CHARRAT STARTS SMALL STILL THINKS BIG PARIS -- The flowers in the boxes are tangled, the carpet is discolored in spots, and there isn't stick of furniture in the place.
But Christian Charrat, holding a bold stance in the center of his new design studio headquarters, looks as lordly as a baron.
It's the second time he's launched his own label, and, if the third time is a charm, second is at least less chancy.
"We'll have only a small space," the designer says, talking small but taking a drag on a cigarette in a Breakfast At Tiffany's-worthy cigarette holder. "As we are producing only shirts, ties, pocket handkerchiefs, sweaters and cluff links, we don't need a big space. Since I'm not well known at the moment, we just need a small space."
Small, however, is not the usual target size of Charrat's thinking. Buyers may remember the life-size recreation of the Orient Express replete with strolling men with cigarette holders, an elegant woman walking a Pekingese, luxury loungewear and a hovering layer of steam, that the designer staged when working for S.T. Dupont.
He's a man who retires on weekends to an elegant country estate, who is met in the gravel driveway by his towering Great Danes, Cocaine and Cashmere, and who strides …
