Cerruti 1881 (Q1816)
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French fashion house
- Cerruti
- Cerruti Jeans
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Cerruti 1881 |
French fashion house |
|
Statements
1 January 1967
design director
Creative Director of Womenswear
intern
The year 1997 was a good one for Americans in Paris. Marc Jacobs and Michael Kors were hired to design for Louis Vuitton and Celine, respectively, and Narciso Rodriguez was installed at Cerruti. All three brought fresh eyes, and a certain pragmatism, to French luxury, which just then was getting a rethink, as the industry was being organized into streamlined conglomerates.Rodriguez’s fall lineup was a fitting sequel to his stellarspringoffering. And it’s from this collection that Kate Moss selected her unforgettable—and rule-breaking—Cannes look, a simple-looking gray sheath with a hint of Hitchcockian glamour. (Christina Kruse wore it on the runway.)“It had some pretty intricate seaming up the back that shaped and kind of molded the body, but the front was quite pure,” Rodriguez recalls. “The color and material was unusual for a bias sheath like that. It was made modern by the texture of it and the stretch in it. It wasn’t lined, you know, something like that in Hitchcock days would be boned and heavy and lined, and this was a second skin.”The collection contained other body-loving looks, like a fishnet lace column worn over a maillot by Chandra North. Cerruti was a menswear house first, so Rodriguez “feminized” suiting fabrics by adding stretch and cutting them on the bias. Nothing in this collection feels extraneous, which is true of Rodriguez’s oeuvre as a whole. What the designer describes as the simplicity and logic of Moss’s dress applies to all of his work, and to some extent, to American design in general.“We in fashion sometimes lose our way, and talk about trends or create things that just aren’t wearable, or useful, or necessary. We do it for the runway...and this [collection] was the anti-that,” Rodriguez says. “I remember coming home and sitting with Carolyn [Bessette-Kennedy] and watching the whole show. She got up and she sat closer to the TV, and she turned around and smiled and was like, ‘This is how I want to look.’ You couldn’t ask for a better compliment.”
14 July 2021
Following the thread of ourIn Vogue: The 1990s podcast,we are closing out the year and heading into the new one with a series of newly digitized archival shows from the decade that fashion can’t—and won’t—let go of. Designed by Narciso Rodriguez, Cerruti’s spring 1997 ready-to-wear collection was presented in October 1996 in Paris.Narciso Rodriguez was 35 with years of experience under his belt when, in December 1996,Voguedeclared him a “sudden sensation.” He’d been hired as a consultant to Cerruti and produced two well-received collections, but what sparked the profile was the perfect ivory slip dress he designed for his best friend Carolyn Bessette to wear at her private wedding to John F. Kennedy, Jr. Just as the wedding of Diana Spencer and the Prince of Wales defined the 1980s, so this secret ceremony on Cumberland Island did the 1990s.The slip returned in Rodriguez’s spring 1997 Cerutti show, but nothing resembling Carolyn’s iconic dress. There would only ever be one of those, he said. Strength and fragility met in the collection. One of the things that distinguished it was that its roots could easily be traced back to the American tradition, which in Paris, was something rare.Below, the designer shares his memories of the 1990s and considers why the decade continues to be so impactful.“It was a small consultancy that I had at Cerruti, it wasn’t a big appointment. The first two shows, I think they were just kind of testing the waters. They hired me to consult, and it became more complicated. I was actually working full-time at TSE Cashmere here in New York and flying there to consult for them. I was busy.It was a great moment in Paris for fashion, there were so many great designers showing there:Ann Demeulemeester,Martine Sitbon. I worked on Carolyn’s wedding dress in Paris and I showed [my third Cerruti collection] right after Carolyn’s wedding, and I think everybody expected to see her wedding dress as evening dresses. But you know what? I did sportswear.I really enjoyed working in men’s wear materials. Many of these [looks were made with] menswear materials that I had taken and cut on the bias. There’s interesting piecing that gets lost in the men’s plaid. There’s also great ease to [the collection], you know: like the slip, the fragility, the mix of the masculine and feminine. These were the girls that I knew, that dressed like this to go to the Odeon and to go to work.
Certainly having Carolyn by my side was always such a great influence and such a great inspiration all the time.
29 December 2020
Richard Nicoll already proved his cultural perspicacity once this season with his signature show in London, all turned on by the Thin White Duke, David Bowie's most enduringly influential incarnation, at least as far as fashion is concerned. For his other gig, at Cerruti, Nicoll initiated a video starring Malgosia Bela, a model whose presence haunted fashion in the late nineties. He had her perform as the equally haunting and ripe-for-revival Warhol superstar Nico. It was an intriguing decision, given that Nicoll's new collection for Cerruti had a lean precision that was practically the inverse of Nico's chaotic bio. Nicoll is a designer who understands— and is inspired by—the female form, so there was an acute body-consciousness in pieces that had the sleekness of a swimsuit or a jumpsuit, like the sleeveless cropped one that was shown in a raffia weave.Nicoll has isolated the core of Cerruti as "structured clothes with femininity," and he cut the back out of jackets to make his point, deconstructing and literally opening up the company heritage. It was a bold move that, on the whole, paid off for the designer, more so than the odd silk knit cocoon he laid over a jacket and shorts. Maybe it was the diaphanous nature of that idea that tripped him up. He was much stronger with a geometric pattern inspired by a suit from Hollywood design legend Adrian, which he paired with fashionably Saharan shades of cinnamon and brick for a dressy tailored look. In fact, Nicoll's strongest suit for Cerruti was the dressed-up stuff that took the house's original functional chic to another plane. A jacket beaded in a herringbone pattern, for example, and a tux-cum-jumpsuit (the accompanying jacket took a month to embroider) were glamorously accomplished.Click here to see the video >
30 September 2010
In its heyday, Cerruti's womenswear elegantly tempered men's tailoring with soft sensuality. It's an aesthetic that Richard Nicoll instinctively understands, as proven by a Resort collection that featured structured jackets layered over elongated, silky draped tops, or an overcoat in double-faced gabardine topping tapered, printed pants. Nicoll's clothes are distinctly urban in their impact. Here, he deconstructed an oversized mac and put it back together again as a chic biker jacket, and used a substantial jersey for a cobalt blue pantsuit that offered a smart, athletic update to power dressing. "For theactiveworking woman," the designer said with a laugh. It was the kind of outfit that exemplified the "bourgeois codes of dressing" Nicoll thinks are fundamental to Cerruti. Still, a white organza jacket with linen lapels was equally part of his equation. He paired it with a tank and bermudas for a seductive take on the city suit. With time, Nicoll may very well give Cerruti a running chance at a renaissance.
27 June 2010
Cerruti, the French tailoring label, hasn't had much of a profile in womenswear for several seasons, but on October 1 last year, the company signed the London-based Australian designer Richard Nicoll to revive its credibility. In the short time he's been there (while shuttling to and fro on Eurostar), Nicoll has identified the house strength in daywear and set about recasting it for a modern woman's working life. One of the ways he does that is through tonal color, matching cranberry shades in a single look, then grays; moving into a strong passage of petrol, teal blue, and navy; and then into unconventional pastel tones of apricot and beige-pink.Yet being allocated the last-but-one slot in four weeks of shows didn't do the management any favors. While scores of editors were streaming home after Hermès, or struggling in traffic across town to make Miu Miu, Cerruti had chosen to show in the bleak, out-of-town cluster of abandoned warehouses the Chambre Syndicale of Paris has christened "Halle Freyssinet"—and which some international fashion professionals have taken to calling "Hell."Overall, there was not enough here to make a fair evaluation of the soundness of Nicoll's ideas about dressing working women. His mohair knits certainly have a fluffy appeal, as does the windowpane check tailoring, but notions like pants in see-through perforated fabric and latex skirts and leggings aren't going to fly. Next season, Cerruti would be better off taking their presentation back home to their classy, light-filled showroom in the center of Paris, walking distance from where their customers live, work, and stay on business.
9 March 2010
Style.com did not review the Fall 2010 menswear collections. Please enjoy the photos, and stay tuned for our complete coverage of the Spring 2011 collections, including reviews of each show by Tim Blanks.
21 January 2010
It's great that Jean-Paul Knott has been given the opportunity to re-enter the fashion arena with his position at Cerruti, but, as of now, the job doesn't seem to have inspired him in any particular way. His collection might best be described as Calvin Klean—contemporary sportswear signatures stripped of personality. The color palette was minimal (primarily gray and white) with outfits composed of the same silhouette-elongating shade, but paradoxically, the tailoring emphasized a degree of uptightness that felt out of sync with the season. The soundtrack was playing "This Charming Man," but the charm wasn't coming through in the hoodies and knits. It's more than likely a case of a collection that is better appreciated in the showroom. Even so, one wonders about Knott's grasp of the easy luxe that traditionally defined the house that Nino Cerruti built.
26 June 2008
In a season where everyone was wondering about menswear post-Hedi, Nicolas Andreas Taralis offered a stopgap at Cerruti, of all places. The white light and dark electronics pulsating from a wall of speakers steered the audience into Slimane's shadow world, and it wasn't an association that Taralis exactly fought. His grimly chiseled Teutons stalked the catwalk in hypertailored jackets and narrow pants. Add details like beaded trims or gold stitching and the collection had enough of the night about it to evoke Hedi's influential eveningwear/daywear hybrid. Ties were as skinny as lapels; some jackets trailed away into tails, others had capelets that suggested the mythical military academy that the more outré menswear designers are periodically drawn to. If Taralis could be credited with his own direction, it lay in the sheer pieces, which had a stark decadence. Anyone who treasured memories of the Cerruti of yore would have felt like they'd fallen down the rabbit hole.
30 June 2007
"The collection is about tenderness, using soft fabrics with wallpaper prints and mattress stripes, all worked into fluid shapes," said Peter Speliopoulos during his small showroom presentation.Speliopoulos' collection was one of his best ever for Cerruti. Filmy peasant tops, tiered miniskirts and camisole dresses with romantic overlays projected laid-back comfort. Smart linen blazers, casual suede jeans and a great disc-studded cotton jacket fringed with shoelaces all looked as though they had enjoyed a fabulous previous life. Carefully thought-out details, like rope cinches on flared-sleeve blouses and weighty ruffled collars on boho dresses, made some of the softer pieces extra-special.To complete this easygoing wardrobe, Speliopoulos debuted a Cerruti accessories line, featuring flat, simple sandals, large totes and a great washed-lizard clutch.
11 October 2001
Madison Avenue regulars will be delighted to find that Peter Speliopoulos tackled at Cerruti many of the season's recurring themes, making them accessible to a perfectly proper audience.His take on masculine tailoring included high-collar button-up shirts, roomy blazers and two-button overcoats with rounded edges. Paillette-encrusted flirty white shifts referenced the mod mood that was so prevalent in Milan. Little capes fluttered over straight trousers, and cocktail dresses revealed geometric flashes of skin in the back. Sexy ribbon dresses, pom-pom-trimmed necklines, and button-lined deep-slit skirts and gowns closed the show.Speliopoulos' clothes are certainly chic and polite; but one wishes the designer would take an occasional risk or two and give Cerruti a more directional spin.
14 March 2001
Designer Peter Speliopoulos is on a mission to modernize Cerruti without sacrificing any of the brand's old-world sophistication—and this collection proves that he is up to the task.While most designers have turned to eye-popping cocktail dressing for inspiration, Speliopoulos focused on simple yet impeccable basics like belted jacket dresses, sharply tailored pantsuits and masculine shirts. More feminine alternatives retained a classic spirit of polished chic: pale tangerine suede dresses looked sharp, as did military-inspired jackets with epaulettes. There was also a more playful series of looks featuring a trompe l'oeil black net overlay print.For evening, Speliopoulos showed overlays (the real thing this time) over simple short dresses, as well as several beautifully worked skirts with straw floral insets—perfect for ladies with an arts-and-crafts penchant.
11 October 2000
Peter Speliopoulos takes the Milanese route for Cerruti, with a collection that provides an elegant, low-key spin on the trends du jour.Thus, neat Duchess of Windsor coats with the look of Julianne Moore's '40s costumes inThe End of the Affairare interpreted in subtly beautiful Cerruti fabrics—like a black wool flecked with ruby glitter, or a pepper-and-salt tweed that catches a bordeaux-colored shadow in movement. The retro ladylike look follows through to the longer skirts with a graceful swing to them, and to the accessories, which included those all-too-familiar open-toed '40s sandals (shown with old-fashioned back-seamed stockings) and tiny fur tippets at the neck, already featured at Prada. Other quiet takes on trend items that Speliopoulos features include a herringbone black-and-white mink trench; chiffon bib blouses; the batwing sweater (with a deep bateau neck, and a fine gauge turtleneck worn underneath) and spiky feather fronding on café au lait and prune chiffons.
1 March 2000
Cerruti has a well-built reputation for producing classically tailored, elegant daywear in top-quality fabrics. Peter Speliopolous, who took over the creative reins from Narciso Rodriguez a couple of seasons ago, has successfully capitalized on the traditional house's strengths, and simultaneously infused the clothes with a younger attitude. This season the look was perfect for a summer picnic on the Riviera: Onionskin jerseys, feminine wraps, delicately ruched dresses, and Spanish-inspired skirts evoked a modern interpretation of an impressionist painting. Cutout designs, paillette accents, and very delicate embroidery on light, simply cut fabrics proved how the combination of American sensibility with European tradition and craft is working at Cerruti.
6 October 1999