EXCLUSIVE: Patou and Guillaume Henry Part Ways

PARIS — Patou and artistic director Guillaume Henry are parting ways after seven years.

The French fashion brand said Friday that the French designer was leaving after a fruitful tenure to fully dedicate himself to other projects.

The 48-year-old designer joined Patou, which had been dormant for 30 years, after LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton acquired majority control in 2018.

“I would like to thank the LVMH group and especially Sidney Toledano for their trust over these years,” Henry said in a statement shared first with WWD. “I have been very happy and proud to accompany the renewal of Patou and I am forever grateful to all the teams participated in the adventure and invested themselves unreservedly.”

His final effort for the brand was the fall 2026 collection presented in January. The brand said it was “exploring a different format for its future evolution.”

Toledano, the special adviser to LVMH chairman and chief executive officer Bernard Arnault who hired Henry in his previous role as head of the LVMH Fashion Group, thanked the French designer for “the energy he has brought,” wishing him “great success for the rest of his career.”

“With the maison’s teams, Guillaume has been a craftsman of Patou’s renewal and, during these seven years, he succeeded in offering ambitious collections that captivated critics and clients at each presentation,” the veteran executive said.

Henry’s future plans could not be immediately learned. It is understood he will also be leaving Patou’s parent LVMH.

Fresh from his tenure at Nina Ricci, Henry oversaw the revival of the fashion house founded by trailblazer Jean Patou a century earlier, going for sporty chic silhouettes with a cinematic French je ne sais quoi.

His first collection was unveiled in September 2019 and by July 2022, the brand staged runway shows on an off-beat timing on the eve of couture weeks, with an eclectic and glamorous front row that included the likes of Katie Holmes, Maya Rudolph, Kelly Rutherford, Susan Sarandon and Zooey Deschanel.

There was also a clutch of collaborations such as with Onitsuka Tiger, Ladurée and the World of the Moomin, the cult Finnish book series and 1970s TV series.

Henry also dressed Sabrina Carpenter throughout her recently concluded “Short n’Sweet” world tour.

Under the French designer’s tenure, Patou grew to 100 stockists worldwide and opened stores across South Korea and Japan, markets where the brand gained swift early traction. Its permanent Parisian address, after a well-received pop-up dubbed Patou Market, bowed in at Galeries Lafayette Haussmann in 2023.