Passionata

Passionata is a French lingerie brand launched in 1988, designed in a Paris studio and sold today as part of the Israeli apparel group Delta Galil, which it joined in 2024. It makes bras, briefs, bodysuits, loungewear and swimwear at a mid-market price, and has always pitched itself younger and lighter than the corsetry houses around it. The brand's own timeline sums up its debut in one line: a "fresh and spontaneous" approach to femininity, in a market then dominated by heavily structured French lingerie.

A 1988 label built for everyday wear

The founding year matters, and it is often misreported. Passionata's own brand history gives 1988, not 1986. The late 1980s were the years when French department stores began to give real floor space to fashion lingerie aimed at women in their twenties: printed microfiber, bright colors, sets meant to be bought on impulse rather than fitted by a corsetière. Passionata was one of the labels that grew up in that space.

The brand describes its purpose plainly, as lingerie "designed to accompany each woman every day." That is a modest claim, and it fits. Passionata has never been a couture name. Its strength has been a wide spread of familiar shapes, the balconette bra, the plunge, the triangle and the bandeau, offered in fabrics that change each season while the patterns underneath stay stable.

From the Chantelle years to Delta Galil

For a long stretch Passionata was filed by retailers, and by this museum's own database, as a brand of the Chantelle group. The brand's published timeline does not cover that period in detail, and this entry could not confirm the dates of that ownership from a primary source, so they are left out here.

What the brand does state is the 2024 move. In its words, Passionata "opens a new chapter by joining the Delta Galil group," with the aim of lingerie that is "ever more inspiring, comfortable and modern." Delta Galil is a large manufacturer. It was founded in Israel in 1975, is headquartered in Caesarea, employs roughly 25,000 people worldwide and reported revenue of about $2 billion for 2024. It makes underwear, bras, socks, nightwear and leisurewear.

The French end of that structure is visible in the small print. The Passionata website is published by Eminence SAS, a company registered in Nîmes with its base on the Route de Gallargues in Aimargues, in the Gard. Eminence is itself a French underwear maker, founded in Nîmes in 1944 and taken over by Delta Galil in 2018. It is one of the last companies still producing underwear in France, with sites in Aimargues and Sauve. Passionata, in other words, now sits beside a men's underwear specialist in the south of France rather than beside a Paris corsetry house.

Paris design, southern checks

The brand splits its work between two places. Designers sit in a Paris studio. The technical side, which the brand lists as "adjustments, fabric validation, fittings, tests and controls," happens in the south of France. A quality team runs resistance tests, fits samples across several sizes and checks support and finishing before a style is released.

The materials are the ones a mid-market French label can afford to do well: stretch lace, embroidery on tulle, and smooth microfiber for the invisible lines. The emphasis is on adjustable straps, flat finishes and pieces that disappear under clothing, which is where most of the money in everyday lingerie is made.

The current lines

Passionata organizes its range into three tiers, which it calls Signature, Fine Lingerie and Les Essentiels. Within those, a few names recur:

• Simone, built around a soft stretch lace that the brand presents as its most sensual line;
• Les Iconiques, the long-running core styles that return season after season;
• Les Dentelles, the lace collection;
• Les Invisibles, smooth microfiber pieces meant to vanish under T-shirts and knitwear;
• Naomie by Passionata, a shapewear line.

Swimwear and loungewear round it out, along with bodysuits and the usual spread of briefs: shorty, culotte, tanga and string. The website ships free within metropolitan France above 80 euros, a detail that says something about where the core customer lives.

Where Passionata sits now

The brand's positioning has not moved much in nearly four decades. It still sells youthful, comfortable French lingerie at prices well below the Paris luxury names, and it still leans on lace and color rather than heavy engineering. What has changed is the machinery behind it. A brand long grouped with a Paris corsetry house now belongs to a multinational manufacturer, with its legal paperwork handled from a factory town in the Gard. Its fall and winter 2026 collection, the newest on its site when this entry was written, was designed and sold under that arrangement.

Last updated October 7, 2026