Just two years after they oversaw the relaunch of the 60s cult brand, French design duo Sebastien Meyer and Arnaud Vaillant are set to leave Courrèges. A statement from the brand says the decision was mutual and that Sebastien and Arnaud’s autumn/winter 17 collection was their last for Courrèges, Business of Fashion reports.
The duo introduced a new era for Courrèges with their collections, which looked towards the future rather than the past, and focused on modernising the brand. Last year Arnaud told i-D: “When you find yourself faced with such a weighty history, you can’t quote it too literally. You have to rethink how its philosophy translates into a modern context.” Their debut collection was suitably modern, filled with laser-cuts and high-tech fabrics.
Read: We asked those lovely boys from Courrèges 20 questions we want to ask everyone.
Their decision to take the helm at Courrèges meant they were forced to put their own promising brand, Coperni Femme — which won an ANDAM award and was nominated for the LMVH Prize in 2015 — on hold. At the time Sebastien said: “It felt like the right thing [to take the role at Courrèges] because Courrèges is so close to our DNA. It’s a very natural, organic continuation of it, but at a scale we wouldn’t have been able to reach on our own”. According to a statement from Courrèges the duo will now be focusing on “new creative projects”.
The statement also said that a successor has not yet been named, but an announcement on the brand’s new creative leadership will come from Francois Le Menaheze, who was named president of the company in April 2017, once a decision has been reached.
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Text Roisin Lanigan