For their Fall/Winter 2024 showroom appointments, the mother-daughter duo behind Antwerp-based Bernadette, Bernadette and Charlotte de Geyter, both dressed in their own designs. Bernadette, 58, selected a grey knit with a subtle white floral embellishment, which she paired with a busier pink and red floral skirt and white Prada shoes. Charlotte, 31, went for a slinky top with a delicate floral print, baggy denim, and buckled Miu Miu kitten heels. That room for unique interpretation is one of their favorite aspects of the brand, they say.
The two launched Bernadette in 2018 after stints in the fashion world (Charlotte in school for design at Antwerp’s Royal Academy of Fine Arts and later internships, Bernadette a former buyer and knitwear designer). Their debut collection explored principles of femininity in structured silhouettes, veering heavily into the world of botanicals. In the years since, they’ve expanded into hand-painted ceramics, embroidered slippers, and bow-bedecked bridal.
Still, if you’re searching for saccharine frills, look elsewhere. Despite their girlish nature, the lines of their couture-like creations are clean—a tenet of Charlotte’s sense of style. The designers explore tropes like bows and volume without sacrificing gravitas. In doing so, they open their world to a wide array of customers. “I always think it's really cool if a punk woman wears a pink Bernadette dress,” Charlotte notes. Ahead, the two dissect their brand and personal style.
Coveteur: You’re obviously both extremely stylish. Charlotte, what was growing up in your house like in terms of aesthetic exposure?
Charlotte de Geyter: “Well, my mom was always my muse. She's always been a big fan of fashion, so she always chose the most exciting pieces in stores. She would always pick the shoe with the most beads or embroidery or the highest heel. She had a lot of accessories and had a lot of fun with decorating and in her closet. Also, she allowed me to wear whatever I wanted when I was young. So it was very inspiring and very free as a young girl to grow up as my mom’s daughter.”
Bernadette, I think I read somewhere that you also grew up with a mother who was aesthetically inclined.
Bernadette de Geyter: Yes. She knows a bit of everything, and she taught me a lot: to sew, to knit, to do a bit of everything. She was very creative.
Charlotte: “She always had her sewing machine on the table in her living room, making these quilts or knitting. She used to crochet things to put under your pots, like old school crochet.”
Bernadette: “She was always busy. She was always busy creatively, either cooking or sewing or gardening or something.”
Charlotte: “And I would say the entire family—my mom has four brothers—they all love creating things, love creating little atmospheres.”
Bernadette: ”Your grandfather, too.”
Bernadette Spring 2024 Collection
Courtesy of Bernadette
I love that. Did you always plan to work together?
Charlotte: “No, we actually never thought of it. We were, of course, always having a lot of fun. Our relationship was both being really good friends, but also traveling a lot together. She was always showing me the different stores. I didn't grow up in the city, but my mom took me every Wednesday afternoon to Antwerp.”
Bernadette: “Or to Brussels or to Ghent.”
Charlotte: “The moment we started thinking about working together was when I moved to London. And then it went quickly.”
Can you run me through what you both had been doing before you launched the brand and how the idea came about?
Charlotte: “I went to the Royal Academy here in Antwerp to study fashion design, which was a really intense process. There was not much of a social life. And after that, the first thing you want is to get a great internship. I got an internship in London. It was the first time that we were not living in the same city, so we were calling each other every day. It suddenly became really clear for us that we were missing out on something and we could really do something together.”
I'm so curious to hear about the first collection you did for Bernadette. When you were conceiving what this brand would look like, what was on the mood board? What did you want from it?
Charlotte: “It started with a lot of my mom's existing closet, consisting of a lot of beautiful designer pieces, but also a lot of vintage pieces. Here in Brussels you have amazing antique and flea markets, so we were always hunting for these luxury dresses with handmade lace, for example. She also has a lot of ’90s and 2000s Ralph Lauren kept from the time that she worked there. We had a great existing archive. And we knew that we wanted the brand to remain very close to us, to who we are. We thought, let's see how we can approach different women of different generations. And then, of course, drawing became a big part of my life in school; it became my signature to draw and create these moods for different collections.
Back then, I was living at home, and we had a beautiful garden. We started researching a lot of botanical paintings, as well. You could probably cover a whole room’s walls with those paintings and drawings. And then we started scanning them, making the prints, looking for fabrics. We started with silks only, really developing the colors. Color has really always been a big part of our life. In my mom's house, there wasn’t a lot of white. We knew we wanted to challenge our customer and really play with color a lot.”
Bernadette: “We wanted to make dresses that were very feminine, very elegant, very chic.”
Charlotte: “We've always admired all different kinds of women, either from movies now, like Sienna Miller, or really old movies. We really studied those iconic women and what they wore, these more classic shapes, a lot of evening wear that you can take into today's style—the colors and the fabrics.”
Bernadette (left) and Charlotte (right) de Geyter
Courtesy of Bernadette
Do you have super similar personal style as well?
Charlotte: “My mom’s style was always more…”
Bernadette: “Fun.”
Charlotte: “Yeah, more daring. More unexpected styling. It was very Sex and the City back in those days. My mom had always had these rose brooches that she put on all these different jackets.”
Bernadette: “And I like to wear the feminine dress, but then I like to wear it with a man's coat. I like to clash a silk skirt with a masculine knit or something. I like to play with opposites.”
Charlotte: “You always look for a lot of contrast in your outfits, but I would say the main thing is fun. And then I think for me, starting in school, I started to dress more simply. More clean. Now, you’ll see me in a white T-shirt and black pants, or a Bernadette dress. That's how we both look at design, too. What we love most is that we design for many different women and different personalities.”
Bernadette: “And when we make the mood boards, we both go research on our own, and then we put everything together. It comes together very naturally.”
I know inspiration is one of those things that literally can come from anywhere, but what are your favorite things to consume, whether it's a favorite Instagram account to follow, Pinterest, films, books, museums?
Bernadette: “I think it's different by the season, of course, but it can be everything. You can see a movie, and then it can give you some ideas, or you go to a city, or you go to a garden even and see some flowers that you think about. We take a lot of pictures and we send them to each other.”
Charlotte: “We're big on movies.”
What are some of your favorites?
Charlotte: “Ever since I was seven years old, I've been obsessed with Julia Roberts. I don't know why. When I was 10 years old, my favorite movie that I watched literally every week was Pretty Woman. I love those 2000s movies."
Bernadette: “And Sex and the City, because they were wearing whatever they wanted.”
Charlotte: “And then I also love looking for prints and color. I love looking at art, lots of figurative arts, lots of painting. My boyfriend is a painter, so I'm naturally influenced every day. I love Hockney and Matisse.”
Bernadette: “Monet.”
Charlotte: “All those colorful paintings.”
I'd love to hear about printmaking. I'm so fascinated. Are you just drawing and painting a lot of your prints and then scanning them? How does that work?
Charlotte: “In the beginning, I started on paper really using lots of different techniques, like crayons or paint or watercolor, and then scanned it, but it wasn't very easy. Sometimes you lose some depth of it. Now, we can create prints and we can really develop and turn them into such a lot of different colors. That’s difficult if you only work on paper. Now I have my iPad, which is amazing because it has a really good program where you can choose all the different brushes, all the different crayons, and you can switch the colors. You can really be on there for many, many hours. So I've gone digital, but I didn't start digital.”
I know you told me a little bit about your style, but when you look at your closets, I’m sure Bernadette takes up a chunk, but what are the brands that each of you mix in to complete the picture for you?
Bernadette: “I really love Prada. I have a very big respect for Miuccia Prada.”
Charlotte: “We obviously buy mostly accessories now because we wear Bernadette so much. So Prada and Miu Miu, they have good shoes."
Bernadette: “Also the bags.”
Charlotte: “And of course, Miuccia Prada is one of the biggest icons for us. She's really amazing and beautiful. And then I have a lot of friends working in fashion, so I feel like I am also influenced by where they work at the moment. My best friend has worked for Balenciaga for a few years now. It's really nice to see Bernadette in contrast with Balenciaga. It's a good unexpected combination.”
Bernadette: “Especially for me at my age.”
Charlotte: “And I love a lot of young brands, too.”
Bernadette: “We have a friend who works for Bottega [Veneta], so we love that, too.”
Charlotte: “I really admire Simone Rocha. She also has such a beautiful feminine world. And then Molly Goddard, for example, but also young Parisian brands like Abra. So, it's a good mix between younger brands and also the icons like Prada.”
Bernadette Spring 2024 Collection
Courtesy of Bernadette
I feel like your Bernadette world is so feminine, but it's also quite simple and pure. It's not so frilly and embellished.Bernadette: “No. We have our days sometimes.”
Charlotte: “Yes, we love really big sculptural shapes. We love going in one direction, not too busy. I would say what my mom always did, looking for the contrasts, makes it so much more interesting. I always think it's really cool if a punk woman wears a pink Bernadette dress. And that's how we approach everything.”
Do you find that when you release a new collection, you two will gravitate towards the same piece when you pick things to wear yourself, or do you usually have very different favorites?
Bernadette: “Sometimes we have to call each other to ask, ‘What are you wearing now?’"
Charlotte: “Five years ago, we really chose differently. Now, we're starting to choose the same items in our personal orders. Maybe it's because I'm getting older. We're becoming more similar when it comes to style, but still we wear it differently.”
What does the text thread between you two look like?
Charlotte: ”It's never-ending.”
Bernadette: ”We have a lot to speak about, always.”
Charlotte: “There's never like a ‘hey.’ It's always an instant question, ‘What do you think?’”
Bernadette: “The moodboard starts with text messages.”
Charlotte: “Yours is always the name that's first in the WhatsApp app. It's quite funny because at work, we usually only talk about work, and then we go home, and I'll call her to talk about something more personal.”
Bernadette: “Like, ‘Are you cooking?’"
It's good to keep it separate. What do your homes look like now?
Bernadette: “Well, I just moved into Antwerp. We live like 10 minutes from each other. Also, my son is very near. It's a big change for me, living in the city. But I love it.”
Charlotte: “My mom lived in the countryside her whole life. And now it's really cool to see how you decorate your city home, because you're really still decorating your city home. It's cool to see your style evolving, too. There's still this cottage inspiration, but now there's a lot of more art and more design.
My home—I've lived there for one year— it’s more minimal. It's very white. It's very clean, not a lot of stuff.”
Bernadette: “And the kitchen is blue.”
Charlotte: “My kitchen is all blue, but then my living room is all white. My mom has a lot of fun elements, like a Tweety Bird or these little dolls all around, but I only need my bowls and my plates in the kitchen.”
Bernadette: ”We both have pink bathrooms.”
That's so fun. I'll wrap it up with one grander question: What do you hope to see from Bernadette in the next five, 10, 20 years?
Charlotte: “What really excites us the most is seeing so many different people in Bernadette. I love it when someone can see something on the street, even if it's a tile or something stupid, and can say, ‘Ah, that's very Bernadette.’ I love that it sort of can become…”
Bernadette: “A signature.”
Charlotte: “We're really expanding both our homeware and our ready-to-wear collection. We now have knitwear, we have embroidery. The Bernadette world is really growing. You can surround yourself in the universe.”
Bernadette: “Yes, you can start in the morning and go very late in the evening.”
Charlotte: “Our dream in five or 10 years would be to have—and we are really dreaming here—the hotel Bernadette or something, where you can wake up in our silk robe and then have a breakfast on our ceramics.”
Bernadette: “Maybe a wine in our name.”
Charlotte: “A Bernadette cocktail.”
Bernadette: “A Bernadette cocktail, you never know.”
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