The Quiet Rise of Ponte

PARIS — “The secret is to stay unnoticed as much as possible,” says designer Harry Pontefract, as we meander through an exhibit of pieces from his four-year-old London- and Paris-based label Ponte that opened today in the basement of Dover Street Market’s Marais megastore.

So far, Pontefract has managed to steer clear of fashion’s hype cycle, which can turn promising young designers into darlings of the system only to drop them a few seasons later. But with Ponte shortlisted for this year’s LVMH Prize, his low profile could be hard to maintain.

The designer inhabits a space at the intersection of fashion and art. He creates one-of-a-kind, sculptural pieces full of poetry: an enormous stole made of tufty wool; a top that looks like a cascade of grapes; a beaded dress that appears to be an accumulation of stones and bin liners. His list of clients includes the Metropolitan Museum, which has acquired eight of his one-off pieces, some of which are currently on display in its “Costume Art” exhibition. But Ponte’s offering also includes more practical pieces like five-pocket jeans and twisted tailoring.

“As much as I delve into forms that are abstract, or sculptural, it is important for me to define the Ponte items that can be worn day by day and stay as they are as classic, almost generic pieces,” Pontefract says as we ponder a dark green suede shirt with matching trousers, and a faultless graphite suit. “I love the fact that fashion is a trade of functional things.”

Pontefract was born in Sheffield, in the north of England, to an artist mother. “Back when I was a kid, the places we inhabited were completely dilapidated, which worked as a sort of aesthetic imprinting on me,” he says. He was schooled at the University of Westminster and Central Saint Martins in London, where he founded Ponte in 2023 with Bryan Conway, then design director at Tiger of Sweden, who remains a behind-the-scenes co-pilot of the label.

Ponte was an immediate hit with influential insiders. “Amanda Harlech was my first customer,” Pontefract says. Dover Street Market, which had bought Pontefract’s MA collection back in 2016, became — and remains — the label’s main stockist. The designer has never gunned for growth and has no plans to rapidly ramp up distribution, leaning into private sales. “I prefer my work to find its audience naturally, without pushing too much,” he explains.

Pontefract lives in Paris where he spent six years at Jonathan Anderson’s Loewe before joining Glenn Martens at Margiela, where he works in the “Artisanal” division. And if Ponte’s aesthetic roots can be easily traced — whiffs of Margiela, a bit of Comme, hints of Hussein — what makes the label original is its utterly specific balance of abstract and organic, brainy and animalistic, not to mention the sheer emotion that runs through it all. “As much as our work is abstract,” Pontefract says, “we build characters, and work around what they feel.”

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