Alfie – The Sustainable Fashion Brand for Feminine Tomboys

ANDREW AND SARAH ARE MEETING ALICE FRESNEL, THE FOUNDER OF ALFIE, IN THE BRAND’S STUDIO IN SAINT-GERMAIN-DES-PRÉS, PARIS. THE PLACE HAS A SUMMERY, WARM, AND WELCOMING ATMOSPHERE. THERE ARE FRESH PEONIES ON THE TABLE, CANDLES BURNING ON THE FIRE PLACE, AND FABRIC STACKS LAYING NEATLY PREPARED ON THE SOFA. IN THE BACK OF THE ROOM, YOU CAN STEP DOWN INTO THE ALFIE SHOWROOM. IT LOOKS LIKE A SMALL WINE CELLAR FILLED WITH CLOTHING RACKS. ALICE INTRODUCES US TO THE SPRING/SUMMER 2022 COLLECTION, WHICH WITH ITS BRIGHT COLORS SETS YOU IN AN INSTANT GOOD MOOD. ALL HER GARMENTS ARE MADE WITH HAUTE COUTURE LEFTOVER FABRICS IN PARIS. ON THE TAGS ALICE GIVES THE DETAILS ABOUT WHERE THE FABRIC COMES FROM, AND NUMBERS EACH PIECE. MANY OF THEM ONLY EXIST IN A VERY LIMITED QUANTITY, WHICH IS WHY SHE ALSO CALLS THEM ‘COLLECTIBLES’.

words by SARAH MARIE FRANKEN
photographs by ANDREW DAY

Sarah: Your brand’s slogan is ‘Borrowed from the boys’. How does this translate into your designs?

Alice: I take inspiration from masculine garments and transform them into feminine designs by using nice and refined fabrics and cuts that are perfect for women’s silhouettes. Some of the menswear garments I use for inspiration are basic oversized collar shirts, cargo pants, and boxer shorts.

How did you come up with this concept?

I have always been feminine, but I was never attracted to tight dresses, skirts and all the clothing pieces typical for women. I really feel like there is a gap in the fashion industry between the tomboy brands and the really feminine ones. When I decided to launch Alfie, reaching the right balance between femininity and masculinity was my ultimate goal. I wanted to design feminine clothes without using the typical feminine garments.

You told me earlier that you have a twin brother and a younger brother. Do they have something to do with the design direction?

Not at the moment when I launched Alfie, but probably during my whole life before. I also have a lot of cousins, so I was always hanging out with the boys and was up for any adventures with them when we were kids. It wasn’t really fitting to wear dresses and skirts, so I just found myself borrowing a lot of their shirts. Actually, my twin brother is kind of skinny, so I used to borrow his jeans as well!

“I really feel like there is a gap in the fashion industry between the tomboy brands and the really feminine ones.”

Alice Fresnel

That’s awesome. Cargo pants are one of your brand’s staples. Did you also borrow them from your brothers?

They had a lot of cargo pants and shorts and all of these garments, but they never really fitted me if I would have taken them out of their wardrobes. I wanted to have my own, and that’s what I did within Alfie.

Do you design all the pieces yourself?

Yes, I do.

You didn’t study design though, you studied marketing, didn’t you?

Exactly, I studied the business side of fashion at Parsons. I feel like designing is not the hardest part for me, because I have a pattern maker that I show the drawings to, and she brings life into the garments. And then it is just a lot of attention to details when we do the fittings, which can take a really long time. To me it is all about being super attentive to the details.

So you do the drawings yourself?

Yes! And I just want to point out that you don’t have to know how to draw to launch your fashion brand. I don’t feel like my drawings are the best. Sometimes I just print out model bases that I find on Google and draw on top of them. I really think you don’t need drawing skills. You just need a vision and to be sure of the garment you want to have at the end.

Where do you take inspiration from?

Weirdly I think for the shapes it’s the 90s, very minimalistic, very straight to the point, simple garments. But for the colors, I am very much attracted to the 70s. I love orange, I love pink, I love yellow.

And these colors are a big part of your current Spring/Summer 2022 collection! What is the collection about?

I think this one is the most colorful collection I have done until now! It is a breath of fresh air after Covid and all the confinement, and all that is happening in the world right now. I wanted to make a collection that is just happy, bright and beautiful.

I love that! Do you have a favorite piece from the collection?

Yes, the khaki cargo pants I am wearing right now! I think they are the most elegant cargos that we have done since the beginning. Every cargo before was really versatile and you could have worn it for every occasion. But this one is actually a blend of silk and viscose, a deadstock fabric from Fendi. So, these ones are really fragile. But it is the most beautiful piece, I love it!

Let’s talk about the fabrics! They are all deadstock fabrics, where do you find them?

For the first two years, I would just go to ‘Le Sentier’ in Paris and get lost in the streets with all these fabric stores! And then a new start-up opened from LVMH, it is called ‘Nona Source’. You book an appointment and go to their showroom where they show you all the fabrics. They can tell you the brand it is from and the year it was used for their original collection. It is much easier, and you can be 100% sure that you’re getting high-quality fabrics.

That’s such a great start-up! Did you have a favorite fabric of this summer’s collection?

The very thin viscose from Céline I have showed you earlier! I have it in pink and yellow. It is really comfy to wear, and yet I think the sexiest pieces of the collection. With this fabric we made the skirt, the dress and the polo shirt. They are so comfortable, and that is exactly what I am trying to do. When the design is feminine, it has to be really comfy and easy to move in. And when it’s a typical masculine garment, the fabric has to be very feminine and elegant.

You have also told me, that this is the first collection where you go a bit more to the feminine side.

Yes. These pieces are a little touch of the 90s in the collection. Even though the 90s were very minimalistic and simple, it was a very feminine era.

What is your all-time bestseller?

Definitely the cargo pants. Just yesterday I had a client who came by the studio to try them on, and she ended up taking three of them! It is kind of crazy, the customers that come back often take the same piece again.

“When the design is feminine, it has to be really comfy and easy to move in. And when it’s a typical masculine garment, the fabric has to be very feminine and elegant.”

Alice Fresnel

How do you name your pieces?

Very straight-forward and simple. Usually, I take the name they already have in French or English: ‘Le Cargo’, ‘La Jupe Tube’, ‘La Homme Shirt’, or ‘La Polo Dress’.

Do you work in drops or collections?

At the beginning we were working in drops, but since the fashion industry is still very traditional, we had to align with it and make two collections a year. Unfortunately, you kind of have to get into the schedule of Spring/Summer and the Autumn/Winter collections, if you want to be sold at different stores. I think this way of working is starting to change though. There are a lot of young brands starting within the last 5 years that don’t work in this traditional way.

True! Where are the garments sown?

In Paris, in an atelier in the 2nd arrondissement.

Do they also do the pattern making there?

Sometimes, but mostly I collaborate with a pattern maker outside of the atelier, who I really trust. She does an amazing job. I usually go to her with my drawings, then she does the patterns, she brings life to the clothes and once the patterns are perfect, I take them to the atelier to be sown.

It is all made within such a small radius, everything is made in Paris!

Yes! Actually within 2 kilometers.

When did you learn about sustainable fashion?

I feel like I grew into wanting sustainable clothes. I really don’t go to Zara, Mango and all these stores anymore. I know this is difficult, there are not a lot of stores that do affordable clothes that are sustainable. It is really a challenging topic, because producing sustainable is super expensive at the moment. I started to be aware of sustainable fashion through the media bashing the fast fashion stores and fast consumption. And now I am super aware of it and stay away from it.

Was there a specific book, or a lecture in university that was a turning point for you?

I don’t think there was a particular moment. It was just something I heard a lot around me. Parsons as an American university has been pushing sustainability and all these really important subjects for a long time already. I feel like in France it is just becoming a thing. But in America it has been a topic already when I have studied there. There was not a specific class on sustainability, it was just seen as normal that if you want to have a fashion brand in the 21st century, it has to be sustainable.

“There was not a specific class on sustainability, it was just seen as normal that if you want to have a fashion brand in the 21st century, it has to be sustainable.”

Alice Fresnel

Can you tell us more about your studies, you have studied at Parsons in New York as well as in Paris?

I started here at Parsons Paris for one year, and didn’t really like it. I went to Parsons for the American way of teaching, which is super different from the French way. I decided to do 6 months abroad in Sydney, and then did the rest of my curriculum in America. And I loved it!

What was the moment when you have decided to start Alfie?

It is very funny. After I graduated from Parsons, I did a master in luxury management at Bocconi in Milan. And for the last 6 months of the masters, we had the choice to either get in groups and work on a project for big identities such as Net-a-Porter or Gucci, or to do our own personal project. By this point, I was already really interested in sustainability and all these new ways in which brands are developing, so I decided that I work on my own brand for the final presentation. And it became real, really fast. I think 2 months into it already. The project had to be really complete, I had to research all the ateliers in Paris, all the pricing. I got really, really into it. One of the final judges was our merchandising professor, who really doesn’t believe in online shopping. The initial idea of Alfie was that I would sell exclusively online, and everything would have been made to order. Only once I would get the order, I would start the production, which was a zero-waste concept. When I presented it to him, he loved it! He told me that I really have to launch this project and that he really believed in it. I was very surprised because he normally hated everything online! So, I went for it. And two and a half year later, here we are!

That’s a great story! How did you decide on the name Alfie?

It has been my nickname since a few years. I guess it is a short version of my full name Alice Fresnel. It became my personal Instagram handle, and when I launched the brand, I thought it is easy to pronounce in every language, and it is easy to remember.

What do you enjoy most about your work?

The creation part. When I am just by myself drawing for days and days and imagining the new garments and silhouettes. And my second favorite thing is shopping for the fabrics.

I can imagine, that must be so much fun. What was a challenge within your work?

I think getting sold at stores was the biggest challenge. There were a lot of people saying no because they found that they didn’t have enough pieces to select from, or that the production wasn’t big enough. And lots of buyers would tell me that when they see my email and it is titled SS22, they don’t even open it, because they have spent their budget a year ago. Even though at this point summer 2022 hasn’t started. So that was a big challenge, and a time when I asked myself a lot of questions. I considered designing a year in advance to sell to more stores. But I decided to keep my production as it is, because this is really special about Alfie, and how I work best creatively. And eventually some stores opened their doors to me, which I am very grateful for. I am sure that even the biggest stores will get out of that very traditional way of doing things at some point soon.

“I considered designing a year in advance to sell to more stores. But I decided to keep my production as it is, because this is really special about Alfie, and how I work best creatively.”

Alice Fresnel

I agree. What was a moment when you felt particularly proud within your work?

I think the first article that I got in Vogue. That was crazy. As a girl I would see my mom buying the magazine, so that was very big moment!

Do you have any tips for young designers who want to start their own brand?

Like I said before, if they don’t know how to draw, that’s not an issue. You can even design on Illustrator or Photoshop by now. Or you can go collages. In the end, only your vision is important. Also, something that is very challenging is following your ideas all along. You will have a lot of people advising you on what they think you should do. Don’t be afraid to say no and follow your own vision. It can be an indicator that you’re building a brand that is different and that is going to make a difference. There is no point today in launching a fashion brand to be like everyone else. There are so many people in the market. When people are trying to put you back in the same line as everyone else, I think that is when you know you’re doing something right.

“Don’t be afraid to say no and follow your own vision. It can be an indicator that you’re building a brand that is different and that is going to make a difference.”

Alice Fresnel

How do you know which advice to take as helpful criticism and which ones not to follow?

I think I am still learning how to deal with it. I always ask a lot of questions, because I am trying to learn from people with more experience. That’s why I hear a lot of opinions and get different advice. I just try to consider if the advice they give me comes from too traditional thinking or not, and look from my own perspective if it would make sense to my brand.

Last question: what is the piece you wear the most from all the collections?

It’s a cargo pants I have made in collaboration with Moda Operandi. It is dark blue with white pinstripes. It is a fabric from actual menswear suits. It was the design that was sold out the fastest, and people still ask me about it today!

So nice, you have to show them to me! Thank you so much for taking the time! It was so interesting!

Absolutely. It was my pleasure!

alfieparis.com

Further Reading