Inès de la Fressange Gears Up for Growth as It Celebrates 10th Anniversary

PARIS – Ten years after relaunching her brand, Inès de la Fressange is gearing up for expansion, with plans to grow the label’s retail footprint, accelerate e-commerce and expand into fragrance with the launch of a new scent next year.

In a joint interview, de la Fressange and Fabrice Boé, chairman and chief executive officer of her namesake brand, said they hope to open several stores in key fashion capitals, with the aim of reaching 10 million euros in revenue within three years.  

“We’re looking for partners to support our investment plans,” Boé said.

“Our current shareholders have been with us since 2013, so this might be a good time to refresh the ownership structure and bring in additional resources to accelerate. We’ve proven the brand works, the model works, and the structure is in place – we’re ready to grow, as long as we have the capital,” he added.

De la Fressange, who rose to fame as the model and muse of Karl Lagerfeld at Chanel in the 1980s, initially launched her brand in 1991, but split with her former backers in 1999.

In 2013, the style icon and Roger Vivier brand ambassador signed for a collaboration with Japanese fast-fashion giant Uniqlo while relaunching her label, following its acquisition by a consortium including Dubai-based venture capital firm The Luxury Fund and Calao Finance, which has since merged into French investment management company Acer Finance.

The brand made its official comeback in 2015 with the opening of a flagship boutique on Rue de Grenelle on the Left Bank. De la Fressange recently celebrated the store’s 10th anniversary with a party attended by designers Alexandre Mattiussi, Guillaume Henry and Elie Top, which saw the venue decked out like a country house.

Singer Albert Newton performed in front of a bathtub in striped pajamas from the brand’s collaboration with French brand Dim, while its recently launched fridge – developed with Smeg – was stocked with nonalcoholic piña coladas courtesy of organic café Wild & the Moon. De la Fressange posed with guests sprawled on a double bed.

“We French sometimes have a reputation for being a bit stiff, but this felt more like an English party,” the 68-year-old recalled. The author of the style guide “La Parisienne,” which has sold more than one million copies worldwide, was especially pleased to see her designs on guests in their 20s.

“The last few years haven’t been easy for brands that are positioned between luxury and mass market,” she said. “It’s still the toughest segment to be in, so I was pretty proud to celebrate this milestone.”

A Balanced Retail Mix

A year ago, Inès de la Fressange opened its second Paris store in the chic 16th arrondissement, and it has a third directly operated boutique in the Alpine town of Annecy, in addition to half-a-dozen corners in department stores including Le Bon Marché and Galeries Lafayette.

The brand is available in around 150 doors worldwide, including 40 in the U.S. “We started in France and Europe, made solid headway in Italy, Germany and the U.K., and now the United States is on the way to becoming our leading market,” said Boé.

Already present in two Coin department stores in Italy, the label will eventually be sold in seven or eight branches as they reopen following renovations, he said. It’s also arriving at Manor in Geneva.

“After the coronavirus pandemic, we really questioned the future of physical stores, but our Grenelle location has been doing extremely well. It is up versus last year, which was up already versus the year before, and it just keeps progressing. Online is growing the fastest, but our physical retail is performing very well,” the executive reported.

Inès de la Fressange now makes a quarter of its revenues online, with e-commerce sales up 33 percent year-over-year between January and September, Boé added. It’s carried by platforms including Zalando, Miinto and the Galeries Lafayette website. “There’s still room for growth,” he opined.

The label is also mulling more stand-alone stores worldwide.

“Our first choices would be Milan, London, New York, and then a few key cities in Asia,” said Boé. “These projects require significant investment for a brand like ours, so we either bring investors into the parent company to give us the means to move forward, or we find strong local partners. Both options are on the table.”

Boé declined to reveal the brand’s revenues, but said it’s at breakeven.

“We haven’t yet reached our target of 10 million euros, but we’ll be up this year. As of end-September, we were up 10 percent year-to-date compared with the same period in 2024,” he said. “The economic context isn’t great, but we believe we can meet our goal within two or three years.”

Courting the Daughters

The brand recently brought on Romain Trébuil, the former cofounder and CEO of sustainable running apparel and footwear brand Circle Sportswear, as deputy CEO, charged with helping Boé implement a new strategic road map designed to accelerate the brand’s development and international reach.

Under Trébuil’s purview, Inès de la Fressange has started to revamp its visual communication.

“For the last 10 years, we’ve operated without fashion shows and with very few images, because it’s expensive to hire photographers and models. That’s pretty unusual. Now, I really hope we’ll be able to showcase the work more because until now, our ambassadors and influencers have been essentially our clients,” said de la Fressange.

“I’d like to share more of what we do and how the pieces are worn, and above all, not be the only face of the brand,” added the former model, who designs her collections with Eric Bergère. “I love seeing different generations come into the store together.”

Since the end of its 10-year partnership with Uniqlo in 2023, Inès de la Fressange has collaborated with other brands, most recently cashmere label Linnea Lund.

It’s looking for a new footwear licensee, after breaking up with its previous partner last year due to delivery delays, and recently inked a perfume license with Création Beauté International that should see a first fragrance launch next year.

De la Fressange, who is preparing to publish a new book focused on Provence, said the deal with Uniqlo boosted brand recognition worldwide. While her own label’s positioning is higher, it offers a more down-to-earth alternative to luxury brands, who have put off even well-heeled consumers with repeated price hikes, she said.

“I even do my fittings in the store before it opens. That’s what’s fun: this very hands-on, artisanal way of working, when all you hear about is big luxury groups, huge investments, and brands being gobbled up, usually by the same people. We’re really outliers,” she said.

“We’re showing that this model can work, where I still function exactly as I did with Karl: standing with the model, working on the toile, adjusting it by hand. That’s how I learned, and I’m happy it’s paying off, that women can feel the difference.”