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Life.Culture.Discovery.

Busy as a b

With a global fashion, floristry and pastry empire to manage on top of her conservation, artistic and philanthropic commitments, Agnès Troublé has no time for shopping or shows - not that she'd have it any other way, finds Gemma Soames

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Fashion designer Agnès Troublé in her first store, on the Rue du Jour, in Paris, where the global agnès b empire began.
Photo: Edward Wong
Photo: Edward Wong
In the behemoths that are global fashion houses, personal stories can often get lost. Big brands signify big bucks and give life to images of multimillionaire moguls and conference rooms; of roll-outs, strategies and suits; of names that jump from the pages of fashion bibles and trip off the tongues of fashionistas.

Agnès b is one such name.

At heart, however, this brand is a more personal affair. It encapsulates the story of a woman, born Agnès Troublé, with humble ambitions and little regard for fashion, who went on to become one of France's best-known entrepreneurs; a self-made millionaire who doesn't shop; a mother of five and a grandmother of 15 who distributes free condoms in her stores; and a filmmaker.

Welcome to the world of Agnès b, the person.

"I don't care for fashion so much," says Troublé in a thick French accent, as she perches on the edge of a sofa in Hong Kong's Peninsula hotel. "Fashion that comes and goes is not that interesting to me. The best thing is to be oneself, to find your own personality and keep that idea in mind."

Staying true to her own ideals has helped Troublé build her business, which started in a converted butcher's shop in an unfashionable district of Paris, into one that now boasts 282 stores - including cafes, florists and patisseries - and more than 2,000 employees, scattered across the world.

"I've been here [in Hong Kong] for 19 years, and the team have been developing agnès b very well, taking my ideas on the fly. Like these flowers," she says, gesturing towards a perfectly imperfect bunch of peonies. "I wanted to be a florist when I was 15, so now they do agnès b flowers, and they do it perfectly."

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