Family is at the core of the St Agni brand. When Lara Fells founded the business with her husband Matt in Byron Bay, New South Wales, the intention was to create a label that reflected the minimal-yet-elevated style of clothes she yearned to wear. A little under a decade – and two kids – later, she can’t see herself running the company with anyone else. ‘I honestly think having a business partner who is your life partner is the best thing ever,’ says Fells over Zoom from her home office, dressed all in black – a reflection of her refined personal style. Given that the brand is named after Fells’ Greek grandmother, it’s clear St Agni is a family affair: the duo’s innate creativity has even trickled down to their five-year-old son. ‘He’s definitely very experimental with his clothing choices. I’m not allowed to dress him anymore,’ she says, laughing.
Fells designs durable pieces for women who are followers of The Row and Khaite but seeking a more accessible price point. Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid can attest to the versatility of the brand, having recently been seen in, respectively, the slate-grey knit ‘Vas’ mini dress and a pair of low-slung trousers with a raw hem orbiting the waistline. Fells gets excited at memory: ‘The Kendall [Jenner] moment was massive – she was even selling the dress to me!’
As a former business student, Fells came to fashion later. ‘I’m from Tasmania, a small island at the bottom of Australia. We don’t have any fashion schools.’ Nevertheless, she and her husband scaled up the business just three years after the inception of the brand, opening a bricks-and-mortar space in a warehouse. Fast-forward to 2023 and her stockists include Browns and Luisa Via Roma, while a new store in Brisbane has joined the Byron Bay branch. Fells has plans to open the first European St Agni location soon.
She’s also focused on the brand’s sustainability efforts. ‘We like to choose natural fabrics. If we use synthetics, we always try to get recycled materials, which can be limiting, as Australia doesn’t have a lot of good options for mills.We source globally – Italy has the most beautiful fabric, but it comes at much higher prices.’
Resort 2024 is catnip for the quiet-luxury crowd. ‘The moodboard had a lot of khakis and iterations of green,’ Fells explains. ‘That merged with 1990s messaging – Kate Moss was a reference’. With a design team of three, the pair executed a collection full of earth-toned satin slips that cling flatteringly to the body.
A co-ed working dynamic is reflected in St Agni’s first genderless pieces, which initially emerged in the Resort 2023 line: ‘My partner and I have been fluid in every aspect of the business. We have a few men on our team, and they started wearing our clothes. The decision was driven by what was happening around us – and feed- back from our customers.’
The area she plans to conquer next? ‘Swimwear,’ she says excitedly. (It makes perfect sense for a brand born out of Byron Bay.) Agni stresses she lets her instincts lead her creative decisions and tries not to ‘overthink it too much’. Whatever the next chapter of St Agni brings, with Fells’ sky’s-the-limit approach, her family by her side and the world at her feet, the next move is sure to be the right one.
This article originally appeared in the November 2023 issue of ELLE UK.
