Like many French girls, Violette Serrat’s first memory of Guerlain is her mother’s box of Météorites. Those violet-scented pastel illuminating powders were applied with a brush that the girl Violette dreamed of inheriting. Almost two years ago this Frenchwoman, passed through Brooklyn, and now back in Paris, she was appointed Guerlain’s creative director of makeup. I ask her in her Parisian office if she will dare to change this cult product created in 1987, and she smiles: “I can’t say it, but it’s one of the projects that excites me the most.”
Before coming to Guerlain, Violette was a makeup designer for Dior and global beauty director for Estée Lauder. With 506,000 followers on Instagram and her own brand -Violette Fr-, she fits the profile of a creative, very active young professional who always has a plan B and is usually a successful personal project.
Devoted body and soul to her mission as creative director of makeup, one of her aspirations is that the daughters and granddaughters of Guerlain clients continue to trust the brand despite what TikTok recommends. “I think it will end up happening in a very organic way, you don’t have to force things. We are creating attractive pieces that are already appealing to the youngest”.
Violette shows the spring collection with unique packaging, denim embroidered with colored flowers. “When they open up the palette, they’re going to find bold, sophisticated colors that they’re going to immediately identify with,” she says. She knows what she’s talking about. Against all odds in the fall, the metallic blue shadow from the ella Ombre G palette blew up social media, heralding the death of minimalism and the definitive return of 80s makeup.
“Don’t think that he had everything under control, his success amazed me almost like everyone else. I think it had to do with the use of high-quality pigments and with the vital moment after the pandemic, when everyone wanted to party and announce it, with a look and attitude”.
She defines herself as more intuitive than strategist, preferring to inspire rather than influence. “I think that’s why Guerlain chose me, my networks and my work with other brands have shown that I can connect with a young audience.” Actually, her ambition is to work for all ages. “In these times it is difficult to place someone in a specific age group because everyone seems to be between 20 and 40, people take care of themselves, they remove wrinkles, so we have decided to work for everyone.”
With this inspiration, he has created another of the key pieces of the season, the Terracotta Le Teint make-up base. A product that he has managed to square the circle: it is fresh and natural, it lasts 24 hours and does not transfer. “It really is the equivalent of terracotta powder in the make-up category, an unbeatable product”, says Violette, and highlights: “What makes terracotta powder great is its natural effect, it seems that you have been touched by the sun, its tones exist in nature, the skin appears healthy and that is not easy to achieve.”
For Violette, creating a makeup base was “a challenge.” “I don’t like them and I’ve always thought that if you hate something you’ll never be good at it.” She acknowledges that her theory has failed on this basis. “It only acts on those that need to be improved: redness, tone or luminosity, but it lets the skin breathe and show. The formula is very good and I have had the best team working with me”.
Another tough question: Will Violette change the legendary Terracotta powder? “Because? They are perfect. What is already good I will not touch. I have not come to Guerlain to destroy. I want the best for this house.”
