often combine Chanel clothes with jeans and T-shirts. This is what real style means to me: street fashion clashes with haute couture. Christelle does it like no one else.
YOHANNA SENIK
PARIS JOHANNA:
ON THE WEEKEND I LIKE TO WALK THE FLEA MARKETS AT PORTE DE CLIGNANCOURT (18th DISTRICT).
BEST DINNER AT ABRI RESTAURANT (DISTRICT 10): the perfect combination of price and quality
L'ÎLOT (3 DISTRICT): my favorite seafood restaurant in Mare
FORNEY LIBRARY (District 4): Parisian designers often come here for inspiration
Wanda nylon
"I've always liked the Crazy Horse cabaret dancers: have you noticed how consonant their first and last name are?" - 35-year-old Johanna Senik begins her story about her brand Wanda Nylon with its name. One of the girls in the cabaret was called Wanda, she, like Senik, is of Polish origin, so with the first word the choice was obvious. And for the second - she wanted to pick up something technical and provocative "with a touch of fetishism", the main component of the DNA of the future brand. So Johanna chose the word "Nilon".
Released: Wanda Nealon. We admit that it sounds frankly sexy, and Senik is not at all shy about it. Today Johanna jokes that the brand originally specialized in waterproof trench coats because she was madly in love with Parisians wearing similar models in the photos of her beloved Helmut Newton for Vogue Paris. By the way, Senik made her first trench coat from a shower curtain purchased from the BHV Marais department store. "Often my main source of inspiration is materials: don't forget that clothes are made to be touched!"
Johanna always knew that she only wanted to live in Paris (she moved here from a provincial Tour when she was 18), but it took a long time to discover what she wanted to do. An ANDAM laureate (at various times they were Iris Van Arpen, Christophe Lemaire and Martin Margiela), Senik at the beginning of her career edited the avant-garde French magazines The Face and Crash and assisted the casting director Maida Gregory-Boyna (the one who selected super-slim models for Rafa Simons at Dior and whose latest work with Balenciaga turned into a big scandal). But picking up a needle and thread, I realized that it was hers. And she created her own brand "to be as free as possible."
The new collection, inspired by Black Panther, has everything she loves: vinyl, crop tops and loose llama dresses. Her heroine is in many ways similar to her - she adores Paris, fights for her rights and knows exactly what she wants. "For me, beauty is in character, but the woman of Wanda Nylon is definitely fine with him!"
GLENN MARTEN
PARIS GLENNA:
AT FREE TIME I MUCH MUCH TO MY HOME BELGIUM, BUT SOMETIMES I CAN MEET AT RUNNY PARTIES IN PÉRIPATE (DISTRICT 19).
Y / Project
Glenn Martin is an architect who became a designer by accident. Once, while on a business trip to Antwerp, he stared at the building of the Royal Academy of Arts. It was so beautiful that he submitted his documents and portfolio with mock chairs and was immediately accepted. “I thought I only had to paint. After two weeks of study, it became clear that it was also necessary to sew. But it was too late to retreat, I was sucked in."
Now thirty-three, he had already worked for several years for Jean-Paul Gaultier, when in 2013 he was called to lead the menswear brand Y / Project (at a difficult moment: its founder, Johan Serfati, unexpectedly died). Glenn, without thinking twice, began to show the show during Women's Fashion Week. "We didn't have the means to expand production, so I just started doing the same things, but in a woman's size: the buyers were confused." But this idea, even before the phrase gender neutrality became fashionable, loved Parisians madly. The secret is in the fitted cut: Y / Project clothes look very sexy on girls. The Y / Project heroine is seductive, romantic and very strong, as one of the most famous fans of the Rihanna brand: she chose her for the Anti tour. “The main thing is freedom! And I like that my clothes can be worn the way I like. " And today, 50 percent of Y / Project's production is unisex.
Glenn's main sources of inspiration are Gothic architecture, which he adores, and the girls in the Paris subway: "I'm that strange guy who stares at you like a maniac." He loves to joke and generally treats everything with humor.
In his latest fall-winter women's collection, the main starting point of which is the men's January show, everything he likes is a real mix of cult things from the street: bombers, hoodies, crop tops, an abundance of leather and velvet and conspicuous details like huge ruffles or fan scarves with the faces of kings. “I grew up in Bruges, where history comes to life. Therefore, kings and emperors were my idols as a child. In my new collection, I have combined them with hip-hop culture from the 1990s to show that yes, Henry VIII was actually the Kanye West of his day."
