Julien Dossena to design Jean Paul Gaultier’s next couture collection

By

Dominique Muret

Translated by
Nicola Mira

Published
Mar 27, 2023

Julien Dossena will design the next haute couture collection by Jean Paul Gautier. The French label has heralded this new collaborative effort as “a fusion of the creative DNAs of Paco Rabanne and Jean Paul Gaultier.” The fruit of this cooperation will be unveiled during the next Paris haute couture week, in July 2023. 

Gaultier and Dossena had met only once, briefly, during a photo shoot a few years ago. This is the first time that Dossena, who since 2013 has been in charge of style at Paco Rabanne – a label owned by the Puig group, like Jean Paul Gaultier – will be working on haute couture. Three weeks ago, Dossena began immersing himself in the archives and eclectic world of the Parisian label, which its founder, fashion’s 'enfant terrible', exited in 2020.

Gaultier sold his label to Catalan group Puig in 2011 and stopped producing ready-to-wear collections in 2015. He brought his career to an end with a last haute couture collection presented in January 2020, in a memorable show at the Châtelet theatre in Paris.

Since then, the label led by Antoine Gagey has reintroduced ready-to-wear fashion, launching a sailor-themed collection in 2021, created in collaboration with five emerging designers. Jean Paul Gaultier then revamped its e-tail site, and has relaunched its haute couture collections by asking young, well-known guest designers to reinterpret the label’s codes.
 
The first to try their hand at this exercise was Chitose Abe, the Japanese designer of French label Sacai, in July 2021. She was followed by Y/Project’s Belgian designer Glenn Martens in January 2022, by Olivier Rousteing in July 2022 and Haider Ackermann in January 2023.