Lamia Lagha is a storyteller. A cinephile since early childhood, she first fell for world-building through the lens of others, losing herself in the wonder of Spielberg’s suburban dreamscapes, and later, the rebellious freedom of the French New Wave. Before launching her eponymous label earlier this year, the Tunisian-German designer spent 15 years constructing visual narratives of her own as a stylist, consultant and creative director in her adopted hometown of Paris. Her debut collection, presented at VIE Projects, doesn’t just take her name – it’s an intimate portrait of Lagha herself. Like its founder, the label moves through the in-between: across cultures, languages, aesthetics and identities.
Lagha was born in Dortmund, a steel-grey city in northwest Germany, to Tunisian parents. Her childhood was shaped by contrasts: between her industrial surroundings and the rich Tunisian traditions of her family, between slate-skied melancholy and a vivid interior world. “Growing up there, you dream of a different world,” she says. “I’m thankful I had that time to daydream.” With no social media and little distraction, there was space to imagine and explore. To climb trees, to play football with her brothers, to escape into films on Saturday nights. “My childhood was beautiful, idyllic in many ways.”
But home, for Lagha, has never been a fixed concept. Tunisia is a place she’s never lived but has always felt deeply connected to, while Paris, her adopted city for over a decade and a half, has shaped her womanhood and her artistry, giving her the space to understand herself and what she wanted to become. Despite dreaming her way there, the city wasn’t always welcoming. “When I moved here, Paris still felt very much rooted in tradition,” she says. “It was the old guard, and unless you spoke French or had connections, it felt almost impossible.”
Lagha had neither. After arriving, she took a job at American Apparel, one of the few places that would hire her without speaking French, and spent her free time chasing internships to get her foot in the door. Eventually, she landed one with Kris Van Assche. “Even though it required French, I pretended to understand everything,” she says. “I learnt a lot there. It was an exciting environment with a young, fresh team.”
“I think women have always held the world together, often without recognition.”
At night, she watched the films of Jean-Luc Godard, Chantal Akerman and Éric Rohmer – on repeat, sound up, subtitles on – until the French embedded itself. (It worked: today she could be mistaken for a native Parisian.) Her education extended beyond language, too. Early PR roles built on her fashion studies, giving her a taste of the industry’s mechanics and the hard work behind the scenes. “I’m really grateful for those early experiences,” she says. “I learned that every role is equally important in building a brand.”
If there’s a word that best describes Lagha’s path, it’s one so overused it borders on meaningless: self-made. But in her case, the term holds. Not in the glossy, bootstrap sense so often marketed to us, but in the more rigorous reality of creating something from scratch over many years. It’s easy to get caught on the surface – her insider status, growing fashion following, the founder – creative director title now beside her name, and overlook the slow, steady ascent in between. Lagha learned by doing, working her way through fashion’s backstage, helping to shape the visions of some of Paris’ most covetable brands while quietly dreaming of something of her own.
“I’ve never been afraid to take risks,” she says. “Growing up as the only girl with two brothers, I always felt the need to prove my strength. The first risk was moving to Paris on my own. The second, starting my company without any external investment, just my savings, during a time when everything felt uncertain.”
Those risks are paying off. The label is a moment of arrival for Lagha. Elegant yet comfortable, conceptual yet wearable, endlessly chic. Silhouettes nod to the 1980s glamour of her mother’s youth. “I became obsessed with that silhouette,” she says, referring to an old photograph of her mother in a tight black dress with wide batwing sleeves. “It became a key feature of my collection.”
The collection was made in Portugal from organic cotton in a simple yet striking palette. “Each of the colors represents a different type of woman,” she says. “The woman who loves dark colours like black, the one who enjoys light shades like white, and the one who wants something bold and alive, like red.” A silver fish belt, handcrafted in Tunisia, offers both ornament and meaning: protection, abundance and ancestry.
Lagha designs with herself in mind (“I think every designer does”), but just as often for the women she admires: those she imagines moving through the world in clothes that feel natural and effortless. “I want women to feel elegant, sexy, sophisticated, but never boring,” she says. “Most importantly, I want them to feel like themselves.” For Lagha, designing for women also means designing with them. “I think women have always held the world together, often without recognition,” she says. “It’s not about ego – it’s about understanding the world and moving through it.” She hopes for a future where women can lead with their own vision, free from restriction.
“One of the reasons I started my own brand was to create my own space and freedom, because I knew no one else would give that to me.”
Freedom has never been just about work. “Freedom, to me, means being true to yourself. It’s about believing in your own voice and not letting others tell you how you should be,” she says. “True freedom comes from being at peace with yourself and your own identity.” When asked when she feels most like herself, she doesn’t hesitate: “When I’m with my family or very close friends.” That sense of peace, of feeling fully herself, is also what draws her back to places she’s never quite left behind. “Lately, I’ve been feeling a bit homesick,” she says. “Maybe because my life in Germany, as a child, felt so simple and carefree. And Tunisia is also pulling me back in, offering a sense of peace and creative inspiration.”
“As a designer, it’s hard to narrow down ideas and focus on one only – it takes a lot of strength not to show everything at once. But I believe this approach is important for creating something meaningful.”
If her multidisciplinary, multicultural background gave the label structure, it’s Lagha’s point of view that gives it soul – that rarest of things in fashion: original taste. Taste is slippery, hard to catalogue or contain in words, harder still to teach. Lagha inarguably has it. Her personal style flows naturally into the label’s aesthetic, and in many ways, she is the perfect ambassador for her designs. “I’ve always had a deep love for fashion,” she says. “But I never really splurged on expensive clothes; 80 percent of my wardrobe has been vintage. I did this both to create my own style and because of financial reasons, and even as I started making more money, I kept that mindset. I love giving beautiful pieces a second life and I enjoy supporting new designers.” It’s this aesthetic instinct, immune to superficial influence and algorithmic sameness, that defines the brand’s ethos: not to dictate style, but to encourage women to find their own.
“What I want to offer is the idea of building your own identity, without feeling the pressure to follow every trend,” she says. “It’s about finding something that reflects who you are and has lasting value.” That kind of restraint takes discipline.
“As a designer, it’s hard to narrow down ideas and focus on one only – it takes a lot of strength not to show everything at once. But I believe this approach is important for creating something meaningful.”
Lagha’s influences and interests are wide-ranging: spatial, emotional, filmic. “The label feels like a playground for all my creative passions,” she says, citing architecture, photography and furniture design as key inspirations. “I’m obsessed with chairs in any form. If you look at someone’s living room and the chairs they choose to have, it says so much about a person, much like clothing.”
Her structural instincts are shaped by German Bauhaus – form meeting function in its cleanest and most intentional expression – while her Tunisian heritage brings a softer, more tactile counterpoint. “It’s definitely a challenge because these two traditions seem so different, but in my mind, they coexist perfectly,” she says. “The Bauhaus movement shaped how I view design, while Tunisia adds something dreamier, more emotional. My silver jewellery, made in Tunisia, a country with such rich craftsmanship, is a perfect example of that mix.”
Nowhere is that duality more lovingly realised than in the Salma dress, named after her mother. “She’s such a strong, elegant woman who worked so hard to provide for our family,” Lagha says. “She always used to wear blue mascara and blue eye pencil. It seems weird when you think about it, but it looked fantastic on her – it almost felt like her own little revolution.” The dress is black and white, a combination favoured by its namesake. “It’s a perfect symbol of how contrasting elements can come together to create something harmonious,” she says. “It reflects my own identity too – like my mother, I’ve navigated two worlds.”
Cinema has long been Lagha’s refuge. She speaks about directors with the same reverence others reserve for couture designers. “I’ve always passionately loved films,” she says. “Growing up, watching a movie was like a mini adventure, and I could imagine myself in the characters’ world…. I also went through a big phase of watching Almodóvar films and, of course, the French Nouvelle Vague. Wim Wenders has become one of my favorite directors. His melancholic view of the world resonates with me; we both came from the same region in Germany.”
It’s easy to see how that filmic sensibility carried through in her presentation. Rather than stage a traditional runway show, she debuted the collection in VIE’s gallery space. Working with photographers Marie Deteneuille and Erik Gustafsson, she created a two-part visual story – one-part filmic tableau, one-part still life – where the garments took centre stage. “I wanted the space to feel both minimal and dreamlike,” she says, “allowing the clothes to speak for themselves while leaving room for interpretation.”
“True freedom comes from being at peace with yourself and your own identity.”
Lagha is someone whose orbit is small but close, and she feels fortunate to have grown up surrounded by strong personalities that helped sharpen her vision.
“Starting something on your own is always a challenge,” she says. “I struggle to ask for help, but I’m lucky to have friends who supported me when I almost gave up.” Her mum was a constant source of encouragement, as was Simon Porte Jacquemus, whom she first met as an intern in Paris and latwer worked alongside at a department store.
“We still laugh about that,” she says. “We became very close during that time, and he told me about his plans to start a brand. Seeing how hard he worked, how long it took – it made me realise that anything is possible if you truly believe in it.” Helena, her longtime friend and now visual art director, also played a pivotal role. “When she showed me the first logo of my name, it made the whole project feel real.”
It might take a village to raise a label, but the vision behind it is entirely Lagha’s. “I’ve always had a lot of faith in myself. I believe in manifesting and thinking about something until it happens,” she says. “Even using my name felt like a natural decision – it’s 100% me. Everything I do comes from a place of authenticity.”
Lagha’s daily life is grounded and quiet. “It’s simple, but I really love it,” she says. Mornings begin with coffee, stretching, sometimes meditation. Her studio is a small, rented space near Palais-Royal, a short walk from the gardens she wanders during lunch breaks (“It’s a dream”). Weekends are spent with friends. Most days are a balance between production emails and sketching the next collection. Her current mood board is filled with knitwear, vintage images of East and West Germany, stills from forgotten pop videos, and snapshots of food.
“Beauty is everywhere,” she says, with the kind of filmic outlook that colours everything she does. “You just have to look closely.” Lamia Lagha has come full circle. The girl who once escaped into cinematic worlds is now building one of her own.
