Marie Louis Launches FW18 Collection

A leading Egyptian women fashion brand since 1989, Marie Louis just launched their latest Fall/Winter 2018 collection and it is next-level impressive. The fashion show event took place last Tuesday at the luxurious Manial Palace, where fans and media gathered to see what the renowned designer had been cooking for the last eight months.

While the founder of the label, Marie Louis, had been working on the collection for so long, she told us, “Fashion is always a last-minute business. Most of the pieces that you would like or notice in the show are pieces that I added in the last 48 hours.”

Believe it or not, the collection is big and diverse enough to hold three themes. The first one is inspired by old semi-precious stone colors, including fuchsia, mauve, amethyst and turquoise. The other theme is earthy colors, which entails browns, oranges, olives, brick colors and even flowery embroidery. These resemble nature during the fall season because it’s what you see in the early month of October when the tree leaves are falling.

As for the last theme, Marie presented a gold and black color palette which she says takes us to an era of luxury and red carpets, festivals and movies. You’ll also see small capes, dresses that are completely made of Lurex, small jackets with zippers and very long and sleek, off-white salopettes. The lines of those wide-legged salopettes and wide capes were inspired by Pierre Cardin, a French designer in the 60s who used to create lines that were very geometrical.

When asked about where she draws her inspiration from, Marie told us that anything could inspire her, whether a piece of music or nice scenery. “My eyes are very sensitive. They capture images that I keep and develop later [in a design]. The sleek lines on the new BMW car created [and displayed] in the latest fair in Geneva for automobile inspired me, for example. I kept those pictures for another collection coming out in the spring. We can get leather of the same color and do something very modern and avant-garde.”

What some people don’t know is that BTM has been a successful, thriving family business since 1960. Marie gives all the credit to her father and late mother who founded the brand and backed her throughout the whole journey, even when things weren’t going well with the economy.

We asked her about how the fashion industry has changed in Egypt throughout the years and she said, “I think we are at a point in time where there is a potential for everybody to prove his/her power and sustainability. This is the key for young designer to stay in the industry. As a president of the EFDC (Egyptian Fashion & Design Council), I will announce that in 2020, we are working on creating the first fashion week for Egypt. We want the young designers to be ready to represent Egypt along the international brands.”

Her daughter, Anne Marie, will be launching her own collection by the end of the first week of December. We’re excited to see what she comes up with but if you’re expecting something identical to her mother’s designs, think again. The young designer seems to have a strong identity of her own.

By Sarah Guirguis