FLORAL PRINT LONG DRESS
A LONG DRESS IN A FLORAL PRINT, DEFINITELY A CONSECRATION FOR SIXSISTERS
It doesn't seem like that, but making a long printed dress with an exclusive ultra-quality floral fabric made in France, obviously made in Paris, is a real feat for a responsible fashion brand, like SIXSŒURS, and a huge satisfaction for its designer Madeleine Ably.
Interview of Madeleine Ably, creator and founder of SIXSŒURS, by her sister Jeanne, journalist at Informations Dieppoises, carried out on Sunday May 8, 2022.
A LONG FLORAL PRINT DRESS MADE IN FRANCE
I think I succeeded: making a long dress with an exclusive floral print made in France , created and made in Paris . Not easy but what a look, once worn. Moreover : it guarantees you to be the "dominating stylistic element" wherever you are...
I have to tell you how it started: to be honest, I've always wanted to create floral prints . However, the condition for having your own prints is to order hundreds of meters of fabric, to mix large quantities. Easy when you are a group that sells all over the world. Less easy, if not impossible, for a young brand that is launching, with the concern of manufacturing quality clothing in France (in a short circuit and without unsold items).
And here, luck once again marked the history of SIXSŒURS : a French company allowed me to realize my dream, more particularly thanks to an encounter: an exceptional girl, Sandrine, who worked in a very famous Lyon house with traditions bicentennials. Besides, it's funny because at the start of our relationship, I was rather intimidated. Given the tone, the emails, I thought I was going to have to “take it easy”. Although I was "the customer", she was in charge. Well no, she generously took me under her wing. She believed in me, and agreed to lower her production minima to allow me to have my first exclusive fabric. It was two years ago. Obviously it was flowers , our large flower capsule collection with a long dress in a floral print as its flagship piece.
And since it was a hit, we repeated, gradually increasing the quantities. And There you go. This year I'm releasing two lines of floral print fabric made in France , with a very good quality of sheets, for exceptional clothes that are all made in Paris .
Thank you Sandrine! And congratulations to France who wears this fashion!
WOMEN FLORAL PRINT LONG DRESS
WHY FLOWERS?
I love working with floral prints . It's a rewarding design job, because the final rendering is bound to be a surprise. We start from a few flowers that we assemble without ever knowing very well what we will end up with. These flowers, I find them both in my father's flowerbeds and while strolling in friends' gardens or in the fields, in spring and summer.
I am lucky to have my family home in Varengeville-sur-Mer , an internationally renowned gardening hotspot, particularly for the Sturdza Park and the Bois des Moutiers, a unique site in France, a major witness to the English Arts and Crafts and which once attracted many artists such as Braque, Prévert, Monet, Miró. At the moment it is making headlines because it has just been bought by billionaire Jérôme Seydoux, from Pathé studios. Without forgetting, all these meadows that line the cliff and overlook the sea. In short, magnificent landscapes with a profusion of vegetation which is a varied source of inspiration for me.
My selection made, I arrange the flowers as for a bouquet. Then I work on the drawing, the contours of each flower and I match the colors in view of the long floral print dress. At the end, the pattern and the dress harmonize into a whole from which a real design creation is born, often quite far from the initial bouquet. It's obvious here: we could have expected a flowery country dress reminiscent of the Normandy meadows. However, by playing on the design, the composition, the assembly, the colors and the clothing, it is an exotic flowery that is essential, straight out of a 60's comic strip with Tarzan and Jane.
I wanted this dress to be fluid, so that it would naturally hug the body. I wanted it to be both ample and capable of emphasizing the curves. In this lush jungle atmosphere, I think I confusedly wanted a hint of eroticism.
The Calypso version goes further: you have to imagine yourself in Deià, in a long floral print dress, under the pergola of an old stone house...
Conversely, I worked my other floral print from an almost Hawaiian hibiscus flower that I placed in a garden party atmosphere from the beginning of the last century, coloring it pale pink on a black background . Hence, here too a long dress with a floral print, but resolutely different, because it is much more structured and less loose/wide.
In short, on the one hand the refinement of Europe at the beginning of the 20th century and on the other, the wild exoticism of the jungle.
As you can see, I take such pleasure with my flowers that I sometimes ramble a little. But what's the point of doing this job if it's to keep a cool head?
A tip to finish: go for a walk in Varengeville. The places will enchant you, that's for sure. Admittedly, it rains there sometimes: but it is then a sign of good weather! The sun always ends up breaking through, and its light gives even more color to the rhododendrons, hydrangeas, magnolias...
In any case, know it, I am impressed by the talent of the designer Laurence Bras. Like me, she seeks to blend the print of the fabric into the shapes, and she succeeds magnificently. I had to tell you. I am also eternally grateful to France for all they do to help fashion develop. To immerse you in this world, there is currently a brilliant documentary, very interesting, very easy to access and very moving, it is " the Century of Seamstresses " on France.tv and we talk about a long floral print dress made in France and made in Paris , Lyon , Strasbourg and Roubaix of course.