Celine

Sarah Joyce, thanks so much for coming in to us this morning.

forget Paris we were talking a lot about Paris Fashion Week and Celine and everything yesterday absolutely nailing the L'Oreal show but we're forgetting Paris we're forgetting London and we're forgetting Milan because all eyes of course are on Irish Fashion Week it's going to kick off for its second year October 7th and Ashley McDonnell is the brains behind the operation and she is in studio looking fabulous this morning I wouldn't expect anything less it's lovely to see you

lovely to see you as well thank you so much for having me wearing Eva

McNamara yes so is that your thing now that you just don't wear anything that's not Irish You know what?

But, like, if it's working in store, then none of that matters, and it's still at least making us think.

Does this feel a bit like, remember when Hedi did the first Celine collection and we were all-

Oh my God

... like, very stressed out, and then the second runway show, was that, like-

But yeah, so Balenciaga, Hermès, which is actually an Italian brand.

Um, Hermès, Givenchy, Céline, Schiaparelli, which obviously is Italian, and then Loewe.

I'm also thinking Chloé, et cetera.

Yeah So those are some of the more well-known fashion brands that are based in the four major fashion cities.

Did you swap for it?

I just swapped a pair of Celine shoes that were doing nothing in my closet-

Yeah

... except giving me pain every day.

Mm.

And it wasn't until I was really, like, in the, in the swing of the job where then the invites were coming to me, being like, "Celine, dear Billy Bardot, we would love to have you at the show." I'm like, "What? Are you sure? Are you sure?" Or like, you know, I don't, fucking see me in the eighth row, I don't care.

But, um, I th- I, I think part of me still will, will always feel slightly imposter about the whole thing because I see the women who it comes so naturally to, and I've never put myself in the same category.

Yeah, but I think from the outside looking in, you disrupted that industry in a way that was so needed.

Yeah.

But at the time we were just trying to make it through the day.

Bro, if I got an invite saying, "Sasha Pillay inviting you to Celine," I would assume it was a ticket to Celine Dion live.

[laughs] Would be thrilled.

You need to come to the Galeries Lafayette Store or to Dover Street in London, but I think the Galeries Lafayette Store, the people who work there are truly amazing.

I feel like w- a few of them worked at Celine when she was there.

They're, they totally get it.

They are ... kind to everybody.

opportunities

like listen Whatever was allegedly happening at Phoebe Philo's comeback, the way that people talk about what was going on behind the scenes there allegedly, like, that immediately disqualifies a person like Phoebe Philo from having funding, despite the impact of her time at Celine, despite how many people love her clothes, despite the fact that 99% of this whole current wave of fashion is because of her influence during her tenure, right? You know, people will say, oh, there's like all this buzz about what it's like behind the scenes.

And that disqualifies a female designer from participating in the fashion industry, from holding a major house, from basically allowing any sort of platform to women or even just designers of color, specifically Black female designers, but God forbid also, you know, Black male designers, Asian designers, all of it, they are held to a standard that genius white men like John Galliano are simply not held to because people think genius white men are rarefied and deserve to be protected.

The fashion class is aging rapidly, and they are from a time where when, you know, the Boys Club was still the modus operandi for all of their behavior and all of the way that they kept things going.