Cecilie Bahnsen's eponymous founder and designer speaks with us about Denmark's special affinity with Japan, her dreamy Sicilian sojourn and the importance of letting in a little darkness.
17 October, 2019
Dainty and delicate in the details, maybe, but make no mistake - the Cecilie Bahnsen woman has edge. The young Danish designer has long occupied a head-seat at the table of Copenhagen's coolest it-girls, and in a time where femininity is ripe for the reshaping, Cecilie's malleable and customisable mould is one to which women worldwide are drawn.
Launching her career at John Galliano, Cecilie's rise has been nothing short of astronomical and shows no signs of tailing off. Like a stormy cloud - the shape of which resembles the puffed sleeves and billowy skirt of her signature babydoll dress - Cecilie's aesthetic carries something wild rumbling beneath its soft exterior. Designed for all and made for life, a Cecilie Bahnsen piece is intended to share, to lend, to pass on.
Unabashed femininity is the sun of the Cecilie Bahnsen universe, casting its many shapes and silhouettes through beams of yellow, floral motifs and chunky dad-sandals marching down the runway. Broody, unpredictable and subtle in its power, the Cecilie Bahnsen brand is a teenage girl rendered in hand-embroidered quilted silk and tulle. Brand: Cecilie Bahnsen
Designer: Cecilie Bahnsen
Origins: Denmark
Homebase: Copenhagen
Stockists: Dover Street Market, Selfridges, Net-a-Porter, Nordstrom, Matches Fashion and many more across the world.
I started out in London and Paris so the romance and detail of my designs are inspired by these two cities, with Scandinavian minimalism. It needs to feel effortless. All my collections focus on clothing made by hand. It's important for me to combine the intricate details of a couture house and my Scandinavian heritage of inherent beauty with openness, simplicity and pragmatism.
There is power and strength in romance and femininity. I make clothes for women to feel comfortable, strong and independent.
Each Cecilie Bahnsen woman has her own uniqueness, her posture, her stance, her feelings and her interpretation of how to wear the clothing. It means a lot to me to see how a woman wears the label according to her own style, how she puts together the pieces in unexpected ways. I get as much out of seeing the clothes in everyday life as I do in a show.
Each season we curate the universe of the brand, building on signatures, sculptural dresses, architectural silhouettes, puffed sleeves and bow details. We build on this with each collection to ensure the brand grows by feeling and instinct, with meaning and care.
Fall/Winter 2019 is about me letting a little darkness in. I was thinking a lot about [American photographer] William Eggleston and that sense of something bubbling beneath the surface. The collection is mostly black and white, but I wanted some Eggleston colour, so we used yellow in the tulle dresses embroidered with flowers. They are my homage to his photo of his wife Rosa asleep on a flowery yellow bedspread. He never gives his pictures a title or an explanation; it's up to the viewer to decide what they think. That's how I'd like my collections to be thought of - the dresses give every woman that wears them a different experience.
The look this season is less clean and controlled than I've done before. It's the feeling of unravelling or coming unstitched. I had an image in my mind of a girl who's experimenting with putting together an identity, finding her adult self. So there's a lot of patchworking, mixing together craft techniques, textures and materials.
Embroidering and knitting with my grandmother in our summer house - she inspired me to work with my hands, and created the most beautiful embroideries of her flowers in the garden.
I think my base and studio will always be in Copenhagen but maybe in the future we might look to show the collection in other cities.
Merging tradition with innovation, we work with manufacturers in Como, Italy, to design new textiles for each collection that offer a unique combination of style, sustainability and quality. Quilt reimagining, one of the oldest couture techniques, is a constant inspiration to me. Our double-faced embroidered quilted silk is created by hand for each garment; we stitch beautiful floral motives into the garments following our hand drawn design.
I have always been drawn to femininity and a romantic way of dressing. I think this may have been inspired by my love of Sofia Coppola movies, especially Virgin Suicides and Lost in Translation.
The collections are always a study of fabric, texture, line and volume. We refine and evolve the silhouettes, details and fabric to fit with the mood of the season. Often you can't see the progression when you are in the middle of the design process, but when everything falls into place you get this overwhelming feeling of how beautiful it all has become.
Perhaps Japan; it has always been such a big inspiration - it has the same tradition of craftsmanship you see in Danish design: a focus on simplicity, functionalism and details. Growing up I watched [Yasujirō] Ozu and [Kenji] Mizoguchi movies, and lately Osamu Yokonami's photography has been a real influence. I love Tokyo; I can wander the backstreets for hours, revelling in the sense of everything being so hectic yet so calm.
I loved living in Hackney and sometimes miss the energy and inspiration this part of the city gave to me. Studying at the Royal College of Art was some of the very best years; the people and the creativity were fantastic and so inspiring.
Right now, I am so excited to be in my studio working on the new collection. After the show in August, I'd love to take a holiday in Sicily, driving along the coast, listening to music and enjoying the beautiful beaches and food.
The Library in the Design Museum Denmark, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Galleri Nicolai Wallner and Décor for vintage shopping.