Hussein Chalayan has been appointed to the design team of historic French fashion house Vionnet, having previously collaborated with the label on their demi-couture offering. Chalayan will work with owner and creative director Goga Ashkenazi and alongside designer and stylist Albino D’Amato and footwear designer Diego Dolcini on the ready-to-wear collection.
“Hussein will bring his unique approach into our creative debate, where we all will be organically integrating our views with the Vionnet aesthetic,” says Ashkenazi. “My aim, in the long run, remains to create an authentic creative community around Vionnet: a collective of individual minds working in unison, adding new voices to the chorus as we go along. I am very thrilled of this perspective and strongly continuing to believe in it,” she adds.
The founding designer of the Parisian fashion house, Madeleine Vionnet, was known as “an architect among dressmakers” in the 1920s, due to her bias-cut silhouettes and mastery of draping. Chalayan is known for his conceptual and intellectual approach to fashion and has, in the past, applied an architectural approach more literally, taking inspiration from interior design to create a dress that transforms into a table.
“There’s a really fine line between respecting the heritage of Vionnet and all the things that it is known for, but at the same time, making it relevant to the modern woman,” Chalayan told BoF, “It’s about not being cliché and vintage, nor having an identity that isn’t Vionnet.”
Chalayan is celebrating 21 years in fashion during London Fashion Week this season and has recently opened his first flagship store in London. He joins Vionnet as the house prepares to open a new store in Paris.
Credits
Text Charlotte Gush