Maurice Jamin: Building a Baroque-Meets-Contemporary Fashion
Alice Bouju
The young Paris-based designer behind Jamin reflects on history, identity, and the balance between creativity and commerce
Maurice Jamin is part of a new generation of designers shaping independent fashion through deeply personal narratives and highly constructed visual worlds. At just 22, the Paris-based creative has already built a label that merges baroque references, military codes, and contemporary tailoring into a singular language. Since launching his brand shortly after moving to Paris, Maurice Jamin has moved from early spontaneous presentations to fully produced runway shows, gradually defining a universe where history, imagery, and emotional storytelling coexist.
Speaking about his journey, he is clear about the intention that guided him from the beginning: “Creating my own label had always been my goal… I wanted to build my own company, create my own collections, and design garments that would carry my name.”
From ESMOD to Paris: The Foundations of the Maurice Jamin Label
Maurice Jamin’s path into fashion began at ESMOD in Lille, where he studied fashion design before relocating to Paris. The move marked a turning point, allowing him to transition from education to industry experience through freelance work with various brands.
A year and a half after arriving in the capital, he officially launched his label. The first presentation came in October 2024, followed by a more structured runway show the following July. For Maurice Jamin, this progression reflects not only professional growth but also a clearer sense of direction.
He describes his early ambition clearly: it was never about abstract experimentation, but about building a fully formed brand identity from the very beginning.
A Childhood Fascination Turned Creative Obsession
Maurice Jamin traces his relationship with clothing back to both a defining moment and a longer, quieter evolution. A televised interview with Jean Paul Gaultier acted as a catalyst: “I suddenly felt an overwhelming desire to do the same. I had no idea how I would get there, but I knew that was the path I wanted to pursue.”
Looking back, he realises the foundations were already there. Even as a teenager, he spent his savings on clothes, without really seeing it as a passion at the time.
“It was only later that I understood that my fascination with clothing had actually begun in childhood”
From Intuition to Construction: The Evolution of Maurice Jamin’s Shows
The contrast between Jamin’s first presentation and his later runway show illustrates the rapid formalisation of his practice. The initial presentation, he admits, emerged almost instinctively. Driven by intuition rather than planning, it was a direct response to pieces he felt were ready to meet an audience.
“It wasn’t extensively planned or strategically thought through. It simply happened.”
By contrast, the first official runway show was the result of a year-long development process, staged at ESMOD’s Paris campus. The shift in scale and structure marked a decisive step forward for the brand.
“Everything felt more accomplished: the garments, the staging, the production… It felt like a genuine runway show.”
Between History and Modernity: A Baroque Language Reworked
Maurice Jamin roots his work in a strong dialogue with history, particularly fashion history. His fascination with Jean Paul Gaultier opened the door to a broader obsession with archives, documentation, and cultural references. He explains: “What interests me most is understanding garments: their origins, their evolution, and the cultural contexts in which they existed.”
This historical sensitivity translates into a design language that blends baroque references with contemporary silhouettes. The challenge, for him, lies in avoiding pastiche.
“How can we translate this heritage into contemporary fashion without creating costumes or theatrical disguises?”
The answer lies in hybridisation. Historical references are constantly reworked through modern cuts, materials, and attitudes, often using deadstock and reclaimed textiles. The result is a tension between ornamentation and wearability, between memory and present-day functionality.
Designing Through Images, Words, and Accumulation
Maurice Jamin’s creative process is highly visual and accumulative. Collections begin long before garments are designed, often through years of image gathering and conceptual exploration: “I tend to begin with images,” he explains.
“I already have a theme in mind, and I start collecting references around it.”
Alongside visual material, words play a structural role in shaping the emotional framework of a collection. Over time, image and language converge into moodboards that generate unexpected associations and narrative directions.
From this process, meaning gradually emerges rather than being imposed from the outset.
Stratego: Conflict, Colour, and Political Subtext
One of Maurice Jamin’s most explicit conceptual collections, Stratego, takes its name from a childhood board game built around military strategy and confrontation. The collection uses this framework to explore broader social and political tensions.
“The game revolves around conflict and confrontation. I began drawing parallels between the game itself and the current state of society.”
The recurring colour palette (red, blue, black, and white) becomes a symbolic structure for opposing forces. Rather than illustrating politics directly, the collection translates ideological tension into visual language.
“It was about translating a relatively serious and politically charged idea into something more instinctive and visual.”
The Idea of the “Jamin Club”
The upcoming collection extends this narrative universe while shifting its emotional register. Set between Stratego and a future project, it introduces a more festive, playful vision. “What would a Jamin nightclub be?” he asks.
This conceptual question becomes the foundation for a series of imagined characters and silhouettes designed for a fictional social space. The result is a more expressive wardrobe, featuring embroidery, sequins, and elevated tailoring, particularly around eveningwear and tuxedos.
Maurice Jamin on Collaboration and Building a Community
Collaboration plays a central role in Maurice Jamin’s practice, particularly with emerging creatives such as Maxime David. For him, these exchanges are not peripheral but structural.
“It is essential not to work in isolation. A brand cannot exist entirely within its own bubble.”
These relationships form what he describes as a creative community, an ecosystem of mutual exchange where collaboration often leads to future reciprocity. He also cites designers like Rick Owens as an example of how established houses can meaningfully integrate younger voices into their work.
Between Creation and Commerce: The Designer as Entrepreneur
As the brand grows, Maurice Jamin increasingly navigates the tension between creative freedom and commercial responsibility. He describes this duality as two opposing internal logics: one driven by intuition, the other by viability.
“In a way, it feels like having two opposing voices inside the same process.”
While acknowledging the necessity of financial structure, he resists the idea of reducing the brand to purely commercial logic. His ambition remains rooted in creating garments that exist in real life, not as static objects.
“I never wanted to create a ‘museum brand.’ I want clothes that live, that are worn.”
Sustainability as Practice, Not Communication
For Maurice Jamin, sustainability is not a marketing position but an operational principle: “We prefer to do it rather than say it.” The brand works primarily with deadstock fabrics, recycled materials, and upcycled garments, while maintaining limited production volumes. He is also critical of the way environmental messaging is often instrumentalised within the industry, arguing that authenticity is what ultimately determines credibility.
“If a value is truly sincere, it will resonate much more strongly than if it is constantly advertised.”
Building Slowly: A Long-Term Vision for Maurice Jamin
Looking ahead, Maurice Jamin rejects both fast growth and a purely limited positioning. Instead, he advocates for a gradual, controlled expansion that preserves the integrity of the brand.
“Fashion is not a sprint; it is a marathon.”
Growth, for him, must remain intentional, rooted in real community building rather than metrics alone. While expansion is part of the vision, longevity is the priority.
“I don’t have a plan B. This is the project I am fully committed to.”
Cover image by © NATALIE SKOTNICKA
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Alice is a Paris based photograper with a passion for fashion. Based in Paris, she develops an approach that brings together photography and writing, often mixing the two within her projects.
Her work is deeply rooted in reality. She is particularly drawn to documentary practices, using images and text as complementary tools to observe, question, and reinterpret the world around her. Whether through visual series or written pieces, she seeks to capture fragments of the everyday and give them a new narrative dimension.
She has developed a strong interest in research and editorial work. Writing articles, exploring contexts, and building stories from real-life subjects naturally extend her creative process. This intersection between documentation and storytelling reflects a field she has long been eager to explore.
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