When asked what she thinks about corsets, Brooklyn-based designer Sophie Theallet scoffs, “I need to breathe. Fashion is supposed to be about freedom.” A protégé of two of the industry’s most architectural vanguards, Theallet worked in Paris for both Jean Paul Gaultier (for whom she created a line of clothing for babies), and Azzedine Alaïa (for whom she worked as a head designer for 10 years). “After I moved to New York,” says Theallet of her Stateside sojourn, “I thought it was time to design my own line because I couldn’t find a company that would give me what I was looking for in fashion—my own vision.”

Last fall, Theallet presented her first collection during New York Fashion Week, making waves with her unique aesthetic: a fusion of sensuous curves and airy frills that evoke her homeland in the South of France, Bagnères-de-Bigorre, along with colors and shapes inspired by nomadic North Africans. “My collection was based on color, and the models were like princesses,” she says of her all-black cast. And although she owes a great deal to her French mentors, Theallet’s soft fabrics and delicate florals are a far cry from her extreme design past. “I’m not into the intellectual concept of fashion,” she says. “I’m more into what comes from my heart, so I’m never going to do conceptual fashion. I love simplicity.”

Photo: Pieter Henket.