Hussein Chalayan tapped to design for Vionnet

Designer Hussein Chalayan is set to design the fashion house's demi-couture line.

His first collection for Vionnet will be shown on January 21 during Paris Couture week.

Vionnet creative director and chairman Goga Ashkenazi told WWD: “I’m extremely happy about this collaboration because I think that Hussein is a supertalented, forward-thinking designer.” He added that he believes the designer is a “true artist, very conceptual, he thinks out of the box and has a strong architectural approach. He represents what Madeleine Vionnet represented in her era.”

To celebrate the fashion house 100th anniversary, which occurred September 2012, Vionnet launched the demi-couture collections which consists of unique gowns that are sold to selected customers.

Chalayan is known for his eponymous label which he founded in 1993. In 1999 and in 2000 he was named British Designer of the year by the British Fashion Council. Chalayan revealed that he excited to work in collaboration with “the combined elements of Goga Ashkenazi's creative energy and entrepreneurial approach together with the unparalleled heritage of the house.”

The founder of Vionnet, expert couturier Madeleine Vionnet and Hussein Chalayan have both been praised for their innovation techniques; Chalayan for his futuristic designs and use of LED fabrics and Madeleine Vionnet for her use of “bias cut,' which she used to drape light weight materials over the female body to highlight it curves.

“I’m looking at the Demi-couture as a very special, noncommercial project,” concluded Ashkenazi. “My goal is to show something very special, a little bit different from today’s fashion, a little bit revolutionary, as Madeleine Vionnet was.”