Designer Dries Van Noten’s uniquely elegant glamour means he has a devoted following of discerning women who wear – and collect – his clothes. He talks to Sarah Halliwell …
This article was first published in 2015.
Dries Van Noten’s band of followers is quiet but loyal. Every season for the last four decades, devotees of the Antwerp-based designer have been falling for his unique blend of the aspirational and the accessible. The most besotted among us visit the rails regularly, as we would an art gallery, to see our favourites: this season those include the outlandishly glam-rock iridescent coat with baby-pink shaggy fake fur collar and richly textured jacquard dresses. Most clothes that are beautiful enough to hang in a frame are not easy to wear, but it’s a different story with Van Noten’s lush velvets, silks and wonderfully hard-wearing wools – they are dreamy yet down to earth. These are clothes that extend beyond the moment, the years and across the ages.
The designer grew up in a clothes-orientated family – he would go to the shows in Milan with his father who ran a large designer boutique, and his grandfather was a tailor – and first became known as part of the Antwerp Six, a group of designers including Ann Demeulemeester that put the Belgian city on the fashion map. Van Noten’s first collection in 1986 was snapped up by Barneys New York and Whistles stores: in London in the 1980s, my heart would stop when I spotted a beautiful jacket or scarf on sale on a crammed rail. Decades later, Van Noten remains in the vanguard of fashion in a most subtle way: younger designers may dominate the headlines, but he was creating bias-cut slip dresses when Alexander Wang was in primary school. His masculine touches in womenswear, and his skill at blending luxe with loungewear – a floor-length silk skirt worn with a casual sweatshirt, for example – has had a lasting influence on how we dress. His influence reverberates.
Cool and considered, the designer speaks as he designs, with no extraneous fuss or frills. The enduring nature of his clothes is something every owner will attest to; I have a “Dries” coat – everyone refers to him by first name – and knits that are more than 20 years old. “To wear things over a long period of time is important – to me it’s a modern way of dressing,” notes the designer. “Those days when you bought an outfit specially for a certain event or occasion – they are over. So now you might mix something designer with a good basic piece from Zara or Uniqlo and in that way combine streetwear with designer and even vintage, why not?” At the centre of it all is elegance. “For me, elegance is style, not only a way of dressing but a way of living, a flair …”
There’s long been a democratic aspect to the label: if you’re looking for an entry point, there’s always a more affordable T-shirt or sweatshirt alongside more exclusive, hand-painted or embroidered pieces. “Other designers make catwalk collections and also other less expensive lines. For us everything is included, so I think it is fun for people to combine more affordable pieces with the more expensive – and it’s a good look.”
Accessories offer another introduction to his world. “I’m a little different from other companies in that accessories remain a little separate – for me it’s about how they accessorise an outfit and so change your look and your attitude. The core thing in the outfit is the outfit. But there’s a definite power to an accessory: a pair of shoes means you walk in a different way, while whether you carry a small elegant pochette or a big holdall shows two different ways of approaching life.” Van Noten’s bags are timelessly beautiful yet practical.
“I will start work on a collection thinking about what the person wants – whether she wears flats or heels, or has a man’s style and by defining that, you create for a different person,” explains the designer. “Like a woman who carries her whole life in her bag, it has to sit comfortably on her shoulder; if she only needs a mini purse, it still needs to be comfortable to wear. We will try them here in the studio first so that we know they are working. After all, the modern woman needs to carry a lot of things in her bag – her phone, purse, keys and so on – so she needs to be able to fit in everything she needs, whether it’s a shoulder bag or a clutch.” Each of the bags is eye-catching yet understated, with no obvious logos and often a hidden magnetic closure. “It’s all about a balance,” says the designer. “Sometimes we do flashy fake fur coats or something more showy – it’s all about how you balance and combine things, and accessories can help to get the balance right.”
The designer’s catwalk shows are a masterclass in modern romance, and it’s notable that every look that appears is produced for retail, something that is “absolutely necessary”, says the designer: “We don’t make couture; we make prêt-à-porter.” Van Noten has always invested in the catwalk: “The show is still a very important way of communicating for us, especially as we don’t do any publicity.” He creates just four collections a year (two women’s, two men’s), and no pre-collections. “There is a whole fashion system in place which forces most fashion houses in a certain direction. We always have been standing apart from that and for the last few seasons, people seem to have become more interested in things that are individual – the opposite, in fact, of what big groups and companies are proposing for fashion.”
Van Noten forges his own path, beyond the trends. “I want to make things that say something – we’re always trying to tell an extra story.” An 18th-century textile might be the starting point for a piece, but modern technology is deployed too. “I love fabrics, and I love craftsmanship. I like the fact that we can combine a fabric woven completely on old traditional mills, designs based on fabrics from Uzbekistan and India, and on the other hand we use the most developed scanner for digital printing, so we get a precision that’s never been achieved before. To me, mixing those things is fascinating.”
In 2015, Dries told us, “For me, I just want to continue as I’m working now – I have lots of responsibilities as the company is much bigger now and there are thousands of people working to produce the clothes, something I take seriously. But I want to continue in a relaxed way and make my own rules, while keeping my eyes open.” Now almost ten years later, as the designer announces that he is stepping back from his namesake label (“I want to shift my focus to all the things I never had time for,” he said in his statement announcing his resignation) it looks like he has succeeded, and has certainly created a lasting legacy.
