The story

A life between two worlds: Brazil and France, art and couture, freedom and commitment.

Monica Nogueira is a designer who transforms her heritage into bold, sustainable, and deeply engaged fashion.

Born in Goiânia, Brazil, she grew up surrounded by fabrics and needles, guided by her mother, Emiliana Silva Nogueira, her “fairy godmother.” It was with her that she received her first lessons: respect for the craft, understanding of shapes, the value of a material that has already lived. Her intimate connection with the forest, the savannah, and indigenous cultures still nourishes her relationship with nature today: never waste what the earth provides.

Before her brand, Monica made the world stage vibrate as a dancer and singer with the band Kaoma (Lambada). This connection to movement shaped her vision: fashion must be alive, free, and grounded in reality.

In Paris, she trained in couture at École Fleury Delaporte in the 1990s and discovered the inner workings of high-end craftsmanship. But the more she progressed, the more she saw the excesses of an industry that produces too much, too fast, too far. Overproduction, wasted materials, uniformity, exploitation: a system that went against her values.

When she became a mother, everything crystallized. The future of her daughter Anaï and that of the planet became intertwined. She refused to feed an industry that harms more than it creates. She made a choice: create differently, create better, create less.

Upcycling became her answer — an act of resistance, a way to give a future to what was abandoned. It is not a trend, but a political, aesthetic, and intimate choice: preserve, transform, transmit.

From this conviction, the Maison Monica Nogueira was born: a high-end upcycling brand, free and poetic, born in Paris and nourished by the forests of Brazil. Fashion that refuses the ephemeral and embraces the value of time, of gesture, and of meaning. Fashion that respects, chooses the right time, the best materials, and a second life rather than waste.

Here, a creation is never just a garment: it is a statement, a way to honor the material, memory, and the earth. Her brand carries the strength of second chances, the brightness of atypical paths, and the belief that fashion still needs human, imperfect, and courageous stories. She does not come from luxury, she comes from truth, and that is precisely what makes her a new voice.