Nid de Guêpes is an urban fashion brand that is dedicated to a minimalist elegant aesthetic while creating the perfect fit. Launched in 2013, their selection has grown and they have been praised for their creative editorials and video productions.
“We want to make a garment originally thought to be unwearable, wearable and change the ‘this is weird’ to ‘this is beautiful.'”
Who is comprised of Nid de Guêpes’s creative studio? How did the collaboration come together?
Gwen, the owner, initiated this project on his own from the beginning. He built everything alone, from a simple clothes design idea to a high-end label with a strong DNA and a worldwide awareness. Then a freelance stylist names Eddy join him to help on the patterns making and gave him his own vision of the market. Because N.D.G is growing and in need of brand content, Erwan joined the team recently as an intern to help develop global awareness through social medias campaigns, brand identity, and press relations. If we talk about a full-time worker, there is only Gwen.
How would you describe the style?
N.D.G takes its inspiration from everything around urban culture and the modern youth universe. One of our main inspirations comes from a variety of brands who focus on sneakers. We can create a whole collection based on one pair of sneakers. If you look at our pieces, you’ll see our garments match perfectly with a specific pair: Our Holiday Capsule is composed of pieces that feature laced details and tan colors which can perfectly be worn with Visvim shoes, Our Essentials and Midnight collections match with Adidas Y-3, Same for our most recent collections with Military Boots. We are also influenced by military equipment and Sci-fi movies. If you look at our oversized “cagoule” (left) you’ll see that Anakin could have worn it in Star Wars, same for our Oversized Kimono (right).
What has been the most challenging part of launching a fashion brand? The most rewarding?
I guess the most challenging part of launching N.D.G was to focus on only a specific target by positioning N.D.G on a niche market. If we ask “classic” people in the streets what they think about our clothes, they will be like “This is strange, this is unwearable.” You can guess that our fits aren’t for everybody. The fabrics, the designs, the oversized fits and the colors correspond only to a certain type of consumer. The hardest part today is to create a real growing community of supporters. We all know the worldwide clothing market is saturated, hundreds of new brands come every day and 99% of them don’t survive. We need to focus on our customers and offer them something different, the differentiation is the key if we want to create something in the long-term.
The most rewarding thing was to create a visual website which allow surfers to feel the fabrics and to have HD photos of products before buying. We get a lot of positive feedback about our website. This is our main platform and it’s optimized for brand content with the possibility of including videos and editorials. This website improves the experience, and we encourage customers to enter in our universe with the HD photos.
What do you think is missing from the urban fashion world that Nid de Guêpes fills?
We spend hours and hours surfing the internet, social media, websites, etc. We know our market, our competitors, and our consumers. This competitive watch allows us to positions N.D.G as an avant-garde.
NID de GUÊPES offers consumers a new way to approach fashion. We know that our consumers spend money in priority on sneakers and shoes (which are generally luxury and high-end pieces). The challenge with N.D.G is to offer them an outfit with the perfect fit, the best quality, and the best compliment with the shoes for a reasonable price. The goal is to encourage people to buy full beautiful looks without sacrificing the quality because of the budget. Through this cross-selling strategy, our consumers can benefit from beautiful looks without being stressed about the money. Our prices are reasonable compared to competitors on the same positioning. I guess this is one of our main advantages, this new approach and way of thinking is based on empathy. We are passionate about the fashion industry, we love hanging in shops, showrooming and now webrooming and we think this new Vision was missing in this market.
How do you decide on themes for your collections? Do you have a specific process?
We have lots of influences. Like I said, we can focus on one pair of sneakers and create dozen of pieces that match perfectly with the shoes. But there are other things that influence us like movies and video games. For example the next movie Mad Max can be an inspiration source with all the military clothes and the desert; we can create a whole collection based on this movie. We want to make a garment originally thought to be unwearable, wearable and change the “this is weird” to ” this is beautiful.”
Where do you see the brand going?
We don’t aim to create a basic clothing label. We want more. The goal of N.D.G Studio is to create and sell more than garments, we’re talking about making shoes, objects, and art. The “studio” part is set to showcase photography, music, and arts from all around the world. Our ambition is to become a real label developing various activities like high tech products and not only a clothes brand. The recent digital transformation of our society has changed everything, it offers us a lot of opportunities of development and we’re currently developing skills like web sourcing and brand consulting.
Please visit nid-de-guepes.com for additional information.
