4 Things to know Balenciaga's New Director!

4 Things To Know About Balenciaga’s New Artistic Director, Demna Gvasalia

         

It was been widely speculated that Balenciaga’s parent company Kering would encourage the legendary fashion house to turn to a relatively unknown designer to take the helm of the label.

Enter 34-year-old Vetements designer Demna Gvasalia. Here’s what you should know about Gvasalia ahead of his big arrival at the brand.

1. He works as a creative director at Vetements, which has within the past few seasons made a name for itself as one of the most exciting brands at Paris Fashion Week for its innovative street wear collections (Kanye and Kim are big fans). The label, founded just a few seasons ago by seven anonymous designers, was a finalist for the LVMH Young Fashion Designers Prize.

2. Gvasalia graduated from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp in Belgium, which also trained Ann Demeulemeester, Dries Van Noten, Peter Pilotto and Haider Ackermann.

3. Gvasalia worked as a designer at Maison Margiela — after the departure of founder Martin Margiela — from 2009 to 2013 on the women’s collection team. After that he was named senior designer of women’s ready-to-wear collections at Louis Vuitton.

4. Though there aren’t many designers of Georgian descent (David Koma is perhaps best known), Gvasalia hails from the small European nation.