Olivier the conqueror

Since taking over Balmain at the age of 25, Olivier Rousteing has transformed it into a revolutionary force in French fashion. Nathan Heller meets the designer set to shake up the world

- Nathan Heller

Olivier Rousteing is sitting in a make-shift greenroom, talking with a group of business founders trying to reimagine the future of France. He is dressed, as usual, in black: black coat, black trousers, and, on his feet, clogs like black lapdogs, covered with faux fur, his fingers shielded in long golden rings. When an attendant leads him to the stage wing, he leans against the wall and scrolls through Instagram. Rousteing became creative director of Balmain in 2011, at age 25, and since then has consolidated the house’s power by courting the gaze of an extremely online demographic.

“We might stay a bit afterward,” he murmurs to a colleague—he anticipates a swarm of attention. The conference where Rousteing is speaking is not about fashion; it is called Fighters Day, and it’s a gathering of French entrepreneurs in the American mould: techies, start-up doyens, and ‘self-made’ men and women of the kind who, until recently, scarcely existed in the French imagination. On-stage, in French, Rousteing speaks about his decision to set off on his own at 18. “I left my fashion school after six months,” he says. “I fought because I had no school or background behind me, just determination and desire. I came to Paris, and it’s now 10 years since I’ve been creative director at Balmain.” He adds, softly, “It’s always a battle against yourself.”