Lace, Nostalgia and Craft : Fashion Designer Olivier Theyskens

Olivier Theyskens’ signature is sumptuous fantasy balanced with solemn formal rigor. The designer will inaugurate "In Praesentia," a rich carte blanche display of his imaginative universe, at Cité de la dentelle et de la mode, a.k.a. the Museum of Lace and Fashion, curated by Lydia Kamitsis (June 15-January 5). Located in the northern French city of Calais, the venue has previously featured exhibitions on Hubert de Givenchy, Cristóbal Balenciaga, and Iris van Herpen.

In successions of theatrical vitrines, Theyskens silhouettes mix with in-house historical garments: pairing forms, colors, and materials across decades and even centuries. The selected pieces are beautifully mixed with vintage industrial tools — a lace press, patinated bobbin boards, trestles, registries of lace samples — that double as sculptural totems. The show provides an authentic and striking tribute to Theyskens’ recurring creative obsessions.

The Belgian designer precociously started his own label in 1997, after quitting fashion school. Over the next two decades, he fashioned lavish gowns at Rochas and Nina Ricci, then contemporary separates for Theory. Theyskens revived his namesake line in 2016 and, since February, his Paris atelier has been headquartered in a stunning historic building. The ground floor was built in the 19th century, for an aristocrat during the French Directory; upstairs, amidst architecture from a later period, he and his team work in an Art Nouveau jewel with dark wood panelling and stained glass windows (The setting is pulled down to earth thanks to schoolchildren screeching through recess in an adjacent courtyard).

Theyskens, sporting a black T-shirt that read “Dirty Mind” on one side, and “Clean Oceans” on the other, discussed his insatiable appetite for drama, his wariness of big brands re-writing fashion history, and the pleasures of deconstructing his own work.

You had an exhibition in 2017-2018 at MoMU in Antwerp. How will this show be different?

When the MoMU asked me to do a retrospective, I always imagined it as something you do at the end of your career — and I feel like I’m in the middle! That exhibition was purely chronological; we were featuring absolutely every show I ever did and some key outfits. The visitor would see my evolution collection by collection, plus some fashion sketches, photographs, and personal documents. It was a very classical approach to showing one designer’s path. Soon after the exhibition ended, I got this solicitation from the museum in Calais. I believe by seeing the exhibition of the MoMU, they linked my work to theirs. Their permanent exhibition is about the history of the French industry of lace… I started off by using vintages laces, and reconnected with lace when I started at Rochas — it was their logo. And the museum is celebrating its tenth anniversary during the exhibition.

You’re entwining pieces from their collection into your show.

I felt key elements in their conservation department could dialogue well with parts of my work. It was important for me that the experience of looking at my work for this exhibition be different than what I’d done two years before. I went to Calais a lot — they have clothes from the 18th to the 20th century, but they also have a department of conservation for industrial tools: machines, furniture connected to the industry. I thought that was interesting to show, and they had never exhibited it. I was looking at my own archives without the lens of "this was a great outfit from the show" — it was about the components, and things that didn't make it to shows, that I edited out; I felt some of them now had some resonance. I’m showing more the métier than what people have already seen. The way we could define a new approach in my work was to really dismantle all my methodology and focus on the key elements in my work — black, bias-cut, the feel of nostalgia… We created links between these themes and what I found in the museum. My methodology has something retro, a way of designing clothes like a couturier. With the stuff from the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th, you see the link — I’m in continuity with the past. That was interesting — to feel you’re a bit part of that family.

How do you negotiate that balance between nostalgia and reinvention? Looking back on the history of fashion, but also moving it forward?

Even when I do something new, I can have this vibe that makes you think of the past. My last show was definitely retrofuturist, in my mind, and there were things that were definitely connecting it to the ‘40s, but at the same time the clothes themselves, from my point of view, were new. They didn't look derivative. I think that the nostalgia is in my inspiration — it is fueled by these feelings of watching some elegant past — movies, paintings — that there was a beauty to the way people would dress, which then appears in the sketches. Already as kid, I would draw silhouettes that would feel costume-y, that looked 18th century. I’ve always been like that. And sometimes I love to have something that feels disconnected from anything: the novelty of a new way to create a shape or a cut.

What are some of those implicit influences?

I like artists with melancholy. I appreciate pop artists — I’m open-minded — but I don't personally feel connected to that. I love Louise Bourgeois, though never did an ode to her. I always loved Hans Bellmer, and one time I decided to integrate pieces of his photographic work in my collection. This is something I had never done. I integrated them not for valeur ajouté [added value] but like a real ingredient: with discretion and respect.

Are you yourself someone who goes to fashion exhibitions?

The first time I started seeing fashion exhibitions, I was disappointed about how fashion looks in a museum. It’s very… [pauses] fashion is generated in motion. I remember how much I was fantasizing on the idea of beautiful dresses. In Spain, in the 2000s, I saw an exhibition with some outfits from the 19th century … I saw how small the dresses were, and there wasn't this drama. There was something regional about it. Even Versailles-type dresses with the baskets on the side that are like two meters wide… I’ve been disappointed. I’ve also seen exhibitions that were amazing, where you see how beautiful the clothes are… I loved the Vionnet exhibition.

What about splashier exhibitions like, say, Dior?

I went to the Dior one but it was painful because of how many people there were. Painful. And there was so much. I wish I’d been able to stop in front of the things I truly admire. In my early 20s, I read Christian Dior’s autobiography, and it made me love his work. That exhibition had all the key pieces, which was amazing. I was aware that it was lucky, but I couldn't experience this appreciation. And I regret it. It was too splashy. With the décor! And this! And that! This overlooooad… you just think, today, there are players in the fashion industry. The marketing surrounding these brands is rewriting the culture and the way we see 20th century fashion.

Rewriting the culture in what sense?

When I was at Rochas, it was so hard to find elements about the house and its history. There were a few documents; you couldn't find anything on the Internet. There hadn't been archives or preservation work. I had a small black-and-white book from the ‘80s, and the archives of the perfume, which inspired me so much. Meeting people from fashion museums, meeting Hélène Rochas… I had so much respect for the legacy and what Marcel Rochas brought, actually, to fashion. It’s as much, if not more, than some of the famous brands today. But no one will think that because we only see Chanel here, Dior here, and that’s all. It makes me nervous sometimes, because I am aware of how much other people brought. Good curators can really put everything back in order — but that’s not the splash. That’s the history. Most books are done by brands on their own terms, with a very cleaned-up fashion history. I always take distance from that. Christian Dior, when he launched, he was in his 40s. He had been a pattern-maker for different designers. He, apparently, admired Rochas dresses during the 1940s; during the war, there were already these dresses cinched at the waist in silk taffeta. That silhouette was not absolutely new—it was just a way to bring it back, and enhance it, with talent, with a pure sense of the joy of beauty. There were precursors, and visionaries. And this you will not read in a Dior book today — I imagine! [laughs]

What about your own narrative? Gothic and Romantic are without fail the adjectives associated with your work. Do you like those associations?

I accept that — in essence, I’m first and foremost a melancholic person. I know it because of how I was as a child. I always loved drama, terrible things — I could see beauty in there. I did not fancy funny things that much. What I bring out is some sensitivity… it connects with something dark, something nostalgic, something fragile, something haughty.

Would you say your vision of femininity has remained constant over the past 20 years?

It goes back even further, like 40 years [laughs]. I feel there is a Theyskenian girl. I can never say there is a muse — my inspiration comes from things that aren't just physical, but impressions. When I sketch, it’s a female incarnation of a sensation, an emotion. I spent so much of my childhood imagining myself as a girl.

That’s interesting. Does the conversation about gender fluidity today change your thinking in any way about being a womenswear designer?

A little bit. I admire the youth, who have the bravery to get there. My parents let us express ourselves, and as a child I was so obsessed with dresses and clothes I wanted to be a princess, to have the drama of posing with that dress. In my case, it was a fantasy; not the true will of having that identity. I went to a dance school, and I was imagining being a ballerina because I thought they were beautiful and elegant. It was for the visual of it, of being a ballerina. But the kids that dare to go there and work the identity that is right for them? I can't stand hearing 60-year-old gays saying: ‘We paved the way.’ Yes, but still today — it’s a challenge for these kids. It’s not easy. Take a train and just go to a regional spot! Might be more difficult. But I think it’s really good: I always draw a girl, but it can blend, eventually, because I admire the body of a man. It can be a grey zone.

In terms of wanting to maximize drama, have you done costumes?

I did some costumes! In Brussels, I did almost 300 costumes for an opera. And it was an amazing experience because of the diversity of the physiques. There was a chorus of 80 people, men and women. They displayed all the shapes a human can have — but they had similar costumes, and so I had to adapt and fit all of that with real people. And I enjoyed it so much, whether I was fitting a large short man with legs a bit in the shape of an X…. Your eye just adapts instantly to the person. At Theory we did made-to-measure for endorsements. A football player has huge legs. You reconsider all the time how you make clothes. It’s great to collaborate on special projects. You use your brain differently.

Designer Olivier Theyskens on Drama, Reinvention, and Finding Beauty in Terrible Things. By Sarah Moroz.   i-D , June 14, 2019. 

Olivier Theyskens, the Belgian designer known for creating rarefied, darkly romantic clothing, describes working with lace as “a habit”. The centuries-old fabric is found throughout his oeuvre: from his first collection Gloomy Trips, which featured shards of antique Chantilly lace collected by his grandmother, to his tenures at Theory, Nina Ricci and Rochas – he revived the latter’s moribund signature lace, spending seven months with a French lacemaker to make sure it was just right. And, over a decade on, at his eponymous label, where Theyskens now works solely (his most recent show in February in Paris saw balconette bodices, hook-and-eye blouses and gowns in various iterations of the fabric). “It’s always captivated me,” he tells AnOther. “It is so intimate, so feminine.”

This weekend, a new exhibition, Olivier Theyskens: In Praesentia, opens at the Museum for Lace and Fashion in Calais. The city, which sits on France’s northern coastline, is known for producing lace of all types: from abundantly detailed Chantilly to lighter-than-air French tulle, and much between – houses, such as Chanel, Valentino and Dior, all use lace from factories in the region. The museum, which itself is housed in the abandoned Boulart lace factory, collects the spoils of centuries of French lace-making: clothing, furnishings and ephemera, including the machinery and tools long used to create it. In Praesentia gave Theyskens access to the museum’s entire archive – whether on display or otherwise – asking him to weave a narrative between past and present, between his work and the numerous artefacts in the museum’s collection.

“I had just done a retrospective in at MoMu [ModeMuseum, a fashion museum in Antwerp, Belgium] when the Calais museum contacted me to do something on my work,” explains Theyskens of how the exhibition began. “I never thought I’d do another exhibition, but I was interested because they talked about a new approach – at MoMu it was very chronological, a reflection, show after show after show of what I did – but here, they were interested in my creative process, and work with lace. They gave me carte blanche to do whatever I liked with their collection; to start a conversation between past and present.”

The resulting exhibition is what the designer deems an “emotional” experience, an attempt to replicate the visceral appeal of the fabric itself. “Lace has always captivated me, even when I very young. That sexy side of lace – like lingerie – and how most lace was always hidden,” he says. “When I was growing up my grandmother used to collect little bits of antique lace offcuts for me, and since I have always used it in my collections.” In Praesentia, then, diverts from typical exhibitions on a designer’s work – instead, it is a series of reveries from Theyskens on various themes, the colour black, illusion, nostalgia and the corset among them.

One new, unexpected fascination Theyskens discovered was with the machinery of lace production itself: in the exhibition, mannequins might balance on old worker’s stools; bobbins and boxes might be stacked alongside a towering heelless boot, designed by Theyskens while at Nina Ricci. “I found myself interested in some of the pieces connected to the activity of making lace: the furniture, tools,” says the desinger. “When I was working at Rochas, and I would go to the factories, I was overwhelmed by the environment. The lace is very delicate, very intricate, subtle, fragile, meticulous, and the environment is extremely brutalist: the machines are very heavy, very ancient, there is a lot of noise, it is very dusty, and I kind of like this contrast.”

It is a contrast he has struck in his own work, too, where clothing often teeters somewhere between brutality and beauty: his early collections hinge on just this, combining the excess of 17th- and 18th-century costume with industrial elements – like the hook-and-eyelet fastening, one of his signatures – or fetishistic understones – gimp masks, leather, severe corsetry and the like. Theyskens’ own renown came on the back of Madonna – another artist astute at balancing brutality and beauty – who wore a corseted yellow Theyskens gown for the VH1 Fashion Awards in 1999, taken from only his second collection. Hook-and-eyelet fastenings criss-cross the satin skirt, like it has been slashed apart, and stitched back together.

“I think a lot has changed since then, we were never thinking about creating content,” Theyskens says of that moment. “The fashion world was a lot smaller, we were working with people who we knew, who were experts. But I like change, I never thought that the industry wouldn’t move on: I love that in the history of 20th-century fashion, there are such big changes between the 1950s and 60s, the 60s and 70s, the 70s and the 80s; the reappearance of designers, the disappearance of others. It’s always been about change.

Change might be on Theyskens’ mind, but an exhibition like this provides a chance for a designer to take stock, and look back: Theyskens recently rearranged his archive, which had previously been in storage in Belgium and not looked at for many years. Within it, he discovered a wealth of pieces that even he didn’t immediately recognise, including several garments which, for one reason or another, did not make it into the final runway collection for a given season. Some of these will appear In Praesentia: “I’m always pressured when I put collections together to take out things that don’t quite fit in the story; [with this exhibition] I’m happy to work in a way which isn’t just about ‘full looks’ or collections,” he says.

Such an approach makes the range of In Praesentia far wider than a typical retrospective: instead, it provides a brief journey into the frenetic, resourceful workings of a creative mind. “It’s a dialogue between past and present, between new and old ways of working, of nostalgia and craft,” Theyskens says. “When I make or put things together I draw on emotion, or feeling. Sometimes, I want to put the intellect aside.”

Olivier Theyskens: In Praesentia is on at Museum for Lace and Fashion in Calais, France from 15 June, 2019 – 5 January, 2020.

Olivier Theyskens’ New Exhibition Is About the Seductive Power of Lace. By  Jack Moss. Another Magazine , June 13, 2019. 

In celebration of its 10th anniversary, Cité Dentelle Mode in Calais presents “In praesentia” as a temporary exhibition from 15 June 2019 until 5 January 2020. About 10 months in the making, the exhibition invites viewers into a small part of Theyskens’ universe by expressing the connection between some of his past pieces and lace itself.

Curator Lydia Kamitsis explains the captivating title as a poetic word that evokes a sense of imagination and curiosity. Put simply, “Praesentia,” a Latin term, means “presence”. The title encourages visitors to be present and immerse themselves in the atmosphere and ambiance of the exhibit. She describes “praesentia” as a singular word that one does not have to translate into other languages, as everyone understands its meaning.

In this project, Theyskens works to protect the link between the culture and fashion of the present and the past. Certain pieces preserved by the lace museum inspired him, reminding him of his past works and other memories. Kamitsis carefully mixes pieces from different collections and different times, (as opposed to displaying the pieces chronologically) which serves as another manner of bringing the idea of nostalgia to life while presenting a new way to view modern work with museums.

The exhibit also pays homage to the “behind-the-scenes” industrial workers, bringing them to the forefront by featuring different pieces of lace-making equipment and tools alongside the pieces displayed on mannequins. These roles often go unmentioned, hence the desire to honor them.

Theyskens notes his belief that the exploration of lace with its complex motifs and complicated production techniques is unfinished; he believes that lace is not used enough in the modern context and that it has so much to offer in the world of fashion.

Olivier Theyskens’ “In praesentia” Curated by Lydia Kamitsis at Cité Dentelle. By Kiana Rizel Sales.  A Shaded View of Fashion , June 14, 2019. 

Cité de la Dentelle et de la Mode, Calais