The British designer Sarah Burton is in her sparkling new offices at Givenchy, in Paris, talking about the spring collection that she will be presenting in a matter of days, her second for the storied house founded by Hubert de Givenchy. Burton is currently—unfortunately enough—one of only a handful of female designers at the head of a major international house. Not surprisingly, she has a view of gender that is liberating. “When we think of how to empower a woman, she’s often put in a suit or something constructed, something male,” she says. “Instead, I was looking at female iconography and how it can be used to make a woman feel incredibly powerful. I wanted to look at sexuality and sensuality, revealing bits of the body in certain ways.”

Burton, who is wearing a crisp white Givenchy dr

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