Born in Buenos Aires,  Vanessa Seward grew up in London and Paris.  After training at Studio Berçot, she worked alongside Karl Lagerfeld at Chanel for nine years, then with Tom Ford at Yves Saint Laurent. She then joined Loris Azzaro in 2002 and succeeded him as Artistic Director after his death in 2003. Drawing from her experiences in luxury,  Vanessa Seward turned her attention in 2012 to a more accessible market by creating capsule collections for the ready-to-wear brand A.P.C. Following her success, she decided in 2014 to launch her eponymous brand. Enriched by this dual experience —working with major French fashion houses  and urban ready-to-wear—Vanessa Seward offers a timeless wardrobe characterized by subtle luxury suited for everyday life. With femininity as her priority, she skillfully infuses sensual and distinctive touches into each of her collections, creating a wardrobe that is sophisticated and secretly desirable.

"When she decided to leave the fashion world, in which she had been immersed for so many years, to become a portraitist, Vanessa, without provocation and always discreetly as she knows how, turned her back on the armor that clothing represents, the exaggerated makeup, the obligatory gestures, the spectacular attitudes—in short, on a brilliant and illusory world—to focus on simplicity, spontaneity, and to seek out the aura of people, to discover an emotion, and to reveal the delicacy of the same women she painted." "Whether it's Sylvia Kristel, Nastassja Kinski, Dayle Haddon, Diana Ross, Ornella Muti, or Inès de la Fressange, or even her own daughter, the clarity is total. These figures are most often painted frontally and simply gaze straight ahead. Their pupils scrutinize us and speak to us, penetrating deep within us." After the success of her first exhibition in 2023, a second is being prepared for Spring 2025, where her sensitive portraits will once again be on display. In these works, "she challenges the 'idealized' beauty—superficial, accommodating, egocentric—seeking instead to delve into the gaze of her heroines, to uncover an emotion, a depth, and to track down a fragility just beneath the surface."

*Quotes by Elizabeth Védrenne.