He's a fencing champion, she's a fashion and yoga entrepreneur. This is not Avril Lavigne's next hit, but the real life of Enzo Lefort and Kitesy Martin who met through their common love for hip-hop. Anti-routine interview with these young hyper-active parents.
With Valentine's Day just around the corner, Kitesy Martin and Enzo Lefort, who posed for the Horace x Bious campaign, answer our questions so we can get to know them better as a couple. She is an entrepreneur in fashion and yoga, graduated from the Arts Décoratifs de Paris, has been a stylist for almost ten years, worked for Balenciaga, Balmain, and even Lacoste, and created her upcycling brand in 2018. He is a fencer, world champion in 2014, European champion in 2014 and 2015, silver medallist at the 2016 Summer Olympics and gold medallist at the 2019 and 2022 World Championships, and is already preparing for the future through various photo projects. Hearing them finish each other's sentences and laugh in unison, you know they have found each other.
How do you introduce yourself?
Kitesy Martin-Lefort : My name is Kitesy Martin-Lefort, now that we are married, I am 38 years old, and I grew up in the Paris area. I live in Paris with my husband, our daughter India, and our cat Yolo. I am the creator of an upcycling brand that goes from the gem to an object.
Enzo Lefort : And I am 31 years old, I am a fencer for the French national team, an Olympic champion and two times world champion. I grew up in Guadeloupe and arrived in France at the age of 16 to pursue my sporting career.
How did you meet?
Kitesy : We met almost 7 years ago at the Lejeune bar which no longer exists. It was one of the few bars where you could listen to hip-hop music, drink good cocktails, without it getting too stuffy. We saw each other in the distance, exchanged a glance and a smile, without speaking, and then we went our separate ways. Except that we ran into each other again the same night in a nightclub, and this time Enzo approached me, I pretended not to see him. I’ll admit it, I was playing hard to get. And he said to me, "Let's not pretend we've never met.” And then we just started talking.
Do you believe in love at first sight?
Kitesy : It was infatuation at first sight. We immediately felt a mutual impulse, a curiosity that nourished and made the relationship grow naturally.
Enzo : We don't believe in love at first sight. To fall in love, you have to get to know the person first.
Do you think you are a complementary couple or are you very similar people?
Kitesy : In terms of character, we're not at all alike, but we like the same things, so we complement each other well on a daily basis.
Enzo : She is impulsive; I am calm. I'm logical; she's more emotional. I'm very down to earth; she's more spiritual.
Kitesy : I think our professions also play a role. As an athlete, he has to keep his cool, whereas as a designer, I have to really listen to my emotions and what's around me.
Enzo : Yes, I have to keep my mind of steel to perform as well as possible at each training session, even if it means burying some feelings to go to work. But when I'm on the fencing piste, I take out all the pressure I've built up in my day-to-day life so that I can concentrate better.
Kitesy : Sometimes he screams on the piste, it's quite impressive! I need to follow my emotions, as I can find inspiration anywhere. When I start a project, I listen to my feelings all the more so that they guide me in the right direction. It's completely part of my creative process.
Have you taught each other anything about your opposed ways of managing emotions?
Enzo : Yes, I've been doing photography for a few years now, I've already written three books about it, and I'm working more and more with brands. Thanks to Kitesy, I am more sensitive to the beauty that surrounds me, and I take lots of mental screenshots of associations of colours, textures, and situations. Even if I remain very logical and sort it all out in my head (laughs).
Kitesy : I'm much less impulsive than before I met him. I still listen to my emotions, but act with more sensibility and maturity. And Enzo has made me more competitive than I was before.
Do you share a common vision of self-care?
Kitesy : We both need time alone. I love making appointments for a massage, manicure, or yoga.
Enzo : We both have a lot of activities and commitments. Sport has made me realize that rest is as important as movement. I need some quiet time. In my locker room, I look like a UFO with my skincare routine.
Did you teach each other anything about skincare?
Enzo : I already had a routine before I met Kitesy, but I developed it further and made it more effective.
Kitesy : The fact that I take the time every morning and evening to do my little routine probably made Enzo want to be more diligent too. I receive a lot of beauty products because of my work, but there is one product that I regularly steal from him, and that is his face scrub. Sometimes I steal his perfume too. And especially clothes: when he goes to competitions, I steal jackets and coats, which he often finds out about on my Instagram story afterwards (laughs).
Has being with Enzo changed your view of sport, Kitesy?
Kitesy : When I met Enzo, I was already working out a lot, mostly HIIT and yoga. It was mainly to be fit, to maintain a figure that I liked at the time. In the meantime, I co-founded a hip-hop yoga class, Humble Warriors. I'm much more comfortable with my body since India was born, so I do sports mainly to take care of myself, not for aesthetic purposes. It's our daughter who has made me love my body and gain confidence in it. Enzo, on the other hand, does sport for the competition, to surpass himself with each athletic performance.
Enzo : I would even say that the sport I do damages my health more than anything else. But maybe we'll get together once I've retired from sport.
Has being with Kitesy changed your view of fashion, Enzo?
Enzo : Yes, she went to a school of applied arts, then to art deco, has a solid training as a stylist-designer, has worked for several houses, so she taught me a lot of things, including to put more precise words to talk about things that I already knew about. She’s helped me refine my taste for beautiful materials and good cuts. But above all she taught me as an entrepreneur. When I met her, she had a luxury leather goods brand, then she started her yoga concept, and launched her eponymous brand. I have learned a lot in terms of communication, brand development, etc.
Does fencing represent a world that inspires you creatively, Kitesy?
Kitesy : The first time we met, when he told me he was a fencer, I remember telling him I thought it was very chic! Those athletes dressed all in white on a grey background, it's very elegant and visually inspiring. I love watching the fights he does, and the values that the sport carries beyond the image. It's not just a physical performance, it's also a tactical game, full of suspense. Competing against someone armed with a foil is very courageous and inspires me enormously in my entrepreneurial endeavours, other instances in which you always have to bounce back at a moment's notice and compete tactically.
And you, Enzo, as you are approaching retirement, would a career in fashion tempt you?
I graduated as a physiotherapist in 2018, except that I no longer plan to practice this profession. I'd rather go into image-related jobs and what Kitesy does. I'm quite hyperactive, I already have several photo projects, books, podcasts. I welcome different strings to my bow now so that I have a choice when my sporting career ends. Kitesy made me realise that it's hard and rare enough to find a passion and make a living out of it as I did with fencing, so doing it a second time is complicated. But I am still giving my all to be at the 2024 Olympics in Paris.
In your busy schedules, are there little moments of everyday life that you get to share?
Kitesy : Our common part of the routine is mostly in the morning. We get up at the same time, Enzo will make breakfast for our daughter while I shower and dress her. Once she's ready, she has breakfast while he gets ready and I do her hair, then he takes her to school. We hardly pass each other for two minutes in the bathroom. In the evening we make sure we go to bed at the same time, and during the week we try to have lunch together at least once.
Enzo : The first thing you do in the morning as a parent is to take care of your child, even before you take care of yourself.
Kitesy : But once every two months or so, we book a night in a hotel in Paris, and we bring back skincare products so that we can have a real moment together. I always bring back a mask...
Enzo : And I bring my toning spray, my scrub, my serum, and my mattifying moisturiser. On a day-to-day basis, since I shower where I train, we mostly don't see each other in the bathroom at home.
Your chemistry also shows on the social media: has it been a topic of conversation to do posts together on Instagram?
Kitesy : It was very natural. When we met, I wasn't using Instagram to talk about my professional projects, while he was already sharing his career on it. As our relationship took shape and we could see it on Insta, we started to be solicited by brands who suggested we do things together. And then we regularly invite our respective communities to support each other: I might do a story to call for support in a competition or exhibition, and he might promote one of my jewellery drops. But there is no strategy, we don't try to band together as a couple.
Enzo : Instagram is still a working tool where you can share a bit of your daily life, and as Kitesy and India are part of it, sometimes you see them on it. But we don't want to expose too much on social media, we are careful about it.
What's your best piece of advice on love?
Enzo : In love, you mustn't have an ego, and accept that the relationship is always evolving.
Kitesy : Yes, I think it's by being comfortable with each other that things can work together. Often, when a person feels bad individually, it can damage the relationship. That's why it's important to work on yourself first, so that you never see the other person as a necessity.
By the way, do you celebrate Valentine's Day?
Kitesy : We've never celebrated it together (laughs). Our first Valentine's Day together, we just texted each other to wish each other happy, but since then we've had such busy schedules that we don't have time to worry about it. It's rare that we manage to coordinate and arrange childcare so we can have a night out together, so every time we do, it's like a little Valentine's Day of our own, on our own schedule.
Why did you agree to represent this Horace x Bisous campaign?
Enzo : Horace is a brand I've known since the beginning and the products are of very good quality, I really use them on a daily basis, so it made sense. The brand image fits well with who we are, and we were able to create content for this new campaign ourselves.
Kitesy : It's a brand that's really in tune with the times: for men but that everyone can use; all skin types and all genders. And I like the packaging: no need to hide the products in a bathroom drawer. At the moment I really like to use the Horace x Bisous sandalwood and tuberose shower gel, otherwise I've been loving the scrub, mask and toner for a long time.
Kitesy, do you have a message for women who are reluctant to use Horace products?
Enzo : Don't use them, you already have a lot to choose from, thank you very much (laughs)!
Kitesy : It's a good plan because you can give your partner products that you can then secretly steal from him! Like clothes. When you're looking for men's products, a lot of brands think it's a festival of colours, stereotypical expressions around performance, and awkward scents. So, it's nice to see men's products with effective formulas and sleek packaging that won't look out of place in the bathroom. Plus, it's full of essentials that can be hard to find, after all, kind of like the perfect fashion basic.
Would you like to have more professional projects together?
Enzo : I already often take pictures for Kitesy's brand, without necessarily saying so publicly. We do each other favours all the time.
Kitesy : And we've been thinking about doing a fashion collab together for a long time, but we haven’t found the time yet.
And what are your future projects?
Kitesy : I'll be back to doing daily vlogs from February 1st on my YouTube channel, before the announcement of a beautiful collab planned for mid-February...
Enzo : And I'm preparing the release of my podcast "Le Rebond" which will look at how top sportsmen and women bounce back all the time from the various setbacks they face during their career. What strategies and resources do they use to overcome them and always move forward? It will be released on all listening platforms at the beginning of February.