“I think trendy is old today. I don’t want to be trendy. I want to be timeless,” Olivier Rousteing asserts. “For me, this is the meaning of fashion – to be part of history and not something everyone forgets after two months.” Balmain’s creative director is talking to me over Zoom from his Paris office about what drives his vision as he celebrates 10 years at the helm of the brand this month. It’s a cold morning but there’s a warm smile on his face, and a loose monogram shirt from Balmain’s SS21 collection on his back as he gracefully continues: “I want to focus on the DNA of the house. Why do you love my aesthetic? What do you look for at Balmain? I knew the answers after I made this season’s collection.”

Think Balmain, think glamour. Think sharp tailoring with strong shoulders and nipped in waists. Think army inspired detailing. Think brazen logos. Think mini dresses that glisten with sequins and sex appeal. Think luxurious streetwear for the influencer generation. For Rousteing though, having reflected on what’s important in the midst of a global pandemic, all this razzmatazz must be underpinned by considerations of heritage and community.

As such, Resort 21 and SS21 saw him revisit the Balmain archive to update a number of its founder’s original ideas. “Monsieur Pierre Balmain started the brand just after WWII with the goal of giving strength and optimism to women, and I wanted to do the same,” Rousteing reflects. “So, I brought his idea of the ‘Jolie Madame’ into 2021 to see how it could be. At the same time, I brought back his PB labyrinth monogram from the early 70s. After Monsieur Balmain, we were a house that slept until Oscar de la Renta in the 90s. In that time many things were forgotten so it is my responsibility to revisit the identity of the brand.”

For Resort 21, that meant taking a rebellious approach to French aristocratic codes and fusing them with 90s pop culture references – Will Smith as Fresh Prince and Julia Roberts as Pretty Woman go wild in a Normandy country estate. Bold patterns, pastel hues and large volumes were his upbeat answer to creating under lockdown. “This was the toughest collection of my life because me and my team are like a family and we were forced apart,” he says. “We worked hard to exchange ideas and sketches from morning to evening. There was a lot of emotion between us but this resulted in a collection full of craftsmanship, colours and joy.”

Meanwhile the mainline unites Saint Germain in the 70s with The Bronx in the 90s, resulting in a powerful display of pagoda-shouldered suits, long, lean flares and Swarovski-encrusted gowns. The Paris Fashion Week show – with his VIP audience attending via digital screens placed on the front row - opened with six elegantly reinvented archive ensembles worn by mature models, and progressed through the gamut of what Balmain is in demand for, from Breton tops to cycling shorts via louche knits and cool denims (the brand’s first move into sustainable fabrics). It was a tour de force that brought all elements of the designer’s preoccupations together. “I like the idea of the screens and neon colour palette being very 2021 and contrasting with looks from the 70s. I mean, Balmain isn’t one thing. You can love social media and go back to the archives. You can love contemporary culture and Serge Gainsbourg.”

Rousteing’s choice of Balmain’s Black Style Icons for the Nataal x Farfetch shoot in celebration of US Black History Month likewise expresses his far-reaching passions. All performers, the theme resonated deeply with him in terms of how Black musicians have long inspired his creativity. “Janet Jackson, Donna Summer, Diana Ross – I originally discovered my obsession with fashion through these singers,” he says, namechecking Pharrell Williams, Rihanna, Beyoncé and Kanye West among his modern crushes.

For this shoot though his first choice of female icon had to be Grace Jones. “Grace has that power, that fearlessness, and was one of the first female artists to play with androgynous dress codes. I love the collaboration she did with Azzedine Alaïa in the 80s, which for me was the beginning on the idea of the muse and the designer. Alaïa is one of my favourite French designers, and I’m obsessed with Grace’s songs, so it birthed in my mind this concept of mixing music and fashion.”

And for his male muse, Prince rules. “Like Grace, Prince mixed men’s and women’s wardrobes at a time when people would judge you and your sexuality. He pushed boundaries and was like, whatever you think, I am who I am. In a way, he started the gender fluid concept we have today. I remember an incredible 1995 Versace campaign for which he was shot wearing mesh metal. And of course, I adore his music. He was beautiful and everything he did was on point.”

Drawing on Balmain’s history, he also singles out an icon who might surprise many. “Joséphine Baker was one of the muses of Monsieur Balmain. In one image from the 50s, he dressed her in a white draped silk evening gown. I’m proud of that story and it’s one that a lot of people don’t know about the brand. She was a member of the French Resistance and she adopted children of different ethnicities. I come from an orphanage, so to know that she created a family of diversity is something I deeply admire.”

Rousteing’s life story is something out of a story book too. Born in Bordeaux, he was adopted and grew up not knowing anything of his roots. He graduated from Ecole Supérieure des Arts et Techniques de la Mode in Paris in 2003 and worked at Roberto Cavalli before joining Balmain in 2009. Just two years later, aged 25, he became creative director, making him not only one of the youngest but one of the very few people of colour to head up a French luxury house. He soon went about injecting Balmain with the high-octane aesthetic beloved of his ever-wondrous Balmain Army.

“In my career I had seen many obstacles and when I started at Balmain people asked me why I was bringing hip hop music, or Kim Kardashian or social media to the house. So, I was thinking, this is not an evolution, it’s a revolution and for that I need an army. Now the army has grown to become a Balmain Nation. It’s a community and I don’t feel the need to fight any more.”

In 2018 he reintroduced the brand to the hallowed halls of haute couture after a 16-year hiatus. Conversely, thanks to his embrace of new technology, Balmain has been ahead of the curve with innovations such as Snapchat filters, avatar models, live streaming shows on Tik Tok and its just-launched Signature platform on Apple Music. Rousteing has amassed over 6million followers on Instagram, where he is the unabashed king of the cheekbone selfie, while Balmain has topped a cool 10million followers.

Refusing to let Covid-19 dim the brand’s ability to put on a spectacle, last June he marked the 75th anniversary of the brand with a Paris Couture Week concert on the Seine starring Yseult. “She is one of the most important artists in France today. Mixing Yseult’s aesthetic with couture dresses from the 40s and 50s – a time when fashion was not inclusive - demonstrates that we are creating our own history. This is me saying, I’m a Black designer with a Black singer putting on a show for the world that we are living in today.”

Rousteing has always championed diversity and has become a role model in the process, a responsibility that has naturally fallen on him and one he doesn’t take lightly. “When I was younger, I didn’t have the chance to look up to a Black designer but now I can be an inspiration to kids. For me, championing diversity is normal and I’m happy to talk about it.” He joined the Black Lives Matter protests in Paris last summer to show his personal solidarity with the movement, and thanks to him, Balmain had nothing to hide either.

But is fashion really doing enough? He pauses, and laughs knowingly before responding to my question. “My answer might not be the one I should say but I think you can see when it’s awkward for some brands to talk about anti-racism because it doesn’t feel real,” he says frankly. “Black Lives Matter deserves more than three black screens on the Instagram feed. It’s more than putting two or three models on the catwalk. It’s a real vision of the world rather than trying to please the current mood. It’s sad that fashion has to be forced to change. It’s happening slowly and there’s still a lot of work to do.”

Despite his own dream-come-true success, Rousteing is at a point in his life where he’s keen for people to understand the man behind the sparkles, and therefore chose to lay himself bare in the recent film Wonder Boy. Directed and produced by Anissa Bonnefont, the documentary follows his quest to discover the truth of his birth. Having always assumed he was mixed race, he found out he was in fact half Ethiopian and half Somalian but was stopped short of contacting his mother.

“There are many documentaries of designers in their office talking about fashion and that is one side of me. But the other side of Olivier Rousteing is sometimes really lonely and wants to understand where he comes from. It was hard but I wanted to deliver the most authentic, spontaneous and real journey I could,” he says. “Through research, I discovered my origins and that made me super proud. I’ve always been in love with African culture so now I’m reading everything I can about Ethiopia and Somalia.” Some other break-thoughs were harder to hear, though. “I found out that my mother was really young when she had me and that she was not necessarily consenting… No matter where you come from, you can discover where you want to go and that is my message at the end of this movie.”

After a decade heading up Balmain, which is a lifetime in fashion years, it could be said that the designer has achieved all that he set out to yet he remains as inspired and driven as ever. A glance at the Pre-fall 21 collection suggests a life after lockdown full of outdoor pursuits and nocturnal pleasures. And right now, he’s hard at work conjuring up whatever fabulousness will come next.

“I never plan my future because there are so many things happening in society, and so many things happening in my life. But I have dreams. I hope that in 10 years’ time, I will wake up the same way I do now, with the happiness of creating and feeling free. I know it sounds cheesy but sometimes in fashion it’s easy to forget yourself and try to please a certain crowd. And it’s easy to be put in a box. What I have learnt is that the most important thing is to be satisfied with who you are. In future, I wish to still have my wings and fly.”

Balmain’s Black Fashion Icons: See the full fashion story on Nataal