http://www.laurentdombrowicz.com
Kuki de Salvertes : Laurent, how did you get into fashion? Tell me how and when everything started.
Laurent Dombrowicz : I have a movie director training. I studied at the INSAS school in Brussel, which is a very good school. But after my studies, I understood that the rhythm of a cinematographic project, even advertising, from its conception to its diffusion, is very slow and requires heavy teams. Moreover, at that time, fiction films production in Belgium was almost confidential. Working on music videos, I tasted a more “glam” aesthetic very close from fashion. The seasonal fashion rhythm and less realistic aesthetic bias have been the reasons for my changing of way. I was approached by the biggest French-speaking Belgian weekly magazine in order to make images of young designers from the moment who were about to be an international breakthrough. It was in 1989. The rest was a chain of meetings, ascension, success and failure, like in every business. I definitely settled in Paris in 1998.
KdS : About your first shoot. When was it? For which magazine? What are the memories you still have from it?
LD : I don't even remember. It probably was for the Belgian edition of « L'Express », but it hasn't let me much memories
KdS : What makes the characteristic of your style?
LD : I guess my style shows a lot of my culture which is mostly cinematographic but also pictorial.
I like when fashion is impregnate with references. I also have elegance's codes like graphics of black and white (usually I don't like prints!) that I can translate either into a bourgeois or a neo-gothic style.
KdS : What does Laurent Dombrowicz schedule look like? Is it as complex as we could imagine? How much of your time do you give to magazine editorials?
LD : I think that to be a « good » stylist you don't need to be obsessed with clothes. It's just the emerging part of the iceberg. I love clothes, that's for sure. But first of all our job consists in creating image, therefore dream. I'd like to be surrounded by young people (it's been two years that I work with my extraordinary assistant who is actually 20) or to observe them, the way they live, almost in their every day life's rituals . It's my way to not to stay “young” but to be aware of what's new. It's also something I need to pass on to my clients, such as L'Oreal who ask me to translate the fashion trends in a sociological way. It may seem futile, but having lunch at a terrace can be really instructive.
On week ends flea markets are a must (by personal taste AND to observe the work of art or consummation stuff that our society recycle) wherever I'm in the world. For the time left, the work of a stylist is spent essentially on the phone with press offices or production or on the computer organising iconographic researches, shooting, planning for the season or meeting with photographers or models. And we're closer from the 35 hours per day than per week !
KdS : How much time do you spend on magazine editorials?
LD : About 80%. It's huge but necessary if you want to make really beautiful subjects.
KdS : How many shoots do you style each season?
LD : About 15 – 20 editorials men and women together and beauty subjects included. About 10 for advertising.
KdS : What is your best shoot ever, the one you will never forget? Why?
LD :
There are two. One fashion photoshoot with Isabelle Adjani for Citizen K magazine with photographer Greg Lotus. She has a magnetism that goes way beyond on any beauty or madness consideration.
Usually I don't like pictures with VIPS, because of a too “policed” and invading entourage but Isabelle Adjani is someone who escapes from every kind of standard or control. The other one is a male fashion subject around Mozart's figure with Tyen. I adore this photographer with whom I have a very unique complicity. We like to throw ourselves mutual challenges to push further style's ones but always in its neo classical spirit. For this shoot we had many models including two amazing boys (Jarod and Lucien) and Tyen as usual changed this subject into a metaphor from perversion to seduction.
KdS : Laurent, do you remember our first meeting?
LD : The first time we met was in 1990 when you had your first office rue Etienne Marcel. I came advised and oriented by a friend, colleague and compatriot, Pascale Renaux, to interview the Swedish designer Marcel Marongiu who was at that time a breakthrough designer. You were exactly as you are today enthusiastic, very professional and a little bit boosted.
KdS : I think that in our own way, we both influenced the mid nineties fashion. How do you explain the media coverage on our collaboration around Olivier Theyskens?
LD :
Olivier Theyskens with all he represented was a dreamed meat for the Medias. Extremely young with his androgyny beauty and talented without being trash… The Madonna effect that totem initiated even before his very first show, even before I created what would be his firm, was an incredible almost unbelievable detonator. Actually it was beyond everyone's belief. We used this “bombshell” to explain to customers who wanted to buy the collections (which was not for sale) that Madonna had the exclusivity.
It was driving them crazy and they were all booking appointments to buy the collection six months in advance.
With Jeremy Scott and few others Olivier was part of this young designers generation (not mentioning those who work for big brands) whom Press agreed to allow some credit. The Tom Ford era changed everything. Today being a yound designer is not even difficult but also not necessarily valuable. In a way Magazines would like the Young to be rich, famous and profitable already. Then the media strategy and the beauty of his collections were the catalyst to confirm and emphasize Olivier's notoriety, mostly in the US. I think that every designer needs a fairy, a Pygmalion or another protective creature. Kuki de Salvertes and myself have been without any doubt Olivier's. Without us he would have had an interesting career thanks to his remarkable talent. But not at 20 and not THIS career!KdS : Laurent, is there a life after styling? If yes, what are your future projects?
LD :
If you don't want to become a museum creature like the divine Anna Piaggi or
an old bitter director (I won't quote any name) you have to develop not only
different aspects of the stylist's business but also provide real consulting
and analysis. Offer to magazines but also to fashion brands or to other kind
of business the singularity of our eye. Being multi-disciplinary is obviously
better. I have the chance to be a journalist as well which helps me to communicate
my thoughts about the present and the future, beyond the pictures I create with
photographers. After seven years of a tight collaboration with Citizen K magazine
I finally find my full freedom again. I believe in extremes: in the high luxury
and in the underground. No room for lukewarm as our friend Donatella Versace
says. It is the same thing for magazines. I'm now turning towards this bipolarity
with multiple and interesting propositions.
