Culture

Ella Boucht Is Bringing London’s Queer Community Together With Their Cool Suiting


Of all the stylish crews in London, the one that looks freshest is the decidedly understated group outfitted by Ella Boucht. The 27-year-old, who is Finnish by birth and educated by Central Saint Martins, has created a defined look that can be described as a rowdy, sexy Savile Row. The collection contains waistcoats, a signature in Boucht’s designs, pleated trousers with just the right amount of slouch, and suiting accessories like wallet chains and suspenders. At a moment when many tropes in fashion can feel wrong and overdone in 2020, Boucht’s clothes are assertive, low-key, and right. It’s not by chance, either: Boucht’s experience with suits is deeply personal, and their garments are tailored to their friends, or “queer womxn, butches, dykes, non-binary, and trans people.”

Boucht never intended to be a fashion designer. Instead, they had aspirations to be an actor. While in the theater world, Boucht met a seamstress who piqued their interest in what was happening behind the scenes rather than onstage. “I think it was more about the interest in the craft and learning everything about how to construct, how to sew, and how to build a garment, more than maybe the actual designing,” they say. For Boucht, the interest in design started when they entered the world of Tumblr, a portal that opened up their interest in clothing, as well as queerness, sexuality, and identities. Eventually, Boucht went to design school in Sweden where their world expanded with new friend circles, and in 2018, they started attending Central Saint Martins working towards a Masters Degree in Womenswear.

Boucht considers suiting something that helped them figure out gender, identity, and sexuality. Their friend group at Central Saint Martins have become the inspiration for Boucht’s designs and suits. Mainly because it was never easy for Boucht or their friends to get the right suit, which often fell into the binary of male and female. “When you tried to find a suit, as a non-binary, genderfluid person, it’s sometimes really hard because suits are either made for men, or it’s made for women. There’s not really anything in between,” says Boucht. “I usually bought, and still buy, a lot of suits that are secondhand or vintage, and then have to re-tailor them quite a lot.”

There are several issues when retailoring a traditional men’s suit, including cumbersome details like taking in a broad shoulder silhouette. “Especially for queer people, there is a lot of body dysmorphia, and therefore you have to take that into account when designing and altering suits for them, for the person to feel as comfortable and sexy in their own skin as possible,” says Boucht. Now, Boucht tries to work from a non-binary perspective, mixing in different cuts from men’s and women’s suiting, eventually funneling those attributes into their own creations.

Their pieces are made to transform and fit bodies and identities: Some pants have lowered crotches and some of the vests have chest binders. The waistcoat, an often forgotten suiting feature, is central to Boucht’s collections and is made to straighten the back, a cue that they took from the book Female Masculinity by Jack Halberstam. “I wanted to play with the idea of when you have those posture correctors, because it’s about you holding yourself up, and how you walk. When you put that waistcoat on, the waistcoat also keeps you up, and holds your back in position. It’s a bit like walking into war,” they say, later adding. “They make people feel comfortable in themselves and [it] makes them walk with pride.”

Here, meet Boucht’s suited-and-booted crew.

Ella Boucht 



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