Interview of La Cambre Student Alexandre Paty

By Margot Thibaut

When and how you decided that you wanted to be a designer?

I was in high school, at l’Ecole Estienne in Paris, at first I wanted to be some kind of character designer for 3D animations or video games, ahah! But around 17 years old I understood that i wanted to work with something more concrete, evolving in the same space as myself, and also I wanted to be on a more human scale when creating.

It was your dream job?

Not really, I understood it is now by working on my clothes. I never fantasized this profession.

Which is the first thing you designed and for who (yourself,a friend…)?

My first piece of cloth was a costume i had to do for school, I was 15 maybe, It was supposed to be linked to an animal, I had the elephant, it was hideous! ahah

Who’s the designer you admire the most and why?

My hero is Raf Simons. For his culture and some creative process he tried (like his collection with Sterling Ruby)
But the very first person who made me want to be a designer is Carol Christian Poell.

Who’s your muse, your icon, when you create a dress?

I don’t really use this “icon” tool is my process, it’s more about the clothes themselves.

If you had to design an entire collection using just one colour, which is the one you’d pick and why?

RED, it’s the most intense colour for me and it represents an interesting duality, It’s the colours of blood, death or crazyness but also the one for love, desire and warmth. It’s quiet complete!

Who’s the first person you show your sketches to?

To my friends from La Cambre. It is to them that I trust the most when I want to confront my work from a new perspective.

The fabric you love the most…silk, lace, velvet and why?

Maybe sport mesh. That’s a material i used a lot from the 3rd year at La Cambre until the end (5th year). there are so many different technics possible with mesh.

If your clothes had a soundtrack, which songs you’d choose?

Music is super important for me, I did a collection based on industrial music and its culture and I’m now programming music for a collective called Polychrome in Paris.
So that’s a hard question. Spontaneously I’d go for AIR LQD, a genius from Brussels:

https://soundcloud.com/perfektfunktion/sets/pfl-091-air-lqd-primitive

It’s messy and noisy but beautiful and energetic.

Do you have any trick to avoid that “blank page” moment when you’re at the beginning of the designing of a new collection? Do you watch a movie, flip an old magazine…
Cinema can be a good start, I also begin by doing all the exhibitions I can and see what happen in my mind. And going out in some underground places with good music always gives me nice energies and ideas.

If you weren’t a designer which job in the fashion world you would like to do and why?

I’d be stylist, doing editorials and advising brand on art direction maybe. To stay close to the garments.