Vartan will Reveal Deep Bold Expression in his Latest Collection
This coming Saturday at the historical Henderson House in Weston, Ma. Samuel Vartan Collections will welcome in fall with unveiling a long-awaited collection and host a party put on pause from March of 2020.
Scene&Style was able to sit down with the mastermind behind the sewing machine, Samuel Vartan. We got an opportunity to catch up and chat about the upcoming show and designs to hit the runway. Samuel, what was the inspiration behind the collection? He replied with enthusiasm, “The inspiration for our Autumn/Winter collections comes from a confident woman who is strong willed, smart and most likely a leader in her work field. She is well versed worldly matters, works hard but definitely finds time to play and pamper herself. She does not chase trends but rather sets them. She definitely marches to the beat of her own drum, and she’s gently opinionated on subjects that are close to her heart and mind. The clothes themselves are designed from several themes and topics close to my heart. They have a lot to do with my state of mind during these dramatic season”. Vartan continued, “Black becomes the dominating color sprinkled with a few metallic colors as well as grays and the occasional wine/burgundy colors. I love fall foliage, so a lot of these clothes look amazing against this landscape riddled with all these colorful leaves. The collection is also somewhat on the bold side; definitely edgier than our Spring/Summer looks. At one point we had nicknamed the collection Dark City for my love of cities with an edge, skyscrapers, the asphalt jungle is the ultimate playground for this woman and collection. My personal influences come from my love places like Montreal, New York, Los Angeles, Berlin, London and Paris. Other influences are architecture, travel, industrial design, film and music”.
Samuel, how did you get to choosing a venue with such history? Vartan replied, “We came upon the venue The Henderson House through mutual friends, and we chose it for its opulent setting and the mood it created for this time of the year”.
Moving past the show, what is next for Samuel Vartan Collection in the coming months? Samuel said, “Our goals going forward for the Samuel Vartan Collections brand is to continue pushing our online sales found at www.samuelvartan.com and to concentrate on building up on our e-Commerce site. We would like to start revisiting our wholesale business with specialty boutiques which has always been our specialty from the beginning. We are also working with films, actors and directors such as in the recent case of our dear lead model/actress Naira Zakaryan who recently wore one of our gowns at the Boston premiere of Jivan Avetisyan’s Gate to Heaven in which she starred in. We are getting more and more requests from local celebrities who want to be dressed by Samuel Vartan! Very exciting”!
Finally, Samuel You have quite a team behind you, elaborate on who handles what part of the business for you. Vartan boasted, “Our team derives of only a small handful of personalities who have always had a desire to be a part of this brand. Semi Spahillari is our advisor in all things related to financials; he’s our numbers man. Eddie Vo handles all things related to media, visuals and most importantly he is the man behind the creation of the website. Also photo shoots, video and drone shoots as well as other surprises you will see at our event this Saturday the 23rd of October”!
With a prideful smile Vartan closed, “Finally my lovely life partner and wife Kiky Papadopoulos handles all the “little things” and basically wherever there are loose ends… For example, she’s in charge of decorations (flowers, balloons, gift bags, etc.) also the organization of the silent auction items”.
Samuel Vartan didn’t look for fashion, Fashion found him. Vartan was born in Athens, Greece. A few years later, his family moved to Beirut, Lebanon and finally to Montreal, Canada where he has lived for most of his life before coming to the United States in 2003. Having studied illustration and communications in college, Vartan did not set his sights on fashion at first.
As a teenager, Vartan already had a strong sense of style and spent most of his money on clothing—pushing the closet space in his family home to the limits. Always playing music as part of a band and passionate about illustration and film, the idea of fashion design did not begin to creep into Vartan’s consciousness until his first job working on window displays at a retail-clothing store. Putting things together and experimenting with different combinations became his favorite responsibility.
Around the same time, Vartan made the connection between music and fashion when he tagged along with a musician friend who was being fitted for stage clothes. Vartan became enraptured by what the designer was doing and tried sketching his own designs.
He smoothly translated his skills as an illustrator into fashion design and quickly began running a business out of his parent’s home: working on sketches in his bedroom and bringing designs to reality at his mother’s kitchen table. Friends, musicians and even the model/waitresses from his favorite café were soon wearing his designs. By 1998 Vartan had earned tremendous accolades and won the support of the fashion community at his first official show.
Vartan’s designs are highly personal. His history as a musician, illustrator, animator, film lover, and world traveler culminate in each and every piece he creates. He debuts his collections twice a year as Fall/Winter and Spring/Summer.
Spring/Summer shows us the lighter side of the designer. Nicknamed “Mediterraneo,” this collection is a nod to his birthplace in Greece, but also travels to places like North Africa, Turkey, Italy, Spain and the South of France. Soft hues of blue, white and gray are punctuated by rich orange and red, reflecting the rustic beauty of the culture, architecture, music and food of a coastal vacation. The smell of salty air mingles with swirling chiffon and relaxed linen, taking the wearer on a journey to the place of Vartan’s birth and beyond.
No matter where Vartan chooses to travel in his designs, he remains true to his sense of style. Heavily influenced by the refined, well-tailored, classic styles of the early 1960’s, Vartan’s collections are not influenced so much by current trends as they are by the designer’s sense of style. Looking back to timeless female icons like Sophia Lauren, Vartan cuts his clothes with a kind of elegance and minimalism that simply enhance the wearer rather than stealing attention from her.
Vartan works from the philosophy that “fashion is here today, gone tomorrow, but style lasts forever” and he believes that his designs can be worn for a lifetime. He is involved in every step of the design process so that his standards for quality are always perfectly maintained.
Vartan’s Winter collection, known as “dark city,” is about being a musician, growing up in the 1980’s, living and breathing rock and roll and city night life. It’s as gothic and cool as Paris, Prague, Berlin, and London after dark. Nestled into his choices of leather, suede, cashmere, tweed, satin and velvet are whispers of the art deco movement, film noir and the classic architecture of Europe’s oldest cities.
Guests have been on hold since March of 2020 ready to redeem their purchase. This Saturday Samuel Vartan Collections will debut new elegant, dark and sophisticated pieces. The evening will be class as always with music, food, fashionable faces and more. An event not to be missed, dress to impress. Grab your tickets to the Henderson House this Saturday.
Samuel Vartan Collections Fall Extravaganza Tickets, Sat, Oct 23, 2021 at 6:00 PM
