The things Chavanon Caisiri says are as much of a knockout as the voluminous skirts and body-hugging dresses he designs. Yet talking to him feels very real-deal, and if it's anything like the relationship he has with his clients -- that of dressmaker and customer -- it's one without airs or the kind of pretension that usually surrounds fashion brands that have grown into larger-than-life powerhouses.
Blatantly honest and straight-talking, the creative director of uber-feminine brand Poem explains: "It's not the relationship of a friend, or of a vendor and customer, but a specific one where you trust each other. There are no barriers because you practically see all of them and even have to help them pick or make their undergarments. Sometimes customers don't even give you a design, just a date when they need the dress. So learning their style, what makes them confident and what lines flatter them, is something you have to learn from a relationship."
In fact, he reckons it is this intimacy element -- comparable to that between Audrey Hepburn and Hubert Givenchy -- that has driven the success of his brand, which celebrated its 10th anniversary last month. Despite an increasingly hectic schedule, with seven Poem stores across Bangkok and 50% of sales going to China, Chavanon prioritises having to meet his clients for fitting. Digging deep and focusing solely on the art of making clothes, the 33-year-old designer's pride is how Poem is a ready-to-wear Thai designer brand, yet with the background of dressmaking.
Some of Poem's past collections.
"I'd rather really research and go deep than occupy a wide space and be shallow," he says referring to the inclination of brands to expand everywhere and become everything. "I'd rather be known as a designer who knows how to make clothes than a designer who is good at PR. My mum taught me that if you don't know about clothes, you can't be a designer."
Having grown up doing his homework and eating dinner at his mother's pattern-making table, Chavanon has long understood the underpinnings of dressmaking, despite never having had any formal training. For his love of clothes, he started making and selling some under the name Aesthetic Theory before he even graduated. He laughs looking back at that decision, saying: "It's like those fashion kids who like to have long names, but marketing-wise it doesn't work because nobody remembers it!" However, it was also in that class where he learned that "the highest level of beauty is poetic beauty", that led to him using the name Poem -- a short and sweet name that's easy to pronounce.
There is no doubt that Poem's most breathtaking trademark is its hour-glass-shaped pieces -- for both the viewer and wearer, albeit quite literally for the latter. Collections don't stray far from the images of Jayne Mansfield, or Elizabeth Taylor "as Cleopatra in a green dress with a chopped-off waist", as Chavanon puts it. Still, they exude a modern flair each time around, with raised hemlines, full skirts made of neoprene or technology injected into tutus so they flaunt a gradation of rose petals as in the current collection.
The reason Chavanon adored the style of the 50s screen-sirens was that his mother didn't make those kinds of clothes. While he was fascinated by the hourglass shapes that Dior and Balenciaga were championing, his mother was making the sort of clothes that Jackie O wannabes would approve of.
"Mum had a ton of books from the post-war era in the 50s, and I thought [those women] were beautiful," he recalls. "I asked her why she never made clothes like that, and she said that her customers aren't beautiful like that; her customers are senior grown-ups. She never made anything with a dramatic waist because she said no one had a waist that small." This is a stark difference to today's tiny Thais, what with the store's waist-average dropping down to 23 inches.
The Decade of Glamour collection.
"It's such a contrast to now, because if you have money, you can get liposuction, your ribs cut off or whatever surgery. The market is finally ready for us to come up with designs like this, as opposed to 10 years ago when 24 inches was already considered way too small," says the designer.
The Poem poster girl -- prim, proper and glamorous -- is instantly recognisable now. Thanks to Chavanon sticking to this clear image of the Poem woman in his head, he has managed to carve his own niche.
"Some are old-fashioned and have the idea that women must dress conservatively and shouldn't wear deep necks, but play with other elements," he says. "It's something deeper, and makes a man want to prostrate down at their feet. It's about sex appeal. They don't need to wear short skirts that allow you to practically see their butt cheeks for them to be sexy. They have a way of getting it across that's more sophisticated and classy."
But Poem has had to weather both man-made and natural disasters to get where it is today from its inception on Siam Square Soi 2. There was the 2010 political fire in Siam and the floods of 2011, but mostly it was conquering the mainstream waves of Thai fashion in early 2000.
"Female designers like Disaya, Sretsis and Kloset were the main trend, and their style was girlie feminine. It was all about high-waisted silhouettes and minidresses with ruffles that didn't really flatter the body or show off a woman's curves. When I wanted to be myself, with clothes that are not sexy but very womanly, it was hard to get anyone to listen because it wasn't mainstream."
Now 10 years in and with the brand ready to expand to Dubai next year as well as officially entering its red-carpet phase, Poem is revelling in a new high: making made-to-measure dresses for award ceremonies for A-listers such as Anne Thongprasom and Kemabsorn "Cherry" Sirisookha. Yet even those are not Chavanon's proudest moments from that journey.
"If you asked me this last month, I would have said making Opal [Panisara Arayasakul]'s wedding dress," he says. "But now, after my 10th anniversary, where we showed 80 different looks, I would say that event because my mum looked really happy. It's the most number of looks we've ever done before. Mum's just a dressmaker, and she didn't expect it to be that big or grand. When I first started out, she asked if I was sure I really wanted to do this. But after the event, she said she was happy to see the fashion show and proud that I chose this occupation."
