The Balmain Army Came Out for a Late-Night Fête on Friday

After a decade with Balmain—nearly nine years of which have been spent as its creative director—Olivier Rousteing has cemented a style well-known to those beyond the fashion realm. When the sun sets the Balmain woman is a vampy, club-going glamazon. She’s got an appetite for Champagne and sequins and tabletop dancing, but what does she wear during the day?

It’s a question the designer has sought to answer in recent years, most recently with the BBuzz bag, which could be found in the hands of many, many partygoers—along with the night’s cocktail of choice, the Ipanema Spritz. “I wanted to create something iconic and classic and timeless, so I asked some of my friends who are girls what they want,” Rousteing told us, alluding to his Balmain army, a veritable treasure trove of celebrity market research. “You know who they are, but I will never say their name because I need those friends to tell me their secrets!”

Holding court on the terrace of the Le Chalet bar at Saks Fifth Avenue’s L’Avenue outpost Friday night, Rousteing exuded his signature charm as he stood surrounded by a troupe of models. Well-heeled fans popped in frequently to showcase their Balmain wares, purchased earlier in the day at the brand’s first New York shop-in-shop on the department store’s third floor.

“I think what New York loves about us is our French touch, so I made sure that I brought the French classiness that you can see in our store on rue Saint-Honoré but of course with some more-minimal aspects,” Rousteing later added of the new space. “We wanted this to feel more like a love letter from us to New York rather than another hôtel particulier in Paris.”

As the evening wore on, it was the disco soundtrack that kept the guests boogying into the night, Olivia Palermo, Justine Skye, and Sean O’Pry among them. “Give me black and studs and I feel like a new woman,” Princess Maria-Olympia of Greece told Vogue as Donna Summers’s “I Feel Love” blared through the speakers, the crowd rolling and shimmying to the beat. “I feel powerful, like any woman should when they wear Balmain.”