Myriam Girard‘s studio is inside her SE1 home, which has great views of the London skyline; from the roof you can see the Tower of London, as well as the Gherkin and Cheesegrater. Myriam is a charming host, offering me Mariage Frères tea and some vin santo and waves away my hesitation with the explanation of ‘it’s Friday!’
We sit down with cannolis and chat about her move from events and PR to setting up her own company. A friend of a friend, we met last year and bonded over a love of fabrics and our Frenchy status. She’s a warm and effervescent person, which I guess are qualities you need when you’re selling something as intimate as underwear. Her French accent makes every word she says sound nice, even the words ‘butt crack’, which she says. A lot! We end up on the roof snapping pictures of her pieces as the sun sets, trying to not let them fly away…
Do you think there’s a difference between the way that English and French women wear lingerie?
Here they don’t mind being a little more sexy with their lingerie, brands like Agent Provocateur do well because English people like this kind of sexy. French people are more classic, they wouldn’t buy something peekaboo, but in another way the French like the frills and the lace, it’s part of the culture.
I bought my first suspender belt with my mum, I didn’t even have a boyfriend but it’s part of your heritage to have lingerie.
The word comes from linge (linen/cloth), when you get married you get linge with it, you make yourself a bridal trousseau, you embroider your bedsheets and you and your family make your linge de nuit, your nightclothes, so it’s probably a tradition that has lived on.
Whereas in England if you buy lingerie it’s ‘I want to look sexy for a guy’ but in France it’s more, I buy it because I am sexy?
Yes! The white bra… the nude bra… What for? I want to see some lace! It doesn’t matter if it shows through a tee-shirt.
What inspires you with your collections?
Most of the time I get inspired by paintings of women in general, I do like the idea of everything that started from the Art Nouveau movement with people like Klimt. When women stopped wearing corsets and started wearing things that fit on the body but didn’t restrain them. I make everything cut on the bias so I want everything to float and look nice on the body, but I don’t anyone to be squeezed or feel uncomfortable. Everybody’s got something to hide, so it’s good when you feel nice the way you are, I like those little slips. It’s crepe de chine which I sandwash for that peachy effect and then you can wear that, in the US they wear it under a wrap dress with a bit of lace showing through.
It’s the same idea with the teddy it’s nice and comfortable, you can adjust it if you want, it’s very sexy because you can show a bit of the hip, it’s relaxed. It’s more sexy than when you do it over the top. It’s to feel good with what you have, you don’t have to be someone else.
What’s the type of lace you use?
It’s the French leavers lace, it actually comes from England, made around the Industrial North of England and they invented a machine that replicates the movement of the hand in the 1800s because lace sue dto be made by hand. So they made a traditional machine and you make the lace with those machine, and because they starting raising taxes and the production was too expensive so they moved it to Calais, the production stopped in England and the French took over. But technically the Brits invented it!
And you select your colours yourself, what about the red?
That’s my colour, I made it. You know when you have berries, crushed berries in the summer. So what I tried to do with the colours, if you don’t wear makeup it’s fine. I just want women to be themselves and feel good, so you can wear it in the morning and if you don’t have any makeupyou still look good. It’s like the blush pink as well, it still looks good and flatters the skin, there’s nothing harsh or too bright.
Are you always in matching underwear?
I don’t wear matching bra and knickers, not that often. Perhaps if I know I’m going out and I have a nice dress, it’s not for a guy, it’s more the idea of the whole outfit, it’s nice to have.
In France what’s sexy we say it’s not what you can see, it’s what what you can guess, so see a peek of lace a little strap, you can imagine, so it’s the whole idea of sensuality, rather than ‘hello! I’m here’ So that’s what I try to do with my brand, being sexy is more in your head than your outfit. It’s more the woman that wears the lingerie and presents it how she feels, rather than the lingerie making the woman.
