PARIS — Wearing a black leather jacket, black jeans and heavy motorcycle boots, Nicolas Andreas Taralis, his hair swept low across his brow, strides into the Café de Flore here looking the picture of rock chic.
The soft-spoken, Canadian-born designer, 30, wiggles into a red banquette, orders coffee and starts to explain his formative plans to revive the dusty house of Cerruti, which hired him in August as artistic director.
“Cerruti’s been through tough times,” he said. “It’s a real challenge for me and I’m excited to see what I can bring to the house.”
Indeed, it’s been tough chez Cerruti ever since the company was purchased in 2000 by the now unraveled Italian conglomerate Fin.Part, which tore through designers from David Cardona to Roberto Menichetti in its failed attempt to get on track.
A new chance at posterity arrived last August, when a $3.8 billion private equity firm called MatlinPatterson acquired the house. Taralis and chief executive officer Philippe Cleach were hired to oversee its renaissance.
Though Taralis has yet to start in earnest at Cerruti — he’ll assemble a team after he shows his signature collection Friday — he already has more than a few notions of how he wants to pilot it into the future.
“I don’t want to be too referential,” he offered. “I don’t think it’s modern. I want to look at the house’s past, but I want to be free to interpret it in my own way; I see Cerruti as being very architectural and quite rigorous: chic and sharp.”
Though largely unknown except by his devotees, Taralis, who studied at Parsons School of Design in New York and the University of Vienna, has been considered a rising star ever since he launched his signature collection in 2004. Before that, he assisted Hedi Slimane at Dior Homme for three years.
His look is anchored in sharp, androgynous tailoring. Recently, Taralis took more feminine and sophisticated directions. His fall collection, for example, featured blouses that fluttered open at the back and sweeping tweed capes.
“I’m not so interested in women that are soft around the edges,” he said. “I want to bring out a woman’s inner strength.”
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At Cerruti, Taralis’ debut is likely to be a men’s show in January, to be followed by women’s later next year.
“I’m very happy to be returning to men’s wear,” he said. “Men’s is the essence of the brand, and I’ve always approached women’s wear with the sensibility of a men’s wear designer.”
That might be his link with the brand’s founder, Nino Cerruti. In any case, Taralis hopes to mine Nino Cerruti’s expertise. “We recently dined in Milan,” he related. “He achieved a lot. There’s still a lot for me to learn. I hope that [Cerruti and I] can talk again soon.”