Tucked Away Couture
Published 20 months ago
Vietnamese, Paris-based Xuan-Thu Nguyen has dipped her toes into haute couture.
- Text by Alice Pfeiffer
Sometimes true couture isn’t on display in department stores and shiny avenues; rather it hides away in tiny streets on the other side of town. If ever in the Marais, make a stop on the rue Ferdinand Duval, where the designer Xuan-Thu Nguyen creates, hand makes and sells intricately tailored, jewelry-like garments.
Born in Vietnam but raised in Amsterdam, ‘Thu’ (pronounced ‘Toe’) graduated from the Amsterdam Fashion Institute in womenswear design in 1999 and launched her own brand the same year. "At the time, there wasn’t much room for new designers in Holland, but the French reactions were very positive," Thu explains, and so, in 2005, she took the plunge and moved to Paris to open her own boutique. Later that year, she began showing her Prêt-à-Porter line during Paris Fashion Week; this proved to be a success and in 2008, she launched her first Haute Couture collection.
A mix between experimental geometry, and details which seem straight out of Narnia, she creates elongated, mermaid-like figures, mixing raw colours with delicate, childhood-like flower patterns. "The world makes everything so complicated, but it’s all quite simple really. I might make it complicated for myself when I create the clothes, but no one needs to know that." A life philosophy that is indeed reflected in her garments: the pieces are enriched with imperceptible details, such as elaborate linings, or meticulous embroideries on the inside of the shirt, that no one but the wearer will see. The accessories complete the Tim Burton-esque universe that seems recurrent in Thu’s work, such as small chiffon dolls pinned to the jackets, necklaces made out of thickly threaded oversized beads. Her trademark is a ‘fox’ stole created out of knotted silk flowers, in homage to classical Hollywood chic. "I feel fur is too much of an easy option: kill an animal, stuff it, and boom, you’ve got a stole. This is a longer process but the result is more interesting."
Thu insists that she doesn’t follow style guides or the latest seasonal requirements. Rather she experiments new shapes, new techniques. The designer pulls out a pair of large, pleated trousers, with what appears to be a pocket in the back by the ankle, but is in fact designed for the heel to poke through. "These were designed in the day where the trend was to wear baggier trousers and everyone’s jeans were getting ruined because they were constantly touching the floor", she says. The trousers can even be further lifted by the straps sewn on to the sides that can be wrapped around the ankles, in practical bondage chic.
"Sometimes I make something and create it years later," she says, such as blazers with a different colour lining, which, incidently became a hit for every brand this season, even though she had designed a similar one years ago. "I like to experiment with linings, so this was just a coincidence" the designer says. Childhood memories, and early experimenting with fashion is what matters more to Thu, such as her interest in knitting that she learned when she was very young and which still ripples in her creations, or her line of colourful snap bracelets.
Today, Thu works from her atelier in the back of her shop, with the help of her sister Lan, who handles the communication aspect of the brand. Thu designs everything herself, from the clothes, to the bags and shoes, and makes the majority of her Haute Couture alone, entirely by hand. “None of my clothes have visible, outside stitches" she says, "I don’t want thread showing!" she laughs.
"I don’t feel specifically Vietnamese, nor Dutch, I just see myself as international" she says, "people always tell me they can see Asian or Dutch influences in my work, but that is never conscious, it’s just something in me."
