Sometimes, in the haze of a day of designing, Luis Escudero talks to his fabrics. Not surprisingly, they respond.
Like the pink-petaled floral brocade with a dark teal background. Once draped on the dress form on the ground floor of the fashion designer’s two-story warehouse in Hialeah, the yards of brocade encouraged him in the direction of an off-the-shoulder cocktail dress with oversized puffed sleeves. And after Escudero wrapped a textured brocade with hand-sewn golden organza appliques on a dress form, it suggested to him that it might look best as a strapless fitted gown. Its most important contribution? Adding a matching organza belt to finish the look.
“As fabrics speak to me, I pin them on the mannequin and see where they take me,” Escudero says of how he begins his design process. “It evolves from there, and I want to see where the conversation goes.”
For the past 16 years, Escudero has been designing at Rene Ruiz Collection, a brand known for its time-honored evening wear and special occasion looks. Escudero has spent the last five years as its creative director, taking over for the namesake designer who introduced his first evening wear line to South Florida in 1992. Since then, the Rene Ruiz Collection has expanded, with four boutiques (three in Florida and one in New York’s Long Island), including its new Coral Gables location. The latter, opened in October 2023, is a light-filled haven for women searching for a special look for occasions like a gala, wedding, bar mitzvah, or really any other moment worth sartorial celebration. Within the 2,000-square-foot space, sequined, tulle, organza, and chiffon gowns breathe life and glamour in the Ponce De Leon boutique. Escudero’s newest creation—sparkling evening bags—made their debut on the sales floor and online this summer.
As Escudero puts it, his design process is “old school,” rooted in the idea that there’s comfort in the familiar, and tried-and-true. Instead of using modern-day computer-aided design, or CAD, that some of today’s designer’s use to digitally sketch, for Escudero, the process is more tactile. He describes how he prefers to feel his way across fabric—oftentimes selected during his trips to Paris—and later draping them with his own hands give him a closer connection to his future creation and the women who will wear it.
Once the fabric has been pinned on the dress form, the look begins to take shape. Escudero starts sketching the silhouette, and from there fine-tunes the proportion and details. Necklines are defined and hemlines are adjusted until they feel just right.
“I obsess over these things,” he admits.
Before the fabric is cut, Escudero creates the design with a muslin, a malleable fabric that allows the design team, which includes four other artists, to morph their work even further. Then, the cutting begins. After the piece has taken shape and been formed with more detail, Escudero photographs it on the dress form with his iPad, allowing him to instantly view it from another vantage point, a 2D version, to “see if I’m going in the right direction.” From there, he continues tweaking, working with his design team, which gives input and feedback with each new iteration.
Looking back, the 44-year-old Miami native with a shy, boyish grin says fashion was always in his cards. He remembers learning to sew in the ninth grade and then making prom dresses for his friends, including a Vivienne Westwood-inspired halter dress in cherub jacquard. Designers like Michael Kors for Celine and Alexander McQueen inspired a young Escudero. He went on to study fashion at the International Fine Arts College (now known as Miami International University of Art & Design) before spending a year at the Paris Fashion Institute.
When he landed at Rene Ruiz Collection in 2008, it was a match made in heaven. “Evening wear is my passion,” Escudero says. “I’m lucky. It’s fun for me, and at this point, it’s second nature.”
Today, Escudero and his creative team produce near-countless quantities of looks each year. Literally. During a recent moment inside the warehouse, Escudero asked his team how many dresses they produce annually. After several minutes of contemplating, adding and calculating, the team estimates that about 1,000 different looks are produced a year. These special occasion pieces are then shipped to the four boutiques or directly to retailers like Bergdorf Goodman, Neiman Marcus, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Macy’s. In addition, there is a diffusion line, or a line that is offered at a lower price point, to retailers like Saks Off Fifth, Rue La La, QVC, JCPenney, TJ Maxx, and Marshalls. And then there are the custom-made pieces that clients request, which the design team guesses is somewhere around 200 gowns each year.
Escudero’s gowns have been worn by some of Miami’s most respected women, including legendary musician Gloria Estefan and on-air commentator Ana Navarro for her 2019 nuptials. Actress Rebel Wilson has worn Escudero’s designs, notably at a Monte Carlo gala.
When asked what inspires how he designs, Escudero pauses before saying, “Our clients are my muses.”
Mothers who are marrying off their children, philanthropists who are presenting a new endowment, girls celebrating their quinceañeras, and more have all turned to the Rene Ruiz Collection team to bring their sartorial fantasies to life. Though his clients range in age, size, and geographic location, Escudero says his design process has one common subject in mind: real women.
“I’m very sensitive to treating our clients with respect and integrity for their special day,” he says. “I treat all the people like my family. When I was under the wing of [label namesake] Rene Ruiz, who is a very talented designer, he instilled in me the skills to work with real women.”
That includes, Escudero explains, knowing what to hide and, alternatively, what to show. Most gowns come with built-in bustiers to give a slimmer shape to a woman’s torso, holding everything in and ensuring that the gown will stay in place no matter how much she moves throughout the night.
Escudero points to a recent custom fitting as an example of how he pivots his design based off a client’s comfort level. The New York–based client needed a formal dress for an upcoming event, and after their initial consultation, Escudero went back to the drawing board to show off her shoulders and décolleté, adding detailing to those parts of the gown and drawing attention to her facial features, and taking the focus off other body parts she wanted to de-emphasize.
When he designs a collection instead of a personalized piece, Escudero says oftentimes those are the most challenging assignments. After all, “I have to design for someone who isn’t in the room,” he says.
The fictional wearer will no doubt be excited about the Spring 2025 collection, one that Escudero calls “bright and colorful” and “sexy and more free-spirited” than past collections. He is channeling his inner spirit of Miami, his hometown that gave Escudero his start in fashion and foundation for style. Ombré and vibrant-colored dresses, including a one-shouldered coral pink dress with a ruffled neckline in pink and tangerine, become his ode to the Magic City.
“At the end of the day, Rene Ruiz Collection is a heritage brand from Florida,” he says. “I want the design to reflect that with prints, textiles, and overall ambience.”
Despite his title as the brand’s creative director—an all-important role that makes Escudero its leader in conceptualizing Rene Ruiz Collection’s aesthetic vision and conducting an orchestra of workers—he is a designer at heart.
“It’s a different experience or challenge every day,” he says of designing. “It’s never-ending challenges. And it still is to this day, and I feel lucky to be a part of it.”
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