The way Kévin Germanier sees it, ready-to-wear was a necessary detour in his career.
“I’m not going into couture on a whim,” said the Central Saint Martins-trained designer, who will close the official calendar at 6 p.m. on Thursday with his debut couture show. “It was always my goal.”
However, when he launched his brand in 2018, his designs employing upcycled fabrics, beads and other textile sundries caught the eye of department stores and e-tailers. Without investors, it was a way to start a business with an eye to financing future steps.
Fast forward six years and he was feeling a growing disconnect between his creative leanings and the expectations of new retailers, who wanted safer items than his handcraft-intensive signatures.
“I really had an issue with myself at one point [being asked] if I could remove the embroideries and put a logo,” he said. “What thrills me is creating these moments and a radical proposal. I was tired of being in-between.”
That stuck with him, despite a busy 12 months that saw the Paris-based Swiss designer dress performers and athletes at the opening ceremony of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games; create costumes for the event’s closing ceremony, and design the Christmas windows and fashion for the holiday campaign of Galeries Lafayette.
But one question loomed overhead. “What happens next?” he said. “How do you capitalize without having this kind of extreme exposure?”
In his opinion, couture was the answer. With requests for customizations on his beaded bags, the bread-and-butter of the label, and a slew of bespoke orders, it felt a fit.
Days after his spring 2025 ready-to-wear show in October, Germanier submitted a couture application to the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode. The acceptance came on the day he discovered he’d been named costume designer for this year’s Eurovision song contest, to be hosted in mid-May by his homeland.
“At this point, people have understood the upcycling,” he said. “Now what’s very important from where I stand is to really work on client relationships, something that’s been lost.”
For example, the dialogue about updating a beloved item so it could be worn again. Oddly enough, that also felt right given the somber macro-economic landscape.
Factor in the growing cast of A-listers like Cate Blanchett, Gwyneth Paltrow and Viola Davis opting to repeat outfits on the red carpet — with or without reworks — and the moment felt ripe.
On Thursday, he’ll be exploring upcycling once more, this time using high-end vintage garments, often from prominent couture houses, he thrifted as the base material.
“We’re retouching them, changing linings and embroidering,” he said. “It’s not customization, it’s really this idea of having a piece that you love and want to adapt to continue wearing it — as you would with any couture piece.”
But in this first couture lineup, dubbed “Les Globuleuses” (or “the globulous,” in English), the 32-year-old is zeroing in on his brand’s DNA and the upcycled pearls he’d dug up — literally, from a supplier’s refuse pile — in Hong Kong.
Revisiting his early design days, and particularly his bachelor collection at Central Saint Martins, was important, too. “At the time, I had a lot of intentions, but I didn’t have the means, the atelier, or the expertise of craftspeople who could help me,” he said.
He’s also teamed with Swiss writing instruments company Caran d’Ache for the occasion. Pens and pencils were collected in selected points of sale from September to November and were turned to elements for a dress that will be on the runway on Thursday.
What may come as a surprise is that it will be a more reined-back direction than in recent years.
“I really want to create a connection with my client and if it’s too ‘costume,’ I don’t think she will be able to project herself in the designs,” he said. “People know that Germanier can be about these humongous silhouettes, but can we make an impeccably embroidered jacket?”
Bridal could be another avenue for development, a natural avenue for bespoke creations.
Germanier is not abandoning readily available products, though. Going forward, he will continue to offer accessories, bags and knitwear, a category that is buzzing thanks to its appearance on Lily Collins in an early season of hit show “Emily in Paris.” Jewelry and shoes will follow starting in fall 2025.
Caran d’Ache pens and pencils have been used in Germanier’s first couture collection.
Courtesy of Germanier
All that Olympic exposure and other events paid off. Traffic to the website leaped 600 percent after the Games and in the last three months of the year, sales logged an 82 percent increase.
“It also opened us to a public that wasn’t necessarily [closely following] fashion, as well as territories like Australia, South Africa, Ireland, New Zealand,” he said.
And barely three weeks into 2025, he’s already dressed Norwegian singer-songwriter Ane Brun and Australian soprano Danielle de Niese for the opening of the World Economic Forum in Davos on Jan. 17.
Beyond striking up client fancies, the designer also hopes that he’ll titillate the imagination of other partners. “I’d love to do a train, a plane, a restaurant — or even the Paris Opera,” he said. “What if Germanier did the uniforms for the Swiss soccer team?”
And why not be hired at the helm of a prominent luxury house? “That’s a position from which the most changes could be effected,” he said, pointing to his Prélude project with LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton.
Joining the couture schedule segues with another goal that he feels strongly about: showing what the future of couture could look like.
“I feel Germanier can also be a platform to show the specialty crafts of the world, not appropriating the cultures where they originate but tapping them to express ourselves and their excellence,” he said.
“Paris will always be the home of haute couture, the place where it is presented and which offers a wealth of specialty ateliers,” he continued. “But we designers who show here also bring the best of the best from each craftsperson we work with, wherever they are.”
