Sarah Burton - Designer, Creative Director of Givenchy

[proseccotabis]

She deserves at least that! When all men do it Sarah can do it too! And better, waaay better! 🥰

right? we support this queen!

 

[tourbillions]

The wipe out is already giving.

 

[Phuel]

"We must go back to the basics, to shape, to cut. Realize something that is both simple and beautiful is much more difficult". Spot on.

Vogue Italia March 2025
"Le Radici del Futuro"
Photographer: Annie Leibovitz
Feature story: Mark Holgate



They are arranged on a table in his Parisian office on Avenue George V some clues of “his” Givenchy. This is a series of lookbook of the first collection (the one from 1952) designed by founder of the maison, Hubert de Givenchy, with images front/black and white back of each dress. Strictly architectural models, but not without a certain sinuosity, sometimes with touch bizarre of a leopard bag. Next to it, a stack of patterns calico from the first two Givenchy collections. Inexplicably ended up behind a wall of the old atelier, they were discovered during a renovation.

Unearthing the past to project ourselves into the future: exactly what Sarah Burton has been doing since she arrived at Givenchy, last September, awaiting the debut at the A/W fashion shows 2025-2026 in Paris. “There have been so many interpretations of it,” says the designer about the maison, which, in recent decades, is was directed by, among others, John Galliano, Clare Waight Keller and Riccardo Tisci, as well as her own former boss and mentor, Alexander “Lee” McQueen, whose brand she has led since 2010 (year of the founder's passing) to 2023. «I think that to move forward we need to go back to the origins, so as to be able to grasp the essence of a maison”.

Browse the lookbooks, commenting on the various models. «This was it a somewhat Hitchcock-like silhouette", she observes. «It's all a question of shape and construction. He used simple fabrics, such as cotton and silk. Maybe what I do won't be like that, but I like the idea to prune and create clothes for the human body, not for Instagram, with the help of a team of incredible people who still make things with their hands. And people have to feel it when they wear the clothes”.

If there is a person capable of grasping the emotional side of fashion, that's Burton. Her McQueen featured layers of almost high fashion craftsmanship, and she had the ability to evoke feelings in almost everything she drew. Her imagination is as powerful as her cutting ability is masterful in construction. If you try to imagine what her debut will be like, her statement «I love tailoring» is probably a good one starting point. «I'm interested in developing new silhouettes, which I hope they bring a touch of freshness to tailoring", she says. "Sometimes they will be clear, decisive, cut with a male hand, others will be sexier, seen from a female perspective. I want to build a wardrobe that includes all this. And I mean starting from the skeleton. At the center of Givenchy is the silhouette, and the effect it creates behind it is no less important than what it looks like from the front.”

And she continues: «Givenchy has a very beautiful story. To attract me it's the fact that it's a small house and that it's based in Paris. Me I like Hubert de Givenchy's relationship with the women he dressed: he was very empathetic." Burton is currently commuting between London and the French capital, where she is looking for an apartment: «I love it this city,” she says. «For years I have organized fashion shows here, but not there I really knew.”

Burton had previously worked for Givenchy, although not in a capacity official. She arrived at McQueen in 1997, when the founder of brand was making Paris gasp with its fantastic collections for Givenchy, sometimes sci-fi inspired, and she came often sent there, from London, with the props that McQueen created in her Hoxton studio. “I once traveled on the Eurostar with a robot at my feet,” she says.

The arrival at Givenchy followed a year-long break who worked in her small studio in central London, enjoying the idea of creating for the pure pleasure of doing it. «Power you stopping allows you to see everything more clearly and reconnect with yourself,” she says. This period allowed her to achieve the clarity necessary to start again. Now, on the threshold of debut, asks herself the same question that, in all likelihood, haunted Hubert de Givenchy seven decades ago, when he launched his brand: How do women dress today? «It's about living in real life, not to wear museum pieces,” says Burton. «Nothing too much elaborate. We must go back to the basics, to shape, to cut. Realize something that is both simple and beautiful is much more difficult".

 

[FashionPower]

I hope she can balance the commercial and artistic side of her tenure and dedicate the right attention to both business. Clare failed miserably in that, her RTW shows were super inconsistent ranging from streetstyle mess (that was coherent to her persona) to basic blandness, however her couture shows were amazing and even got the right amount of PR publicity.

 

[Frederic01]

Elle Fanning Debuts Sarah Burton’s Givenchy on the Oscars Red Carpet​

Some stars always look good, but Elle Fanning is part of the fashion industry family. So it makes sense that to attend her first-ever Academy Awards, she’d also make a bit of fashion history.

On Friday, Sarah Burton will present her debut collection as the creative director of Givenchy at Paris Fashion Week. But those tuning into the Oscars on Sunday night got a sneak peek of what the designer is going to bring to the table as the new head of the French luxury brand. Fanning was wearing the first Givenchy Couture gown ever designed by Burton.

“I absolutely love this dress,” Fanning told E News on the red carpet. “It’s actually very special. Sarah Burton, who was the designer for Alexander McQueen for a while, is now the designer for Givenchy, but she hasn’t shown a collection yet. So I get to wear...the first Sarah Burton design as designer of Givenchy.”


W MAGAZINE

 

[BalkaniStaCouture]

Elle Fanning Debuts Sarah Burton’s Givenchy on the Oscars Red Carpet​

Some stars always look good, but Elle Fanning is part of the fashion industry family. So it makes sense that to attend her first-ever Academy Awards, she’d also make a bit of fashion history.

On Friday, Sarah Burton will present her debut collection as the creative director of Givenchy at Paris Fashion Week. But those tuning into the Oscars on Sunday night got a sneak peek of what the designer is going to bring to the table as the new head of the French luxury brand. Fanning was wearing the first Givenchy Couture gown ever designed by Burton.

“I absolutely love this dress,” Fanning told E News on the red carpet. “It’s actually very special. Sarah Burton, who was the designer for Alexander McQueen for a while, is now the designer for Givenchy, but she hasn’t shown a collection yet. So I get to wear...the first Sarah Burton design as designer of Givenchy.”

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W MAGAZINE

Also Timothee in yellow!

 

[Frederic01]

Also Timothee in yellow!

Like his A Complete Unknown co-star Elle Fanning, Chalamet’s Givenchy outfit is designed by its newly-appointed creative director Sarah Burton. It featured a cropped suit coat and a matching button-down worn underneath. Already, the pairing was outside of the usual boring black suits the Oscars’s male attendees usually go for. But instead of matching dress pants, Chalamet slipped on loose-fitting trousers that were cut like a pair of baggy jeans: see the belt loops, rivets, and some exposed stitching.


W MAGAZINE

 

[FashionFanatico]

Elle Fanning Debuts Sarah Burton’s Givenchy on the Oscars Red Carpet​

Some stars always look good, but Elle Fanning is part of the fashion industry family. So it makes sense that to attend her first-ever Academy Awards, she’d also make a bit of fashion history.

On Friday, Sarah Burton will present her debut collection as the creative director of Givenchy at Paris Fashion Week. But those tuning into the Oscars on Sunday night got a sneak peek of what the designer is going to bring to the table as the new head of the French luxury brand. Fanning was wearing the first Givenchy Couture gown ever designed by Burton.

“I absolutely love this dress,” Fanning told E News on the red carpet. “It’s actually very special. Sarah Burton, who was the designer for Alexander McQueen for a while, is now the designer for Givenchy, but she hasn’t shown a collection yet. So I get to wear...the first Sarah Burton design as designer of Givenchy.”

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W MAGAZINE

i am sorry, not sorry: but this fanning sis makes something boring even more boring.....

 

[jeanclaude]

Elle Yawning with that dress. And Tim looks like a teenager with his older brother clothes.

 

[Kanzai]

That Haider TF suit backs in the Golden Globes was better.

 

[LasagneDelRey]

He’s pushing 30 and still looks like a twink

 

[Balthier]

Like his A Complete Unknown co-star Elle Fanning, Chalamet’s Givenchy outfit is designed by its newly-appointed creative director Sarah Burton. It featured a cropped suit coat and a matching button-down worn underneath. Already, the pairing was outside of the usual boring black suits the Oscars’s male attendees usually go for. But instead of matching dress pants, Chalamet slipped on loose-fitting trousers that were cut like a pair of baggy jeans: see the belt loops, rivets, and some exposed stitching.

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W MAGAZINE

This is an ill fitting nightmare.

The break of the trousers is sloppy. Wtf is that crease under the armpit? It looks equally bad from the back… like it’s made of cardboard. It doesn’t even sit well in the waist… basics… what happened here?

 

[Avonlea]

Elle's gown looks like it was designed during a dressmaking class.

 

[JohannesL]

Elle's gown looks like it was designed during a dressmaking class.

Or came from a local bridal shop.

 

[JohannesL]

He’s pushing 30 and still looks like a twink

Maybe it is time to upgrade his wardrobe as he has stuck with this skinny silhouette since the beginning of his career. It would be refreshing if he had made the traditional sartorial choice for once.

 

[Snejana Onopka]

timothee looks like a tube of kewpie mayo at a takoyaki kiosk

 

[TaylorBinque]

Definitely less impactful than they wish. I wonder did she hold it back or something. Even her custom McQueen look better than this.

 

[GivenchyHomme]

Elle's gown looks like it was designed during a dressmaking class.

It looks old fashioned and dusty, like they pulled it directly from the archives. It is in desperate need of a modern update, or better yet a whole new dress altogether!

 

[justpassingthrough]

I have a feeling this is going to be a rough ride

 

[blueorchid]

I just find her work, at its best to be so dull. I guess she's trying to refer to Old Hollywood/Audrey Hepburn with that boring dress... yawn.