PARIS · FOUNDED 2009 · HAUTE COUTURE APPELLATION
Julien Fournié, a Haute Couture House in Paris
One of a small circle of houses authorised by the French State to use the words "haute couture". Nothing is cut before your measurements are taken.
Who is Julien Fournié?
Julien Fournié is a French couturier and the founder of Maison Julien Fournié, a haute couture house established in Paris in 2009. In January 2017 the house was granted the Haute Couture appellation, a title protected by French law and held by only a small number of houses at any one time. The Maison shows two collections a year during Paris Haute Couture Week and makes every garment to order, to a single client’s measurements.
2017
Haute Couture appellation granted
2
A maximum of two collections per year, on the official Paris calendar
100%
Made to order — no stock, no standard sizes
3–5
Fittings for a couture gown
800 m
Of tulle in a single Last Queen underskirt
What the Haute Couture appellation actually means
"Haute couture" is not a style, a price bracket or a marketing term. In France it is a designation protected by law and granted each year by a commission working with the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode, under the authority of the French Ministry of Industry.
To be granted the appellation, a house must, among other conditions:
- run an atelier in Paris employing a permanent team of specialist workers;
- present a collection to the press twice a year, in January and July, comprising a set minimum of looks for daywear and evening;
- make garments to order for private clients, with personal fittings.
The list is reviewed season by season, which is why it changes: houses join it, and houses leave it. Fewer than a dozen names hold the appellation at any given moment. Julien Fournié has held it since January 2017.
The couturier
Julien Fournié trained at the École de la Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne, choosing its technical discipline over a place at the ESAA Duperré. He learned the trade inside the houses that defined it: Christian Dior, Givenchy under Alexander McQueen, Nina Ricci, Céline.
In 2000 his graduate collection won the Moët & Chandon prize for best accessory at the Paris Fashion Awards. Jean Paul Gaultier hired him into his haute couture studio, where he researched fabrics and embroidery and worked on stage costumes for Madonna’s Drowned World Tour. Claude Montana, the master of architectural cut, took him on next.
By 2003 he was creative director of Torrente, first for ready-to-wear, then for the entire house including its couture line. Three years later he moved to Seoul as creative director of several brands for the LG Fashion Group — an early education in the Asian luxury market that still shapes how the Maison works today.
He founded his own house in 2009, around one conviction: that Parisian couture survives only if its craftsmanship is matched by genuine innovation.
The house is founded
Julien Fournié establishes his own house in Paris, on a market the large groups had left behind and younger labels had ignored.
Guest member of the official calendar
His debut haute couture show is staged with an all-Black cast of models — a first in the history of the Paris couture calendar.
FashionLab, with Dassault Systèmes
Co-founded to explore 3D design in couture. The Maison becomes one of the few to draw, drape and fit digitally.
The Haute Couture appellation
In January the French Ministry of Industry grants the house the appellation, on the recommendation of the Chambre Syndicale.
Bags and accessories
The handbags first seen on the runway, until then reserved for couture clients, are offered through the Maison’s own boutique.
Haute Couture. And that’s all!
A retrospective of the house is staged by the Savannah College of Art and Design at SCAD Lacoste.
First Misfits
This collection is shown on 27 January at Salle Gaveau, Paris.
How a Julien Fournié piece is made
Six stages, and no shortcuts. Most commissions run from first appointment to delivery in 4 to 25 weeks, depending on embroidery.
- The conversation. An hour or two, in Paris or wherever you are. What the piece is for, how you move, what you will never wear. No sketch yet.
- The drawing. A single proposal, not a catalogue. Revised with you until it is right. The Maison works digitally as well as on paper, so you can see the piece in three dimensions before a metre of fabric is cut.
- The toile. A full mock-up in plain cotton, built to your measurements. This is where the architecture of the garment is decided.
- The first fitting. The toile is fitted on you and corrected on the body. Nothing is cut in the final cloth before this stage is signed off.
- The atelier. Cutting, hand-assembly, embroidery. Specialist work — feather, marble, metalwork — is commissioned from the ateliers the Maison has worked with for years.
- Final fittings and delivery. Two further fittings as a rule. The finished piece is delivered by hand, with its garment record and care instructions.
If you do not live in Paris
Most of the Maison’s clients do not. Fittings travel.
Private appointments in your city.
The Maison travels for fittings to the Gulf, East and Southeast Asia and North America...
Appointments outside show weeks.
Commissions are taken all year, not only in January and July.
Digital dress sketch.
The Maison has used degital design in couture ever since. It shortens the process and reduces the number of journeys required. Of course, Julien Fournié can provide traditional sketches—created using paper, pencils, and even watercolor—but that takes more time.
Discretion.
Private commissions are never photographed or published without written consent. Confidentiality can be formalised on request.
Delivery and formalities.
Special delivery worldwide, with export documentation and customs handled by the Maison at your request.
Languages.
Appointments are held in French and English; other languages on request
First Misfits — Haute Couture Collection
Shown on 27 January 2026 at Salle Gaveau in Paris, First Misfits argues against the flattening of contemporary fashion. Couture, in this collection, is where difference is allowed to be visible.
Men and women exchange pieces from each other’s wardrobes. Silk sits next to denim, technical cloth next to lurex, with no hierarchy between them. The embroidery borrows from street art, manga and genre cinema rather than from the Second Empire. For the bridal pieces, the sculptor André Tognotti carved Carrara marble into crowns and bodice cups.
The collection is personal: Fournié has spoken about being bullied as a child for being different. First Misfits is the answer.
Beyond the runway: bags, belts and jewellery
Since December 2020 the Maison has made a line of bags and accessories. It began with the handbags carried on the runway, which couture clients had been asking to buy for years.
The line has since grown: Big Bang and Premier handbags, Pluton clutches, Pollux and Saturne totes, the Hexagon monogram line, haute couture belts and, since 2022, jewellery. Each piece is made to the standards of French leather craft, in limited numbers.
They are sold only through the Maison’s own online boutique.
Made to order, and only to order
The Maison holds no stock and produces nothing speculatively. A garment exists because someone ordered it. That is not a sustainability policy borrowed from ready-to-wear; it is simply how couture works, and it is the reason couture wastes so little.
Materials are traced: the Maison maintains a record of the origin and production conditions of its fabrics, leathers and embroideries. Natural fibres are preferred where the construction allows. Offcuts are kept and reused in accessories and in the studio’s development work.
A couture garment is also, by design, repairable. Seams are hand-finished so they can be opened; allowances are left in so the piece can be altered years later. The Maison alters and restores its own pieces for as long as they are worn.