SPOTLIGHT ON… Coperni
MEET THE FRENCH DESIGNER DUO BRINGING SEXY BACK WITH DARING LOOKS AND A SLEW OF CELEBRITY FANS
HOT GIRL SUMMER IS FINALLY UPON US, and the hottest girls are all wearing Coperni. Thank the Parisian label for the
Y2K revival’s notably sexy undertones, with trademarks that include bold, confidently short hemlines, sheer dressing, sleek tailoring, dramatic crop tops and… a provocative little hand-blown glass bag with devil horns.
Debuted on the arm of Gigi Hadid at Coperni’s AW22 show, the bag was created in collaboration with buzzy glassware brand Heven – and catapulted Coperni from insider secret to viral fashion status, with a little help from Kylie Jenner, Doja Cat and Kim Kardashian, who all wore the bag in the space of a few weeks. ‘We didn’t expect [it] to be such a success because it’s so fragile,’ says Arnaud Vaillant, co-founder and CEO of Coperni. ‘It’s more of an art piece. But Kylie carrying it was major. A lot of celebrities are now obsessed.’ A glass bag is the perfect metaphor for the world of Coperni, which blends technical innovation with Parisian refinement. The brand was founded by Vaillant and Sébastien Meyer, who met as fashion students at Modart International Paris. ‘It was love at first sight,’ says Vaillant. ‘Sébastien was studying design and I was studying business, so working together came naturally. In fashion, you need both the pragmatic and the magic.’
This perfect combination has seen Coperni become a fashion-insider favourite – and its magic comes from the ability to perfectly channel the zeitgeist. ‘During Covid, our shows were about what young people were missing. AW21 was a homage to parties and dressing in a fancy, sexy way, while SS22 was about escaping reality entirely – like going into a psychedelic trip and just enjoying being alive,’ says Vaillant.
In fact, Meyer and Vaillant are so in tune with the mood of the moment that their AW22 show referenced the hit TV show Euphoria – entirely by accident. ‘The youth suffered a lot through the pandemic, so our AW22 show was a homage to them, centred on the idea of “coming of age”. The set was a high
school, with lockers around the runway. This was our concept, and then everyone started saying that it was perfectly timed with Euphoria blowing up,’ says Vaillant. Appropriately, both Zendaya and Alexa Demie are fans of the brand, and a microbaguette version of the ‘Swipe’ bag was featured in the series.
Vaillant and Meyer cut their teeth at Balenciaga, Chanel and Courrèges, where they were appointed joint creative directors, before launching their own brand in 2019 as a futuristic, ‘techno-chic’ label.
‘Coperni is named after Copernicus, the Renaissance-era astronomer, so it’s inspired by science, innovation and technology,’ says Vaillant. Just look to the brand’s cult bag, Swipe, which is named after the iPhone’s ‘swipe to unlock’ function, or the
SS21 collection. Featuring antibacterial clothes in response to Covid, Coperni’s campaign was shot using extended reality, a cutting-edge technology that combines real-world and virtual environments to create an immersive experience.
And yet, alongside this sits a passion for traditional French craftmanship. ‘We love elegance, tailoring, beautiful cuts and embroidery. Coperni is all about that mix,’ says Vaillant.
Coperni is also reimagining sexiness in a modern way, by creating clothes that women can see themselves in.
‘The wearability of the garments has been very important to us from day one,’ Vaillant continues. ‘We want to make women feel powerful, but we don’t want them to feel costumed. So that means bringing creativity to life in a functional way.’
Inspired by the women who surround them, including stylist Helena Tejedor, model Mica Argañaraz and the likes of Eve Jobs, Bella Hadid and Nina Kraviz, this translates into cleverly deconstructed blazers, tailored cargo pants, sheer layers and twisted cut-out jackets – pieces which could be worn to work and then straight out to dinner.
‘We want our clothes to touch as many people as possible. I love when my mother orders a coat, or when my youngest sister buys a miniskirt. To see a girl in the street wearing Coperni is the most rewarding thing,’ says Vaillant. It follows, then, that accessibility is also important (glass bag, understandably, excluded). ‘All our girlfriends are about 30 years old. We want them to be able to buy a Coperni piece and not have to wait for the sales to afford it.’ The quality is high-end luxury, but the price point far less so: the Swipe bag starts at £300, while the same top Rihanna wore recently retails at just over £200.
Above all, however, Vaillant and Meyer see the value of keeping things light. Vaillant says, ‘The rigour is important, but it’s also necessary to find the humorous side of things. We’re not saving lives, right? So let’s have some fun.’