Carole Benazet
For Carole Benazet, the artistic director of Département Féminin,
fashion is a lifestyle, a constant source of creativity and emotion;
clothing a weapon and "outward sign of personality."
When she founded her shop in Toulouse in 2000, she took up an area and devoted it to females in an almost exclusively male institution. She discovered Balenciaga, Helmut Lang and designed the first window displays. She dreams on paper before emerging in three dimensions. Département Féminin was born out of the desire to create a setting that amplifies the breadth and scope of femininity and can be found a few steps away from Place Wilson, at 1 rue Maurice Fonvieille.
Nothing can take away Carole's enthusiasm, not competition in Paris, or even the pressure of a profession that is constantly subjected to trends. Her soft voice remains in shadow, which envelops and conceals a resolve of steel. Discrete at the fashion shows, she prefers direct contact with the creators, with whom she builds long-tem relationships. With a keen and perceptive eye, she selects iconic pieces from the latest collections.
Insatiable homing. Traveling all-over & everywhere, a connoisseur of major cities around world, she captures and envelops both atmosphere and ambiance with a singular energy.
Elegance and simplicity are inseparable to Département Féminin and its founder. A French classicism that remains unconventional. Women according to Carole are the mystery of Monica Vitti in Notte coupled with the tapered insolence of the models of Guy Bourdin, a photographer with whom she feels a keen admiration. Feminine and assertive like the impervious and anti-conformity heroines of the novels of Edith Wharton. Beauty is a way of being and the clothing one wears only channels it. As every purchase from Département Féminin gently reminds us.
DISCOVER
Services
Aware of the specificities of e-shopping, Département Féminin has designed an online shop adapted to the web, providing quality service and expertise as close as possible to a in situ purchase.
The boutique
At 1, Rue Maurice Fonvieille in Toulouse, Département Féminin - named in reference to the boutique - exposes to passers-by its bay windows surrounded by a black frame.
