Ami’s Evolving Paris Attitude

Ami — the 14 year-old French brand known for its mix of heart-emblazoned sweaters and more discreet, well-cut wardrobe pieces — has grown its sales ten-fold in 4 years to more than €300 million ($312 million). Leveraging a network of 75 stores and 700 points of sale in over 100 countries, Ami has won over an international clientele ranging from shoppers seeking bold symbols of identity to those who seek to free themselves from overly visible codes, preferring sober lines and a quiet allure.

Powering Ami’s seemingly irresistible ascent, there’s the backing of Chinese fund Sequoia Capital, which acquired a majority stake in 2020. And a vision: for a friendly, optimistic brand that draws inspiration from its Parisian roots while steering clear of snobbery and “posturing.”

“Ami is a promise kept between the commercial reality of a garment—its price, its quality—and the values it conveys. It’s a joyful, reassuring simplicity,” Mattiussi said in an interview at his Place des Victoires headquarters ahead of the brand’s autumn-winter 2025 runway show in Paris Wednesday.

“After four years of hyper-growth, we want to strengthen the foundations,” CEO Nicolas Santi-Weil said. The brand is pulling back its exposure to online wholesale and taking steps to project a more consistent brand image.

The brand has headroom to invest in preparing its next steps, having achieved a double-digit profitability in 2024. Five years after launching womenswear, the category remains a key opportunity for growth, making up 15 percent of sales.

“We’ve rethought our offer to make it clearer. We want to have the same message for both retail and wholesale. We want to be masters of our own destiny, to create a story that makes sense,” Santi-Weil said.

Ami’s new collection championed relaxed, fluid tailoring, with a palette of matcha greens punctuated by the occasional floral print and styled with leather bags that echoed the return of ultra-classic pocketbooks at many brands this season.

Stars including Whoopi Goldberg and Catherine Deneuve counted among some thousand guests in attendance. But the show, which was accompanied by tranquil piano music, still felt like a softer expression of the brand than recent spectacles like a star-studded runway show on the Buttes Montmartre or the brand’s marketing coup in season 3 of “Emily in Paris”.

After all, as Sacha Guitry said: ‘To be Parisian is not to be born in Paris, it is to be reborn there.”

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Laurence Benaïm: Fourteen years after creating Ami, how would you define yourself?

Alexandre Mattiussi: I love doing, creating, producing… I’m an entrepreneur who looks at AMI’s worldwide figures every morning before his coffee. Nothing gives me greater pleasure. I’m a retailer, and I’m proud to be able to maintain the same enthusiasm and passion every day.

LB: How do you explain Ami’s worldwide success?

AM: Ami is a promise kept between the commercial reality of a garment–its price, its quality–and the values it conveys. It’s a joyful, reassuring simplicity: a rib in the right place, a sweater that doesn’t puddle, a fit that’s just right, a cut that doesn’t play tricks. We don’t mock our customers by raising prices and not the quality.

Did you feel you’ve made some mistakes along the way?

Yes, with products that weren’t right, that didn’t live up to my passions. Or with mega-runway shows. The worst was the Sacré Coeur show, in June ‘22, at the top of the Butte Montmartre. I got caught up in something that wasn’t me.

And yet you continue to assert this image of Paris and the Parisian woman through your collections…

Yes, but since then I’ve come to understand that Paris shouldn’t be just a postcard. Of course, when I open an AMI café in Tokyo and people queue for two to four hours for a cappuccino with a milk foam heart, yes: Paris is Disneyland, let’s not hold back. It’s bingo.

But Paris shouldn’t be oversimplified. Paris is an attitude, a look. And that’s what I’m trying to convey through Ami today.

How has AMI’s style evolved since the brand was created in 2011?

In 2011, after years of consulting, I decided I wanted to create a brand. I remember calling loyal manufacturers and [marketing expert] Jean-Jacques Picart. At first there were two employees, but today we are over 700.

Fourteen years later, there are fewer effects, fewer tralalas. We’re refocusing on attitude, on clothing, on an increasingly precise and identifiable wardrobe. A blue poplin shirt, a camel coat, a little navy sweater, a blazer, two pairs of jeans, a sweatshirt, pleated pants. The idea is to recreate desire every time. It’s like an orchestra playing the same music—but the interpretation has evolved.

Ami is a wardrobe that evolves with moods and desires. As for next winter, with camels, soft oranges, aniseed, jackets reduced to jacket structures, tee shirts like blouses, satin cut on the edge, coats both enveloping and ultra-airy, knitwear like milk… It’s the lightest winter collection we’ve ever done.

You’ve done more than 20 runway shows now for Ami. What motivates you to keep coming back to the catwalk every season?

WhatI’ve loved since I was a kid is telling stories. And what could be more beautiful than an evening show? Lights up, music plays, the first exit. It’s a vital 10 minutes for me.

The show offers an augmented reality, a staging that I absolutely need. I love the idea of the troupe, the troubadour side of this profession. Even if I’m sure I won’t be doing it all my life.

How do you see yourself fitting in to the world of luxury and fashion?

Between the good guys who have become bad guys, and the bad guys who’ve signed a pact with the devil, I don’t recognize myself anywhere.

I feel apart, even if the appointment of Mathieu Blazy at Chanel and Louis Trotter at Bottega Veneta gives me hope that fashion is evolving in the right direction: away from posturing.

I’ve been offered corporate jobs, and I’ve said no every time. Why would I give my body and soul to a third party who won’t thank me in the end? The fashion world has become an empire of fatal liaisons, with exhausted, jaded people, condemned to produce in quantity, six times a year, to justify the existence of a system that has reached its breaking point.

Do you have any motto?

I’ll always remember the one that Remo Ruffini, the chairman of Moncler, passed on to. He told me: “Don’t get too big too fast”. Our aim now is to improve and structure our image, marketing and communication.

Is it true there’s an Ami fragrance on the way?

We’re working on it. I can’t give a date, but it will be made from the heart. At the moment I wear Shalimar by Guerlain, Musc Ravageur by Frédéric Malle, Bois d’Argent by Dior, Eau de Cologne by Helmut Lang for special occasions.

Your heart logo is such an important signature for the brand, but you almost never see it on Ami’s runway. Why don’t you choose to play with or celebrate the logo in this context?

This little heart is not a logo, but a symbol, a story, who I am: It’s how I’ve signed things since I was eight years old. So I want to protect it in a way.

We can push it sometimes—on a cappuccino, for “Emily in Paris”—but mostly I want to keep it safe. This heart is already copied so much it can make you dizzy.

At one point you could have fooled me into thinking that this heart was a trap. But it’s my signature, my “number 5,” so to speak. I’ll never give it up.

Additional reporting by Robert Williams.