AFP
NOS News•Tuesday, 7:46 PM•Adjusted Tuesday, 9:08 PM
Belgian fashion designer Dries Van Noten is stepping down as creative director of the fashion house he founded. The collection that he shows at the men’s fashion week in Paris in June will be his last. The Dries Van Noten brand will continue to exist; A new creative director will be sought in the coming months.
“I have been preparing for this moment for a while now, and I feel it is time to give space to a new generation of talents to share their vision with the brand,” writes the 65-year-old fashion designer in a statement. “I now want to focus on everything I never had time for. I am sad, but also happy.”
According to Spanish fashion and perfume company Puig, which bought a majority stake in the Antwerp fashion house in 2018, Van Noten will remain involved with his brand “to work on certain projects”.
Antwerp Six
Dries Van Noten is one of the most famous fashion designers that Belgium has produced. He grew up in a family of tailors and clothing sellers. In the early 1980s he graduated from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, just like contemporaries Ann Demeulemeester, Dirk Bikkembergs, Walter Van Beirendonck, Dirk Van Saene and Marina Yee. Together they are considered the Antwerp Six.
In 1986 the designer started his own fashion house. Initially he focused only on men’s fashion, making his debut at Paris Fashion Week in 1991. Two years later, a women’s collection was added.
Since then, the designer has shown four collections every year to the press, fashion-loving public and regular customers like Queen Maxima and the Belgian Queen Mathilde. Under the leadership of major shareholder Puig, perfumes and a make-up line were also recently launched.
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Dries van Noten, women’s collection autumn/winter 2024-2025
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Dries van Noten, men’s collection spring/summer 2024
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Dries van Noten, women’s collection spring/summer 2024
Over the past four decades, the fashion designer’s creations have been characterized by unusual combinations of color, prints and fabrics, without sacrificing elegance and wearability. Men’s fashion inspired his women’s collections, and vice versa. Refined craftsmanship, which he acquired from home, was always paramount.
“In the early 80s, as a young boy from Antwerp, my dream was to have a voice in fashion. With a journey that took me to London, Paris and beyond, and thanks to the help of many who supported me, that dream became reality,” Van Noten now writes.
Anti-waste
Van Noten also dares to speak out critically about the state of affairs in the fashion world. At the height of the pandemic, in May 2020, he wrote an open letter calling for the fashion industry to adapt its speed and seasonality to waste less fabric and supplies.