Founded in 2016 by Creative Director Tatiana Lim, Laveau is created with the hope of helping people appreciate beauty within imperfection. Drawing fro m childhood imaginations and experiences, Lim creates drawings of “monsters”, which are her nightmare in character form, to represent one’s fears, pains, anger, and other emotions. From these monsters, Lim extract pieces from the drawings and recreates it into the adventurous, whimsical, and ethereal prints featured in Laveau’s designs to commemorate and appreciate the hurdles one has to go through in life. Inspired by the childhood dreams and imaginations of Lim, the prints are symbolic of the boundless imagination of childhood that our Creative Director wants for those who wear Laveau to remember.
With a lifelong passion for fashion and the arts, Lim enrolled in Parsons School of Designwhere she studied to become a designer. As a true citizen of the world. Lim splits her time between United States, Asia, and Europe. This dichotomy of culture inspires the essence of the Laveau brand.
IN CONVERSATION WITH TATIANA LIM
Can you tell us a little about your childhood cultural background and when you decided to become a designer?
I spent half of my time in Asia and the United States. By blood, I am Chinese, Turkish, Dutch, and mixed Portuguese, but I have family living in many parts of the world. As a third cultured child, I constantly felt like I didn’t belong anywhere, yet I belonged everywhere.
At 10, I started designing Monster Dolls as a hobby, and at 14, I started seeing Fashion Designing as a possible career. I combined my love of color and the monsters I designed to create Laveau’s prints. In my life, everything was lined with rules. Everything was very black and white, but design was completely different. Of course, there were rules, but they weren’t so black and white. In fact, there were infinite color combinations.
How does your creative process work? Do you have a specific strategy or just ‘go with the flow’?
When designing, I tend to prefer seclusion; I’ve always had an inner mind palace which, in fact, was a ballroom that I created as a child to escape to, and I used to develop my designs. But I get inspiration from every walk of life, including documentaries, books, movies, manga, cookbooks, traveling, road trips, the park, and even grocery stores. The world is full of colors of life, so as long as I’m following the flow of life, yes, I go with the flow.
What about education in the fashion industry? Do you think it is important before launching your own brand and why?
I actually left The Newschool Parson school of design early due to health reasons. If I had the choice, I would’ve continued. But due to leaving college early, I could start my brand, and Laveau’s ethos was born due to my experiences during that period.
What’s it like to see someone wearing your creations?
It’s quite rewarding! I want people to feel beautiful and see how imperfections can be beautiful through our prints since they were purposefully designed in an organic pattern. So, each piece of clothing will never look exactly the same because of that reason. Each piece is one of a kind, just like the person who wears it.
What’s your favorite place where you feel more inspired?
I tend to prefer seclusion, nature and traveling. But I also read books, manga, cookbooks, go to the grocery store or watch documentaries to get inspired, whether it’s a painting in an architecture television show or a cereal box in the grocery aisle. There is color everywhere in all walks of life.
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