Zara praised for the way in which it copies one designer

For years now the fashion set has been obsessed with Zara. There's an old joke that's applicable and it goes a little something like this. How do you get ready for Fashion Week? Cover yourself in glue and run through Zara. Yeah, that pretty much sums it up. It's a trendsetters paradise and it's mostly all designer ripoffs. So imagine my surprise in reading this morning that there is one designer that is happy he's being copied by Zara and even thinks their windows and design concepts are genius.

In a recent interview with Vogue, Balmain's creative direction Olivier Rousteing commented on Zara's clothing copies:

"I think it was Coco Chanel who said if you're original, be ready to be copied," he said. "I love seeing a Zara window with my clothes mixed with Céline and Proenza! I think that's genius. It's even better than what I do! I love the styling, I love the story... I watch the windows always, and it's genius what they do today. They go fast, they have a great sense of styling and how to pick up what they have to pick up from designers. I'm really happy that Balmain is copied - when I did my Miami collection and we did the black and white checks, I knew they would be in Zara and H&M. But they did it in a clever way - they mixed a Céline shape with my Balmain print! Well done! I love that."

We have a feeling not all designers would be as "cool" as Olivier with their opinions on the fast fashion retailer. But we're giving Olivier some major thumbs up for keeping an open mind and remembering that "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery."