Talent Crush: Cyril Paillot
I'm a self-taught designer whose unique journey has been built outside of formal schooling, through daily experimentation and intuitive sewing.
At a very young age, 17, I was making my own clothes, exploring cut, volume, and fabrics. This creative freedom caught the attention of the directors of the children's fashion house CATIMINI, who offered me an internship that turned into an eight-year collaboration.
After this formative experience, at 25, I established myself as a freelance stylist.
I joined the children's fashion group JEAN BOURGET. At the same time, I joined the IKKS group and created the ONE STEP women's line for them. For eight years, I developed a personal, sensitive, and modern style.
The success of this brand led the IKKS group to entrust me with a line for IKKS Kids, and then in 2000 with the complete creation of the IKKS Women line. I still contribute to its design today.
In 2011, I founded my own brand, Nue 19.04.
A rock-inspired, instinctive, and sensual brand, centered on statement pieces in leather, silk, and other fine materials, playing on the contrast between strength and purity.
My brand gained international recognition, and in 2015, I was invited to Shenzhen Fashion Week in China for a runway show.
For eight years, the brand was present in around one hundred points of sale across some thirty countries, with a flagship store in the South of France.
The Nue 19.04 adventure came to a halt with the arrival of Covid, a period during which the industry suffered a major shock.
Alongside fashion, in 2019, I took a new step: sculpture. At first, it was just a curiosity, almost a game. But very quickly, the material spoke to me as much as textiles.
My work as a sculptor revolves around clay, which I shape to give life to the faces of men and women, whether classic or unconventional, ordinary or unique. My goal is to capture that suspended moment through the emotion that shines through in a gaze or behind closed eyes.
My pieces quickly garnered the interest of the public and collectors, allowing me to exhibit in various galleries.
In 2023, I opened my own gallery at 69 rue de Bretagne, in the heart of the upper Marais district in Paris. A hybrid space that is both a boutique and a studio.
I create my sculptures on site and present my entire body of work.
1. Childhood
I grew up near Paris, in a happy and loving childhood. I was a very dreamy child, already sensitive to beautiful things—paintings, textures, clothes. Very early on, I felt the need to express my individuality through my appearance. I was already looking to dress differently, to create my own style. My parents always supported me in this individuality.
Later, we moved to Cholet, in the Maine-et-Loire region, to be closer to my grandparents. This change was significant. In this smaller town, my identity took shape more strongly. At 15, I started sewing without any formal training, instinctively. I cut, I assembled, I experimented. In the Cholet area, seeing a boy dress differently wasn't common, but I embraced this difference—always supported by my family.
My imagination was nurtured by fantastical worlds. Jules Verne, particularly Journey to the Center of the Earth and Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, left a lasting impression on me. This taste for exploration, for the unseen and inner worlds, still lives within me today.
2. Beginnings in fashion
I started designing very young. At 17 and a half, I entered the ready-to-wear industry for an internship… and I stayed for eight years. I wanted to design for women. I started with children's clothing, then moved on to women's and men's clothing.
I stood out because I wore my own designs. Clothing was already an extension of my identity. Very early on, I understood that I didn't just want to dress people — I wanted to convey an emotion.
3. Music
I've always listened to a lot of music, mostly Anglo-Saxon. But when I create, I turn to melancholic atmospheres or classical music. It helps me enter an inner, almost meditative state.
Music allows me to retreat into my own world. It creates a mental space where emotion can emerge. It's a trigger.
4. Duality
Duality has always been present in my work. In fashion, I liked to juxtapose materials: silk, leather, denim… washing them to remove the finish, revealing their true nature, mixing delicacy and rawness. Working with contrasts.
It was never gratuitous darkness. There was a melancholy, a shadow, but not sadness. An emotional tension. Today, in my sculptures, this dimension is still present. Some people find them sad. I find them moving. There is a fragility, but also an inner strength.
5. The palette
When I created my brand NUE 19.04, I built a very rock and sensual universe, with a deliberately limited palette: deep blacks, asphalt grey, off-whites, neutral tones.
I don't like bright, bold colors. I prefer half-tones, muted shades, and soft harmonies. They allow the eye to focus on attitude, texture, and emotion.
In sculpture, this research continues: blacks, sepia, caramel, ochre, ivory, off-white. Organic, almost mineral colors.
6. A look at fashion today
Of course I continue to follow fashion. My tastes evolve, that's natural.
I always look at brands like Stella McCartney, Saint Laurent, Prada, Loewe….
With a particular admiration for Dries van Noten, who is nevertheless very colourful!
I also pay attention to worlds I've loved, like Margiela, Rick Owens, or Ann Demeulemeester…
7. The characters
My characters come almost exclusively from my imagination. I rarely work from photographs. I never know exactly who will appear at the beginning of a play. There's an element of surprise.
For animals, I rely more on visual references. But for human figures, everything is filtered through an inner lens. They are presences rather than portraits.
8. Materials and the future
Before working with clay, I worked with plaster, plaster bandages, and wire mesh. I like materials that are somewhat raw, sometimes ephemeral. Concrete also appeals to me because of its strength, its almost architectural quality.
I am also very sensitive to plants. The idea of installations combining sculpture and organic elements greatly interests me, even if it is more fragile over time.
Clay is still a recent addition to my artistic journey. I feel I will dedicate many years to it, perhaps working towards larger, more ambitious pieces, always centered around the human figure.
“I grew up in a blended family, in that fragile and luminous balance that you invent when life has already shaken you up a bit. My father disappeared from my landscape very early, my parents divorced when I was five, he died when I was 14. I have fragments of him left, diffuse sensations, like a scent that you recognize, its power to hold on to you.”
Yet I never lacked love. My mother and stepfather raised me with a strong, almost militant tenderness. My childhood was truly happy. I was a dreamy, sensitive child, often lost in my own world. Very early on, I understood that I was different, without yet being able to name this difference. I carried it like a quiet secret.
At 15, we left Paris for Cholet. An age when you should be putting down roots, discovering your sexuality, asserting yourself without hesitation. Instead, I created a persona. Every night, in my room, I crafted my outfits like writing a manifesto. The fabrics became armor, confessions, flags.
Meanwhile, my parents were struggling to keep their struggling Italian grocery store afloat. We were a rather unusual family: them behind their counter, in a business unlike anything seen before. But a few years later, it became a real success. And me, walking the streets with an androgynous, almost baroque air, embracing every detail as a challenge to the world.
At school, in the streets of Cholet, eyes would linger on me. The snickers, the lingering silences, the whispered comments. People turned to look at me as I walked by. I faced this every day. It was a succession of trials, doubts, and tiny wounds. But I knew what I wanted: to be myself, no matter what.
It was my determination that saved me. The support of my family, too. Yet, to protect myself, I built a wall. An invisible, thick wall, behind which I hid my vulnerabilities. I thought it protected me. In reality, it isolated me.
I wanted to be a fashion designer. I dreamed of Paris, of fashion school, of working for a couture house. My parents' financial situation made this project uncertain. Even though I know now that they would have sacrificed everything if I had insisted. My studies were difficult. My "outfits," as some professors called them, were perceived as provocative. Yet it was simply my way of expressing myself.
Around the age of 17, the founders of a children's fashion house noticed me. An internship turned into a collaboration. Eight intense years. By 19, I was already designing a line for them that was a real success. I learned my craft there, with rigor and high standards.
With a touch of sadness, I decided to leave to explore new horizons. At 25, I went freelance and immediately started working for another children's brand. This group also had a women's line, and they were looking for a stylist. I was initially refused the position; they said I had no legitimacy in the adult market. I persisted. I took on the challenge. Our collaboration became a lasting success.
But long before certain professional victories, there was a crucial encounter.
In 2002, meeting my friend was pivotal, almost inevitable. He shattered the wall I thought was protective, but which, in truth, was suffocating me. With gentle firmness and unwavering presence, he subtly guided me through all my projects, our projects. It was a quiet certainty, a profound alliance that reshaped my inner landscape. We still share this pivotal encounter today. It continues to ground me and uplift me.
Those were wonderful, fruitful years. But I needed to assert my personality more. In 2011, with my partner, we created the brand Nue 19.04, Nue for its sensual connection to the material, 19.04 as an intimate nod to my birthday. For eight years, this brand gave me vibrant memories, significant events, opened boutiques, and a fashion show in China. Then, like so many others, the story came to a halt with Covid.
Something else had to be told, a different story. Perhaps even freer. Perhaps also driven by a more intimate need for recognition.
After plaster, I turned to clay. As with sewing, I was self-taught. I proceeded by instinct, shaping the material as I once shaped fabric. In it, I rediscovered that original freedom, that possibility of creating my own language.
I don't carry any great tragedy within me. But a sensitivity, yes, a gentle melancholy that accompanies me. It comes to me when I create. It places me in an almost suspended, introspective state.
Certain kinds of music transport me like that. The compositions of Ryuichi Sakamoto, whom I discovered particularly through the film Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, have profoundly affected me. And the melancholic poetry of Jay-Jay Johanson often accompanies me in the studio.
When I create, I'm not running away from anything. I'm getting closer to myself, to that dreamy, different child I was, and who, deep down, I still am.