The Hands Behind Givenchy's Atelier Coat

The fitting room on the second floor of Avenue George V runs narrow and tall. Marie-Claude Benoît stands at the centre, one hand steadying a half-finished coat on a dress form, the other pinning the collar stand with the kind of speed that comes from thirty-two years in the same building. The coat is black wool gabardine, cut with a sharp shoulder and a skirt that falls just below the knee. It is not yet a coat. It is a shell with potential.

Benoît is Givenchy's head of tailoring, though her title undersells the role. She oversees nine craftsmen in the atelier, all of whom learned their trade the same way she did: by watching, then doing, then doing again until the hand no longer hesitates. The coat she is working on will appear in the spring collection. It will be photographed, written about, possibly worn by someone who does not know her name. This does not concern her. The work is the point.

The coat in question is a direct descendant of Hubert de Givenchy's 1968 smoking jacket, itself an evolution of the tailleur he showed in 1952. The line is clean, the shoulder structured but not stiff, the lapel rolled by hand to sit flat against the chest. It is the kind of garment that looks simple until you try to make one. Benoît has made hundreds.

She joined Givenchy in 1992, straight out of the École de la Chambre Syndicale. Her first task was hemming skirts. Her second was learning to set a sleeve without puckering the armhole, a process that took six months and left her with a permanent crease between her eyebrows. She was taught by Jacqueline Moreau, who had worked under Givenchy himself and who did not believe in shortcuts. Moreau retired in 2004. Benoît still uses her scissors.

The coat begins as a pattern, drawn by hand on heavyweight paper and adjusted for each client. Givenchy's atelier does not work from digital files. The pattern is laid onto cloth—in this case, a 12oz gabardine woven in Yorkshire—and cut with shears that weigh half a kilo. The pieces are basted together with silk thread, fitted on the form, adjusted, fitted again. The shoulders are padded with horsehair and cotton wadding, shaped by hand until the coat sits where it should. The lapels are attached with a stitch so small it is invisible from six inches away.

This is where Laurent Petit enters. Petit is the maison's head of finishing, responsible for buttonholes, hems, and the final press. He has worked at Givenchy since 1998, though he began his career at Dior, where he spent five years learning to sew a buttonhole that would not fray after a decade of use. A hand-sewn buttonhole takes twenty minutes. A machine-sewn one takes forty seconds. The difference is visible only to people who know what they are looking for, which is to say, almost no one. Petit sews them by hand anyway.

He works at a table near the window, where the light is best. His tools are modest: a thimble, a needle, a spool of silk twist. The buttonholes on the atelier coat are worked in a gimp stitch, a technique that reinforces the edge without adding bulk. Each one is identical in length and spacing. This is not an accident.

Petit learned the gimp stitch from his grandmother, who worked as a seamstress in Lyon and who taught him to sew before he could read. He does not talk about this often. When he does, he mentions that she made wedding dresses for women who could not afford a couturier, and that she charged less than the fabric cost. He does not say this to make a point. It is simply true.

The coat moves through the atelier in stages. After Benoît finishes the structure and Petit completes the buttonholes, it goes to Sylvie Renard, who handles linings. Renard has been at Givenchy since 1989. She is sixty-three and has no plans to retire. The lining is silk twill, cut on the bias so it moves with the body rather than against it. It is attached with a slip stitch that allows the lining to float independently of the shell, a detail that matters only when the coat is in motion. Renard's stitches are so fine they catch the light.

She trained at the same school as Benoît, though fifteen years earlier. Her first job was at Balenciaga, where she worked under a woman named Simone Letellier, who had apprenticed with Cristóbal Balenciaga himself. Letellier taught her to cut linings without a pattern, measuring by eye and adjusting as she went. Renard still does this. She says it is faster than using paper.

The final press is handled by Claude Ferrand, who has worked the same steam table since 1995. The table is cast iron, heated from below, and weighs more than he does. Ferrand presses each seam individually, using a damp cloth and a hand iron that predates the building. The process takes an hour. A machine press takes three minutes. Ferrand does not use a machine.

He learned to press at Lanvin, where he spent seven years working under a man who had pressed for Jeanne Lanvin in the 1940s. That man, whose name Ferrand does not remember, taught him to press wool without flattening the nap, a skill that requires knowing exactly how much steam to apply and for how long. Ferrand can tell by the sound the iron makes when it is ready. He does not explain how.

The coat is finished in late January. It is photographed in February, shown in March, and delivered to a client in April. The client is a banker in Geneva who owns four other Givenchy coats and who will wear this one twice a week until it needs repair. When it does, it will come back to Avenue George V, where Benoît will re-pad the shoulders and Renard will replace the lining. This is how the atelier works. Nothing is disposable.

Benoît is training two new apprentices this year, both in their early twenties, both from the Chambre Syndicale. One of them, a woman named Elodie, is learning to set sleeves. The other, a man named Thomas, is learning to shape lapels. They will spend the next two years doing nothing but these tasks. They will not complain. This is the trade.

Petit is teaching Elodie the gimp stitch. She is not fast yet, but her hands are steady. He tells her that speed comes later, that accuracy is the only thing that matters now. She nods and keeps sewing. Her buttonholes are not perfect. They will be.

The next collection is already in progress. Benoît is working on a double-breasted coat in charcoal flannel, cut longer than the spring version and weighted for winter. The pattern is different, but the process is the same. She will fit it, adjust it, fit it again. Petit will sew the buttonholes. Renard will attach the lining. Ferrand will press the seams. The coat will be finished, photographed, sold, worn, and eventually brought back for repair.

This is the work. It does not change.