At the 20th edition of Copenhagen Fashion Week, Paolina Russo and Lucile Guilmard — the designers behind London-based brand Paolina Russo — traveled back to the city where they made their runway debut two years earlier, feeling, in their own words, like the brand is more “grown up”.
“Last time we were here, the brand was really new, we hadn’t even set up our direct-to-consumer [channel] yet. Since then, we’ve started our DTC [e-commerce business], our community on Instagram has grown, and more people are wearing the brand,” says Russo, speaking from the brand’s temporary Copenhagen studio, as her London team of handknitters make finishing touches to the pieces. Paolina Russo is one day out from its Fall/Winter 2026 show. “We’ve learned an awful lot in the past two years.”
The biggest learning of all, Russo and Guilmard say, has been how to grow a viable business out of a creative idea, something they recognize is largely down to growing consumer awareness in a brand’s infancy. Now, for its FW26 collection, the duo is doubling down on growing their DTC audience by incorporating tech into the garments, via NFC (near-field communication) chips embroidered onto their knitwear and developed in collaboration with US-based tech manufacturer Avery Dennison.
These chips — woven into what the pair are calling “community badges” and which resemble the Girl Scout-style badges that run as a motif throughout all Paolina Russo collections — are an effort to bridge the physical and digital worlds. When scanned with a mobile phone, the chips send the user through an interactive portal, which they can click through to land straight on the Paolina Russo e-commerce site and browse the collection, so that each garment becomes a “living portal” to encourage sales, the pair explain.
Photo: Ted Mendez
Canadian-born Russo founded the brand in London in 2020, after graduating from Central Saint Martins, and was joined by her French co-founder Lucile Guilmard in 2022, also a Central Saint Martins graduate. In June 2023, the pair won the first Zalando Visionary Award, which recognized their sustainable local craft and materials. As part of the award, the brand received a €50,000 cash prize, as well as full funding and production for their first show, held two months later, during CPHFW SS24.
The Zalando funding helped them invest in the chip technology. “It’s a really cool way for us to incorporate tech into ancient crafted elements, a fusion we’ve always been interested in, and at the same time connect more people to the Paulina Russo universe, whether they are a part of it or new to it,” says Russo.