When Valentina Schuchner won the BA fashion authors contest, just before the isolation brought by the pandemic, she did not imagine that five years later she would be rearming her associated homonym firm no less than her mother. This is Vanesa Brites, who has extensive experience in molding, finished product development and a party dresses for teenagers. Another fact to keep in mind is that both, mother and daughter, come from families linked to clothing and textiles.
Where do we stop as a brand? ”They wonder, after the first joint collection in the recent autumn-winter edition of Bafweek, in the Golden Hall of the House of Culture of the City of Buenos Aires, inspired nothing less than in An own roomthe work of Virginia Woolf that became an unavoidable reference for the emancipation of women, both economic and creative.
“Everything that was seen on the catwalk arose from us in this room,” they express in their Belgrano Barrancas showroom. It is worth literary reference – and literal – since, precisely, That room was also the place where Valentina faced adolescence and carried out her years as a student At the University of Palermo.
In that same place, it is where they now meet with Vanesa to crack the garments with focus on artisanal work, in a contrast that includes a pale color palette and subtle details and, at the same time, strength features represented in geometric cuts, in an imprint that oscillates between the Dark and the romantic.
In dialogue with Viva, the designers review the last catwalk, how they assemble with each other and what they aspire for the brand.
-How are they organized internally and what does each one of the knowledge you have?
-Valentina: I don’t love to socializeIt has to do with my shyness. I am more introverted. Instead, I love my mom.
-Vanese: We both have in common that we are very critical, quite demanding with things. We do not give us the same as a dress looks like a thread. That is a value. We think about it until we finished finding the return. We like to understand the person who arrives, who is, what he is looking for, how we see it. LPeople take us as a reference and trust what we are going to propose.
“We design with our clients”: a proposal that combines listening, intuition and own style. Photo: Gentileza Bafweek -Valentina: I like that. I feel we design with them.
-Do they have everything they ask for or is there a limit?
-Valentina: At first I wanted to make a coat rack and let people take. Then we began to fall as possible and not to say that “no”, it happened to us that they asked us for a green dress with feathers. You have to find the way. And at no time do we plan to do brides, and now the business is going for that side.
-Vanese: That was a surprise for us.
-Did they looked at mouth?
-Valentina: I feel that because of the image I gave, when doing everything in black and white, people understood that I was girlfriends, but I never communicated it like that.
-The clothing they make has some formality, but at the same time it is decontracted.
-Valentina: Now we have a black girlfriend. A genius.
-Vanese: it is a flash what happens. Some say they don’t want to be like traditional brides.
-Valentina: They don’t want to use white, either crowded. They want more modern brides.
-To tone with this was that women want to be comfortable and without disguising…
-Vanesa: They want to continue being them.
-Valentina: The idea is to make collection dresses so that the color and some modification can be changed. And if the dress and fabric works, we do it.
Dresses that tell stories: romanticism and strength in each seam. Photo: Gentileza Bafweek -Who are your clients?
-Valentina: It is very varied. They are usually people I admire a lot. They are always creative, you can be an illustrator of the New York Times or another who advertises for Netflix.
-Vanesa: It can also be a lawyer who tells us to do what we want.
-Valentina: For the networks, on Instagram and Tiktok.
-Vanesa: Then we have the mothers who come to accompany the daughters and get hooked.
-Valentina: also the friends and the sisters.
Modern brides, without mandatory corset or white: freedom and personality in design. Photo: Gentileza Bafweek -And among you, how do you assemble generational looks?
-Valentina: Mom is adapting.
-Vanesa: Yes, and I listen why there are things I can’t get in. I learn.
-Valentina: In the parade there was a trans model.
-Vanese: I loved it.
–That is good, because in fashion there is sometimes a double speech: there is talk of diversity and then, in brands, trans people do not work.
-Valentina: In our case, work with us. His name is Jo Vera. It is very genia.
-What else does the generational show?
-Vanesa: Sometimes I don’t even know what they are talking about. I stayed with the vocabulary and that carries me.
-Valentina: I come with a mental file of people from networks and designers
-Vanesa: And I am in another world.
-Valentina: That helps me.
-Valentina: because I am very contaminated. I retain a lot from older designers or collections as inspiration. My mom, on the other hand, creates from what there is. Also to understand bodies of elderly, and what she put on to feel careful, because I, out there, I’m leaving …
The creative team is entirely feminine. Pieces designed for women who want to remain themselves. Photo: Gentileza Bafweek -Are you going to the catwalk?
-Valentina: Yes, to styling and it is hard for me to go down. And my mom, who knows about biting and endings, is the one who says; “You can’t do this.”
-Vanese: The question is what is the limit, how far something can become commercial and how far not. You have to think about it, we sit down to think.
-Valentina: There are also functionality things. There are dresses that cannot be the same as on the catwalk, for example, if the keel is long, they can step on it.
-Vanesa: There is a laburo that may not see. She is in the world of networks, where I don’t get.
-Valentina: if I could live doing editorials. And while that does not imply a direct sale, it serves to build image and for people to finish reading the concept.
-What do you appreciate having added to your mother and what not?
-Valentina: I am very insecure and my mother, since the contest in which I participated, told me: “You will have a lot of worse than this one.”
-Vanesa: I think of how much power there is here and where we arrive. They were always very creative. Both Luli (Lucia, her other daughter, photographer) and Valen have an eye, it is tremendous what can be projected. We could and here we are.
-With the brand, do they reconfirm that women gathered are unbeatable?
-Valentina: Yes, here we are all women. We work with people who like to work.
-Vanesa: When we started, I put myself as motto that had to be something that matches me the lifestyle I wanted to have.
Each garment is a conversation between generations, with the trade of a mother and the vision of a daughter. Photo: Gentileza Bafweek -What is that lifestyle?
-Vanesa: I have a 13 -year -old son. My priority is the family. I put that limit.
-Valentina: I didn’t want to work stressed.
-Vanesa: I passed it before.
-As being so connected by the networks, today fashion became more mimetic, how do you get out of that?
-Valentina: Always childbirth of a base that resonates with the idea of the brand, half a romantic, and at the same time, half Darkie. It is our DNA.
-Vanesa: It is like an image that is in the air, it goes down and is putting together. Then there is everything, permanent stimuli.
There are things that have already been seen, for example, if someone puts a tuxedo to a woman, Yves Saint Laurent did in the 60s
-Valentina: The good is to reinterpret it in your own way. It is my vision.
-Vanesa: We have to listen to more among us, follow our intuition