INTERVIEW | côte&ciel’s Head of Design, Emilie Arnault

The mastermind that helped shape and sustain côte&ciel’s brand universe discusses art and science, confronting reality, and carrying on with the craft.

“This in-between thing is really interesting,” says Emilie Arnault, Head of Design at côte&ciel. “In architecture, for example, you can think of the building as a scheme between the inside and the outside. A bag is kind of the same.”

Arnault has been with côte&ciel since its inception in 2008, single-handedly overseeing the creation of all the brand’s seasonal and core collections for 13 years. She is an industry veteran who boasts over two decades of experience in design, including a stint designing bags at Damir Doma. At the time of our interview, she’s at her Paris office, inside a small Zoom screen, enthusiastically gesturing with her hands as she describes her design approach.

“You have your things inside of the bag, and the environment outside,” she continues. “Just as you have to be able to live in a building, the bag needs to stand and make sense. The approach is the same with architecture, making something stand from a material.”

Incidentally, Arnault’s personal design approach has been the fuel and foundation of côte&ciel. Her fascination with things “in-between” drives her to explore the disparity and harmony between seemingly contending spectrums. The inside and outside; art and science; form and function. “And coast and sky!” she adds, referring to côte&ciel’s French origin.

Arnault, who got her start in industrial design rather than fashion, describes herself as a scientist, one who begins by making an observation of materials, then experiments with them to test a hypothesis, before finally reaching a scientific conclusion. “I studied industrial design because I needed to use both sides of my brain. It frees you to be as creative as you want, but you still need to make functional things. I can have all these ideas about a certain fabric, but then I have to confront reality.”

The Isar Rucksack, côte&ciel’s first-ever backpack and still its most loved icon, was the result of Arnault’s experimentation with confronting reality. “I designed it with my husband in mind actually. He worked as a designer for a company that manufactures medical systems, but he really lives a very active life and he had so much stuff with him at all time. I needed to make a backpack with a large opening where he can put everything in, and just a small compartment with pockets to organzie it all,” she explains. “Because it was for him mainly, I didn’t have to follow any proven industry playbook. I just took a piece of fabric and went straight to the sewing machine to see what happens. I like that approach because you’re in the real, using your body. You don’t have to reflect on or analyze what you’re doing.”

Arnault relies on her intuition throughout the whole of her scientific design process. “Materials have their natural form and movements. When you let the material be as free as possible, the result is always organic,” she says. “But it’s funny because it always starts from a geometrical shape, because it’s just easier to cut straight from one end to the other. And then I push it, mold it, and it ends up becoming something physical for the body.”

For côte&ciel, whose tagline is “Bags to wear, not to carry,” physicality is an important focus. “Bags, like garments, have an impact on your silhouette, because they are dimensional. The Isar and the Riss will weigh differently and have a different look when you put them on. They’re really in between functional garments and sculptural objects,” Arnault says, reiterating the importance of “the in-between.”

While côte&ciel has expanded their product lineup significantly since its launch, bags like the Isar, the Riss and other signature silhouettes remain in popular demand. “We find our customers to be very loyal. They come back to us five, six years after they purchase their first bag. They bring their old one and say, ‘I want to replace it exactly how it was.’”

“It seems because we stick to this authentic design process, we don’t need to follow fashion trends so much,” Arnault says. “We have this authenticity of what it is to make a bag. How can I turn this surface into a three-dimensional object in order to carry my things? There is this term in French, intemporel,” she says before a brief pause. “Let me Google it in English—timeless, okay. We have this timeless approach.”

côte&ciel’s authentic and timeless approach has worked out well for both the business of the brand, and for Arnault personally. “The brand gives me lots of freedom for design and creativity. I’m lucky enough to work for a brand which puts design at the forefront,” she says. “I would be proud to continue to show people more about côte&ciel. I will stay another 20, 30 years, if they let me go with it.”