Andres Sarda

Andres Sarda, renamed simply SARDA in 2024, is a Barcelona luxury lingerie house founded in 1962 by the textile engineer Andres Sarda Sacristan. Known for early use of elastic fibers and for some of the most theatrical shows at Madrid fashion week, it has belonged since 2008 to the Belgian group Van de Velde, owner of Marie Jo and PrimaDonna.

From church mantillas to underwear

The Sarda family were in Catalan textiles long before anyone in it made a bra. At the end of the nineteenth century the firm made high-quality lace mantillas, the veils Spanish women wore to Mass. A Sarda mantilla even reached the Vatican in the 1960s, worn by Jacqueline Kennedy. Then the Church relaxed its rule on head coverings, and a lace business built on that rule needed a new outlet.

Andres Sarda Sacristan was born in Barcelona in 1929. He trained as a textile engineer, joined the family firm, and was first sent to open up the American market for its products. In 1962 he set up his own company to design and make women's lingerie. The timing was bold. Spain was still under Franco, and Spanish underwear was made on almost orthopaedic lines, built for function with little thought for looks or comfort.

Engineer first, designer second

Sarda's reputation in the trade rests on materials. He is credited as the first designer to work elastic fibers into lingerie, and the house's history lists nylon, Lycra and even Teflon finishes among the technical novelties it brought into Spanish underwear. In practice that meant lace that stretched and recovered, lighter cups, and bras that could be both decorative and wearable all day. That combination is ordinary now. In early-1960s Spain it was not.

Exporting to Paris in 1965

The business looked north early. By 1965 Sarda was exporting to France, selling through Galeries Lafayette and Printemps, the two Paris department stores that decided what French women saw on the lingerie floor. For a Spanish label to sell into the home of corsetry three years after its founding was a real endorsement.

In 1970 the house added swimwear. The first beachwear campaign was photographed by David Hamilton, whose soft-focus images defined a certain 1970s look. Swimwear has stayed in the range ever since, and the brand's seasonal shows give it equal billing with lingerie.

Shows at Madrid fashion week

The runway is where SARDA earns its reputation as a showman. The house showed at Pasarela Gaudi in Barcelona before 1996 and has been on the schedule of Pasarela Cibeles, now Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Madrid, since 2000. Its shows are among the most anticipated of the week, and they lean towards theater: guest appearances by the actresses Rossy de Palma, Victoria Abril and Bibiana Fernandez, and by the singer Mario Vaquerizo. Campaign faces have included Vanesa Lorenzo, Martina Klein, Michaela Kocianova, Bregje Heinen, Denisa Dvorakova, Alina Baikova and Dalianah Arekion.

Father and daughter

In 1995 Nuria Sarda joined the design team her father ran, and the collections became joint work. She is now the house's creative director. Andres Sarda died in Barcelona on 15 September 2019, aged 90. In December 2020 the Spanish state awarded him the Gold Medal for Merit in the Fine Arts posthumously, an unusual honor for an underwear maker.

The Van de Velde years

In 2008 the Belgian lingerie group Van de Velde bought Eurocorset S.A., the company that owned the Andres Sarda brand. Under the deal the family stayed involved and operations stayed in Barcelona. For Van de Velde, a listed family company founded in 1919 in Schellebelle, Sarda added a Mediterranean, fashion-led label to two brands built more on fit. Production for the group is mostly in Tunisia.

The house opened its first own store in 2003 in Madrid's Salamanca district. It now runs its own shops on Calle de Don Ramon de la Cruz in Madrid and at Calle Valencia 272 in Barcelona. A summer pop-up followed in Ibiza in 2018. Most sales still go through more than 400 multi-brand stockists, mainly in Spain, Germany, Belgium and France.

In 2024 Van de Velde shortened the name to SARDA. The founder's first name disappeared from the label five years after his death, while his daughter still signs the collections.

Last updated October 1, 2026