An exclusive interview with Ivan Frolov — the Ukrainian designer featured at Paris Fashion Week

Ivan Frolov, the young designer and founder and creative director of Ukrainian fashion brand FROLOV tells us how he kick-started his fashion career, his future goals for the successful brand, what it’s like to work amid the ongoing war in Ukraine.

How did your career in fashion start? Where did you train and who were your greatest inspirations?

As long as I can remember, I knew I wanted to be a designer. I drew my first sketches before I could write, and created my first dress when I was 14. One of my first fashion memories is a runway show of John Galliano I saw on TV. I loved the pieces I saw, and knew straight away I wanted to create my own too.

© Olia Kolendo, Art de Vivre

When did you found the FROLOV fashion brand and why?

FROLOV was born in Kyiv, in my heart, when I was born so it’s not easy to say exactly when it was founded. Our first collection to reach a professional platform was created in 2013. Officially, our company was founded in 2015 and that’s when we started exporting actively.