Fashion. Beauty. Business. Y M A 15 0 2 o.4 N
MAN OF MONACO
JEWEL TONED
RETAIL’S LAB CLASS
John Mehas may be low-profile as a chief executive officer, but he’s steering Club Monaco to fast growth.
The fine-jewelry world heads to Las Vegas, ready to hit the aisles at the Couture and JCK shows.
From apps and gadgets to 3-D formats and magic mirrors, big stores are using ‘ilabs’ to innovate.
Men’s p. 34
Accessories p. 11
Retail p. 25
BIG NIGHT
THE
US CANADA UK EUROPE
$9.99 $13 £8 € 11
JAPAN ¥1500 CHINA ¥80 HONG KONG HK100 INDIA 800
CFDA PREPARES TO HONOR ITS OWN
Contents FEATURE
CFDA’s Big Night 47 As the Council of Fashion Designers of America prepares to honor its own, WWD asks the nominees, “What do you feel distinguished your work this year?”
Josep Font, photographed by Javiar Biosca.
The Spanish designer behind Delpozo doesn’t believe in playing it safe. — Fashion, page 21
Dao-Yi Chow and Maxwell Osborne of Public School. CFDA photographs by Sasha Maslov.
DEPARTMENTS 4
Agenda
The best and worst in social media, what’s trending, whom to follow. 38
A preview of the upcoming Las Vegas jewelry shows, the Couture and JCK trade events.
Beauty 28
Josep Font builds buzz on a global stage for the house of Delpozo . . . Fashion Briefs
Markets 31
The strong dollar might be good news for consumers, but is it bad for business? Glasgow Caledonian University launches a sustainability center in New York . . . Markets Briefs
Retailers and real estate developers are using innovation labs to supercharge their evolution . . . Retail Briefs
34 Club Monaco has evolved substantially since its days of Chinos and T-shirts . . . M Briefs
Think Tank David Spooner, the former chief textile negotiator for the USTR, on why the Trans-Pacific Partnership is a good thing and long overdue.
80
Remember LVMH Prize winners . . . Human Resources . . . Events . . . Remembering Happy Rockefeller
82
Retail 25
Eye • Parties Closing festivities at Cannes. • Arts & Culture Sophie Elgort is following in her dad Arthur’s footsteps behind the lens. • Report Card Hits and misses from parties over the past week.
Wellness is the latest watchword across the beauty industry . . . Beauty Briefs 79
Fashion 21
Media People Ben Lerer, managing director of venture capital firm Lerer Hippeau Ventures, has invested in more than 300 of the buzziest companies in media and retail. He discusses what catches his eye.
41
Accessories 11
Social Studies
Finale The original Supes in action at the 1993 CFDA Awards.
George Clooney and Paris Hilton get their marks. Report Card, page 45.
4 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
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SOCIAL STUDIES THE WEEK IN SOCIAL MEDIA
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Ralph Lauren glides into summer beach season with striking surf imagery.
Photographer Russell James stepped into the ring during a shoot for Victoria’s Secret Sport.
Not just a trivial matter — Cynthia Rowley tested her knowledge on Celebrity Jeopardy to raise money for charities.
@nomadrj Russell James, Photographer
@ralphlauren Ralph Lauren, Brand
@cynthia_rowley Cynthia Rowley, Fashion Designer
“White biodegradable balloons fly off in the air to celebrate the opening of our Tokyo flagship store! #StellaTokyo #StellaAoyama #StellasWorld” A celebratory — and eco-friendly — shot of the brand’s new Tokyo flagship. @stellamccartney Stella McCartney, Fashion Label
Worst
Anthony Vaccarello will have the nude beach all to himself this summer. @anthony_vaccarello Anthony Vaccarello, Designer
Three’s a crowd — Nicki Minaj and radio personality Nick Grimshaw are too much of a match for House of Holland. @house_of_holland House of Holland, Fashion Brand
Trending
@kaelennyc Kaelen, Fashion Brand
The streetwear powerhouse pays homage to the 20th anniversary of Larry Clark’s seminal film “Kids.” Time to grow up! @supremenewyork Supreme, Streetwear Brand
Who to Follow
Stylized #Snapchat Brands have been embracing Snapchat on their own terms, styling the app’s generic ghost mascot to represent their own identities and announce their arrival on the media platform.
@boucheron
@lacoste
@elliesaablive
@henribendel
8 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
A gust of wind can cause an unfortunate situation — especially when your followers are right behind you.
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LAS VEGAS JEWELRY PREVIEW
Color Codes
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Bold hues come together in striking combos when stones like blue tourmaline and orange pink spinel are paired dramatically.
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By ROXANNE ROBINSON
1 John Hardy’s pink gold, rubellite, pink sapphire, tsavorite and red spinel earrings. 2 David Yurman’s blackened silver, iolite, purple and blue sapphire, blue topaz, color-change garnet, green tourmaline and cognac diamond earrings. 3 Suna Bros.’ platinum, aquamarine, ruby and diamond pin. 4 Katharine Jetter’s platinum, blue tourmaline and orange-pink spinel ring. 5 Pasquale Bruni’s 18-karat gold, smoky quartz, pink lavender rhodolite, white quartz, sapphire and diamond ring. 6 Bavna’s 18-karat gold, Paraiba tourmaline and white diamond earrings. 7 Chopard’s 18-karat white gold, tanzanite and amethyst necklace. 8 Erica Courtney’s 18-karat yellow gold, pink and orange spinel, pink topaz, rubellite and diamond ring. 9 Bulgari’s 18-karat pink gold, peridot, amethyst, tourmaline and diamond collar. 10 Roberto Coin’s 18-karat white gold tanzanite, pink sapphire and diamond ring. 11 Stephen Webster’s 18-karat rose gold, red garnet, ruby, amethyst and amethyst crystal haze ring. WWD.COM MAY 2015, No. 4
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Pearl Jam
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No longer relegated to the prim-and-proper set, these funky new designs with pearls go beyond the standard-issue necklace.
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1 Xiao Wang’s 18-karat yellow gold, Tahitian black pearl and natural color diamond cuff. 2 Mizuki’s 14-karat gold, Baroque white pearl and diamond collar. 3 Jemma Wynne’s 18-karat gold, white pearl and diamond earrings. 4 Phyne by Paige Novick’s 14-karat yellow gold, moonstone, diamond and akoyal pearl ear climber. 5 Yeprem’s 18-karat white gold, diamond and pearl hand piece. 6 Lucifer Vir Honestus’ 18-karat rose gold, horn and pearl earrings. 7 Jorge Adeler’s 18-karat white gold and white cultured Baroque pearl earrings. 8 Mikimoto’s white South Sea cultured pearl, diamond, sapphire and 18-karat white gold necklace.
12 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
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Future Cuts
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Diamonds go beyond the classics with modern, graphic designs, proving they are more than just pretty facets. 10 9 11
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1 Marli’s 18-karat yellow gold and diamond bangle. 2 Kismet by Milka’s 14-karat rose gold and champagne diamond ring. 3 Gumuchian’s platinum and diamond earrings. 4 Sylvie Collection’s platinum and diamond earrings. 5 Astley Clarke’s 18-karat yellow gold and blue diamond cuff. 6 Dana Rebecca Designs’ 14-karat white gold, 14-karat rose gold and white diamond ring. 7 Nikos Koulis’ 18-karat white gold, white diamond and emerald earrings. 8 Ivanka Trump Fine Jewelry’s 18-karat white gold with black and white diamond earrings. 9 Lauren Harper Collection’s 18-karat gold and diamond necklace. 10 AS29’s 18-karat white gold and white diamond cuff. 11 Simon G. Jewelry’s 18-karat white gold and diamond earrings. 12 Octium’s 18-karat rose gold and diamond brooch. 13 Suzanne Kalan for Diamonds With a Story’s 18-karat rose gold, argyle diamond and white topaz ring. 14 Christina Debs Fine Jewelry’s 18-karat pink gold and white diamond ring.
14 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
Couture Salon 1110
#1884kisses
sales@1884collection
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LA S VEGA S JEWELRY PREVIEW
is growing. It’s affordable for what it is.” But Couture veteran Penny Preville, who has exhibited at the show for 25 years, said the fine-jewelry business has its 3 challenges. “This season, it’s taken more strategic planning with our retailers and more of an effort to connect with the customers. The economy is improving slightly, but we’re competing with other luxury categories and consumers. It’s definitely a lot of work,” she said. Preville sees growth opportunities with her bridal collection as well as with mobile. The company is updating its e-commerce site to make it smartphone-friendly, though Preville said, “Soon it will be on their watches.” The retail sweet spot for Preville’s core customer is $3,000 to $5,000, though a growing number of younger customers, the daughters of her collec-
“I find stores are reaching more for designer fashion jewelry, where it’s not as much about the name or the price.”
All That
Glitters
Prices are heading north at many jewelers as improving American and Asian economies are drawing more consumers back to the high end. By MARCY MEDINA
A
s exhibitors put the final polish on their gems for the Couture jewelry show, running May 27 to June 1 at Wynn Las Vegas, buyers should get ready for plenty of gold, geometric shapes, Art Deco motifs and
splashes of color. “The market in America the last couple of years has gone from strength to strength,” said London-based jeweler Stephen Webster. “We had our best year ever on Rodeo Drive and our best year in a long time for Neiman Marcus, two big indicators for the American market.” While the collapse of the Russian market has brought challenges to his business, Webster said he’s not as dependent on that consumer anymore, particularly with the American market gaining stability and more selling in Asia. In fact, he’s focusing more on the highest price points. “One trend we have seen is much more activity in 1 the $50,000-to-$100,000 range.
16 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
2 “From Christmas leading into spring, we’ve invested more in that area. It’s a lot easier than selling 20 things at $10,000.” Webster’s colorful, mixedstone collections have taken a shift toward the geometric with larger single stones rather than pavé. “They’re big looks, but less formal. Think of what ladies wear at Saint-Tropez at lunchtime.” Like others, he’s also doing more gold: “I think our Gold Struck collection will be our success story for Las Vegas.” Even smaller jewelers like Nam Cho, who started her line in 2009, have found more customers at a higher-than-average price point. Cho said her diamond and sapphire baguette earrings and bangles look expensive, but are priced at what is considered the entry point for most high-end jewelers. “When I started out, people told me that the $5,000 to $10,000 range is tough, but that’s where I think the market
1. Alor cuff 2. Nam Cho earrings 3. Vhernier cuff
tors, are spending in the under-$2,000 range. Newness includes more statement earrings, such as climber styles, and collars, chokers and long necklaces. While her garland motifs remain the most popular, she’s also designed celestial, Art Deco and lace groups for the show. “Buyers are going after uniqueness,” said Greg Kwiat, president of the New York jeweler known for its diamond high-end jewelry. “We have seen retailers take risks with younger designers and be rewarded with space at the retail counter.” Kwiat, the family-run firm established in 1907, took a departure this season with its modern Madison Avenue collection, which incorporates black matte ceramic with white gold and diamonds. “We wanted to create something with a contemporary feel that would appeal to a client looking for some individuality,” he said. For Los Angeles-based Arman Sarkisyan, creating more one-of-a-kind pieces has increased his business this year by 25 percent. “I find stores are reaching more for designer fashion jewelry, where it’s not as much about the name or the price. Buyers will say, ‘Show me what’s not commercial,’ so we are changing the business as a result of this,” he said. Arman lockets start at around $2,500 and average about $8,000 to $12,000, though some pieces run as high as $200,000. He’s also changing his signature motifs — typically Gothic and Renaissance — to more Art Deco, and he’s using faceted as opposed to cabochon stones. Some of the most familiar names at the show are under new ownership. In June, Judith Ripka was acquired by Xcel Brands and Hearts on Fire was bought by Chinese giant Chow Tai Fook, the world’s largest jewelry retailer, in June. Hearts on Fire has paused its retail expansion in the U.S., where it has stores in the King of Prussia Mall in Pennsylvania and the Forum Shops at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, ►
Illustration by Christa Guerra; diamond photograph by Elephant Studios/Getty Images
Arman Sarkisyan Arman Sarkisyan Fine Jewelry
LA S VEGA S JEWELRY PREVIEW
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in order to focus on opening stores in China. About 80 percent of its business is wholesaling to independent jewelers in 32 countries. At the same time, HOF has been growing its presence steadily in the fashion category to capture more red-carpet and editorial coverage. To that end, the latest collection features mixed metals, lacy, layered designs and of-the-moment pieces such as ear climbers, crisscross rings and pieces with detachable elements. With its business spanning the globe, omnichannel remains important to encourage customers to buy wherever they are. “We know that elements like live chats and in-store technology are helping our retailers close at the counter,” said chief marketing officer Caryl Capeci. “We’re looking to elevate visibility with ‘brand boutique’ environments that are like shop-inshops.” The brand also expects to reveal a design partnership at the show. Among the 40 or so jewelers showing at Couture for the first time is Pamela Love, who launched the fine-jewelry portion of her business last year. “A lot of the industry may not even know we offer fine jewelry,” she said. “Financing a fine-jewelry business is very challenging, as the cost of materials is far higher. We really had to take our time and set aside funds to launch the collection. It is also a leap of faith. If people don’t love it, if it doesn’t sell, it would be a big loss, financially. However, I believe this is the direction my brand needs to go in.”
new collection also showcases more delicate pieces incorporating the cable. Couture stalwart Chimento, known for its sculptural gold cuffs, has added more stacking bracelets that women can buy for themselves and wear every day. “We try to make an entry-level item up to a statement piece to cover the entire range,” said president Federica Chimento, whose product ranges in price from $1,500 to $40,000 and higher. The collections, called Velvet, Olympia and Supreme, come in all shades of gold, but Chimento said yellow gold is still the most sought-after look. “People like to see that shine, especially if there aren’t a lot of stones.” Yellow gold has always been the signature look for brands like Marco Bicego and Gurhan. “I’d say of industry trends, the return to gold is
number-one,” said Gurhan president and chief executive officer Fiona Tilley. “Our focus is the $3,000-to-$10,000 range, but we’re also making sure we have entrylevel product for the aspirational customer who is returning to the market.” The brand is known for its long, layered necklaces in 24-karat gold, but this season includes lariats, charm necklaces and bracelets, as well as rose-cut rubies and sapphires and diamond slices. Bicego’s hand-textured gold pieces make up 80 percent of his business. “It’s comfortable and looks good from day to night. I don’t think anyone wants to spend a lot of money on something they are going to keep locked up in a safe.” ■
4. Fred Leighton earrings 5. Arman Sarkisyan pendant
Ones To Watch Four collections to keep an eye on at the Couture show.
By LAUREN MCCARTHY
W
hile the show can be a springboard for brands, it’s also a means of reintroducing established ones. The 30-year-old Italian house Vhernier, which has boutiques in Miami and Beverly Hills, is returning to the show after 10 years. “We have concentrated our U.S. expansion with Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus and now we want to be reintroduced to more of the market,” said Anna Maria Castracane, vice president of Vhernier USA. “We value the American market very much, but the show is also becoming more international with buyers from Hong Kong, Mexico, the Caribbean and Canada, so this is a good opportunity.” The brand will introduce two collections: Eclisse, an oversize ring and earring featuring dramatic stones cut down the middle, and Plissé, which represents a departure from the brand’s signature smooth metal look. The surfaces are angular like origami or wrinkled fabric, accented with pavé diamonds. Vhernier also produced a special piece in titanium as an entrant in the Design Awards’ innovation category. Many brands cite a self-purchasing woman seeking everyday jewelry as their target customer. That’s also true at San Diego-based Alor. With a core retail price point of $800, Alor’s twisted steel-cable bracelets have become a category of their own. Principal Ori Zemer, whose family manufactured jewelry for Charriol for more than 20 years, said he’s trying 4 to keep the balance between classic styles and newness to attract younger customers. “That’s important to reach that Millennial out there. We keep our styles traditional, but want to attract that new 25- to 30-year-old who’s looking to buy her first piece of fine jewelry, but make it fun.” To set their product apart, Alor is using colorblocking (the steel is heated in a PVD process that changes color from silver to shades of yellow, brown and black) to add newness to traditional styles, while a
18 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
Sophie Bille Brahe
Sophie Bille Brahe knows that nightmares are not always a bad thing. The Copenhagen-based designer will make her first Couture appearance with a collection derived from a particularly scary dream. “I was in a new flat and had to climb up a ladder — it was really a nightmare, it was so high,” she said. “[But,] the collection is now about going from something to another thing,
from one place to another place.” Brahe strikes this balance with asymmetrical pieces rendered in diamonds, pearls and opals; Prices range from $1,000 to $8,100. Brahe took inspiration from Yoko Ono’s YES installation from the Sixties, creating ladder-shaped pieces in 18-karat gold, with some set with diamonds. “The whole collection is now somehow a dream world.”
Spinelli Kilcollin
have more than one way to wear them. It all works with our original concept.” Among materials used in his designs, which range from $2,000 to $20,000, are 18-karat yellow and rose gold, sterling silver, black rhodium plating, and diamonds, both white and colored. “People are learning about fashion fine jewelry brands and realizing they want something less traditional, but still really well-made.”
Yves Spinelli, designer of Spinelli Kilcollin, is branching into new categories for his first Couture appearance. “It’s a great time to show what we’re working on,” he said. He’s known for interlocking stacks of rings, but at Couture, he’ll offer necklaces, earrings and bracelets, as well as the signature rings. “We designs around shapes — specifically circles,” he said. “All our new pieces
Deanna Hamro
diamonds. “I love stones with a personality,” Hamro said. Besides her one-off pieces, she’ll also show her Classic Collection of more accessible pieces using pearls and diamonds. “I expanded the availability [of the brand] so people could have more access,” Hamro said. The Classic pieces retail between $1,200 and $12,00, while one-of-a-kind pieces typically range between $6,000 and $18,000.
Lito
will show some Izel, a geometric range with colored and clear diamonds, and Tu Es Partout, which features lifelike renderings of eyeballs executed in enamel. “It’s very emblematic of my designs,” she said of the latter group. “It has to do with protecting yourself and remembering that you have to live your life to the fullest in every moment.” Prices range from $500 to $7,000.
For Deanna Hamro, the stone comes first. The Los Angeles jeweler, who specializes in one-of-akind pieces, starts the creative process with the stones, using them as inspiration. “The stones inform the design,” she said. “I’m not looking for the perfect stone…It’s about the color.” At Couture, visitors can expect to see opals, spinels, tourmalines, emeralds and milky
After 15 years in business, Lito is coming to Couture. Designer Lito Karakostanoglou, based in Athens, will bring pieces representative of her design aesthetic, including some one-of-a-kind items. “I love to do one-off pieces,” she said. “I love to find the stone and then make it work for a specific piece.” From her recent collections, Karakostanoglou
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PRECIOSA & PANTONE
FASHION ACCESSORY COLOR TRENDS SPRING SUMMER 2016 Join our Afternoon Tea Party and take a bite out of the sweet and delicious color palettes for spring/summer 2016! In cooperation with Pantone color trend predictions, Preciosa have once again prepared four fashion and fashion accessory colour trends for next spring/summer season. Full of whimsical and playful colors, there is something for everyone at this gathering. Try any of the delectable color combinations!
CUPCAKE SWEETNESS
CITRUS PUNCH
FRUITY SUNDAE
CHOCOLATE RASPBERRY CHEESECAKE
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trends.preciosa.com
20 MAY 2015, No.4 WWD.COM
JCK: The New Look
Vendors will reveal plenty of initiatives at the show, which has its own improved style. By MISTY WHITE SIDELL
T
he upcoming JCK Las Vegas trade show, running from May 29 to June 1 at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, is expected to amass in excess of $1.2 billion worth of sales, with more than $10 billion worth of jewelry showing at the booths of more than 2,500 exhibitors. Brands including Zalemark, Tacori and Roseark are among those planning to reveal new designs, collaborations, improved sales and education interfaces for the 23,000 visitors. Zalemark will unveil its partnership with Crayola. The famous crayon brand is looking to make a play to the fashion industry through various licenses, with Zalemark among the first in its stable. “Crayola, which is owned by Hallmark, really wants to reinvent itself as a color company — kind of what Pantone is,” said Steven Zale, chief executive officer of Zalemark. “Crayola wants to be the reference standard for fashion.” For Zalemark, this has translated into a range of jewelry retailing from $79 to $399. The jewelry, colorful and laden with Swarovski Elements, natural sapphires, topazes and myriad quartzes, will be marketed to better midrange retailers. Zale said he’ll focus his efforts on retailers like Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s, as well as independent stores like Helzberg. The line will launch in stores during the third quarter, in time for the holidays. Forevermark is consolidating its booths, formerly spread around the show, into one 5,300-square-foot space that will house all its activities, like loose diamond and jewelry collection sales, as well as educational events. The company expects to host between 1,000 and 1,500 people over JCK’s four-day spa, according to Adelaide Polk-Bauman, vice president of marketing. Tacori will also hold a large presence at JCK, where it plans to introduce several new initiatives. Among them, the brand will introduce its new men’s offerings, with designs inspired by vehicles spotted at the Monterey car show. “The
challenge with men’s jewelry is that there isn’t that much out there that’s exciting,” said Paul Tacorian, president of sales and marketing. Also on the agenda is the introduction of its new mobile-focused Web site. The impetus for the redesign was that 53 percent of Tacori’s online audience visits its site through a mobile interface. “We are really working to put tech ahead,” Tacorian said. A new Tacori-specific customer relationship management dashboard will also launch at the show. Tacori has 200 appointments on its books for JCK and expects to do between $1 million and $2 million in business throughout the show. Besides showcasing the big corporate names, JCK also serves as a platform to fledging businesses. First-time exhibitor Roseark is among this group. The edgy Los Angeles jewelry store, which opened its own showroom in February, will reside in JCK’s design center and bring eight brands — including its own. “It’s really just about introducing our brands to the market, introducing the Roseark showroom. It’s the first show we’ve done as a showroom and we want to bring visibility to the designers that we represent,” Shelby Rea, Roseark’s showroom director. Its jewelry ranges at wholesale from $20 to more than $10,000. With this level of diversity, JCK organizers felt it needed to improve the show’s navigability and
The show’s visual redesign makes it easier to negotiate the floor. signage. Katie Dominesey, JCK’s industry vice president, explained: “We have invested a lot of money and time into a new look and feel of the show — we hired a creative director and reduced visual noise. There is a standardization of the look and feel, with a nude and black template with a pop of color.” Besides the visual overhaul, JCK has also taken a new approach to socializing at the show. “We’ve added six new lounges to the show floor,” Dominesey said, with some serving a dedicated spa purpose, while others will play home to cocktail gatherings. This year, Gavin DeGraw will headline JCK’s Sunday evening concert. She said it will be interesting to see how JCK fares after dampened enthusiasm at the European and Asian trade shows, where spending was low in the wake of a sinking euro. But JCK is optimistic that a strong dollar will help bolster sales. “We’re confident. A lot of the shows internationally have been more difficult because of the exchange rate. I’m happy to have the U.S. market shine.” ■ Illustration by CARLOS MONTEIRO
EDITED BY DONNA HEIDERSTADT
FashionAgenda
Josep Font:
Delpozo’s Quiet Master Far from playing it safe, the Spanish designer intently spins his vision for building buzz on the global stage. By KRISTI GARCED
Photograph by JAVIER BIOSCA
WWD.COM MAY 2015, NO. 4
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In the Delpozo atelier in Madrid, sketches from seasons past reveal Josep Font’s whimsical themes.
“[My PR team is] always telling me to show in a bigger space to accommodate more guests. But if we do that, we sacrifice the intimacy of the shows I’m trying to create. The most important thing is for people to feel intimate with the clothing.”
Font loves to combine bold colors, as evidenced by a mood board and looks from his fall 2015 runway.
Week in 2007. He owned several shops bearing his name in Spain and one in Paris on Rue de la Sourdière, which lasted four years in business. Citing artists Mark Rothko, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Charles Trenet, Andrey Remnev and Emir Kusturica as inspirations, Font said he developed an early interest in fashion thanks to his late mother, Teresa Calvet. “She was a very elegant woman, and from when I was young, I would go shopping with her to these great boutiques,” he said. “She would ask, ‘Do you like this?’ If I didn’t like it, she wouldn’t buy it.” But as he matured, Font’s parents, particularly his late father, Artur, didn’t exactly embrace his interest in fashion, forcing him to study architecture at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia. “I came from a family that was rooted in business,” he said. “‘You can’t go to school for fashion,’” Font remembered his father telling him. So, while working toward an architecture degree, Font studied pattern-cutting and design on the side. “When I finished my degree, I said, ‘Dad, I finished architecture, but I also made this collection, and this is what my real passion is,’” Font said. “If you have children, you really have to support their passions from the beginning,” he continued. “And you can’t push them to do something they don’t want to do.” And yet, despite a disinterest in the field he studied, an architectural influence resonates throughout Font’s designs for Delpozo. “Now I look at architecture as more of a hobby,” he explained. “And I love it, since it’s not forced upon me.” To wit: Font designed his second home in Viladrau, a region of Catalonia where he spends his weekends, and also helps out his friends with their interiors. Since its acquisition by Grupo Perfumes y Diseño in 2011, Delpozo has been on a rapid, yet careful and considered, path to expansion. In ►
Atelier photographs by Javier Biosca. Runway by John Aquino
Fashion Agenda
I
t was 10 a.m. but Josep Font’s clock, as he settled into a leather banquette at the New York outpost of Sant Ambroeus in SoHo, was badly out of sync thanks to transatlantic jet lag that kept him up all night. “Terrible,” he said, shaking his head, sipping an iced tea to revive. A day prior, the 47-year-old creative director of Delpozo had touched down from Madrid, where he is based, to scout venues for the brand’s New York Fashion Week show in September. The spring 2016 collection, he said, is about halfway complete. Not that Font isn’t used to waking up early. Since his appointment at Delpozo in March 2012, the designer’s typical workday has started at 7:30 a.m. (after he walks to the brand’s headquarters in Madrid, arriving before the rest of the design team to cherish the morning solitude — the calmest part of his day), and he remains there until 8 or 9 p.m. From his tiny atelier, Font has transformed the Spanish heritage house, founded in 1974 by the late Jesus del Pozo, into one of fashion’s most inventive and highly anticipated brands, reinvigorating it with a fresh modernity. Polite, and even subdued in demeanor, Font loosened up as he spoke Spanish, his native language. On the morning after the Met Gala, conversation quickly turned to an assessment of the red carpet fashion; Font lit up with laughter as an iPhone displaying celebrity Instagram memes was passed around the table. (For the event, Delpozo dressed Indre Rockefeller — a social fixture and also the brand’s U.S. president — in a sheer blackand-blue floral-embellished gown.) But back to Font’s first order of business: selecting a venue for his seventh Delpozo collection. It will be the sixth collection presented in New York — where his shows have become a hot ticket — a city that excites him because of its energy, where “people still get excited about fashion — and excited to dress up,” he said. Font, intently focused on Delpozo’s development, has exacting standards for how the brand is presented. For one, he insists that his venues never have an elevated runway platform. Natural light is also essential. “I want people to physically see the details and the quality,” he explained. “It’s important for people to engage with the collection. They’re always telling me to show in a bigger space to accommodate more guests,” he said, referring to his public relations team. “But if we do that, we sacrifice the intimacy of the shows I’m trying to create. The most important thing is for people to feel intimate with the clothing.” It is true that Font’s designs, often referred to as prêt-à-couture, are better suited to a small, salon-style setting than some megastadium with flashy lights. Season after season, editors praise Delpozo’s voluminous, structural proportions and innovative pattern-cutting techniques rendered in contrasts: at once traditional and modern, organic and architectural. His soft pastels appear alongside vivid, electric hues; structured silk twill tops come paired with skirts in diaphanous tulle or organza. A knack for embellishment and hand-embroidery mark his unconventional eveningwear with a youthful spirit and touch of whimsy. In a time when so many designers parade safe and perfectly wearable separates down their runways, Font’s creations for Delpozo manage to transport, surprise and delight. Before he assumed the helm at the label, Font, born in the Santa Perpètua de Mogoda region of Barcelona, was a seasoned ready-to-wear designer and couturier whose work over several decades culminated in an invitation by the Fédération Française de la Couture to show his collection at Paris Couture
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FashionBriefs QUOTED
LET’S DANCE
Capezio Jumps Into Activewear O Capezio, which has been making dance apparel and footwear since 1887, is adding activewear to its lineup — and has an ambassador to boot: 12-year-old dancer and reality TV star Maddie Ziegler. The company started testing a few core pieces a year ago and plans to roll out a full activewear collection with fashion offerings such as shrugs and jackets, as well as a girls’ collection, for October delivery.
The women’s line, which includes bra tops, pants, leotards, jackets and unitards priced from $37 to $69, will be available at Amazon.com, Capezio’s 10 stores and its dance store partners. Ziegler, the breakout star of Lifetime’s “Dance Moms” and Sia’s music video trilogy — “Chandelier,” “Elastic Heart” and “Big Girls Cry” — will represent Capezio across all media and in its ad campaigns. — LISA LOCKWOOD
ORLANDO OPENING
Chanel Wishes Upon a Store O Coco does Disney? Not really, but close. Last week Chanel unveiled its revamped Orlando, Fla., store, a 5,300-square-foot behemoth in The Mall at Millenia that sells all product categories and replaces a 2,000-squarefoot accessories store. “It will really be a complete brand statement,” said
Barbara Cirkva, Chanel Inc. division president of fashion, of the new selection of ready-to-wear, small leather goods, costume jewelry and watches. While Orlando is an international, tourist-driven destination, Cirkva said the revamp will hopefully draw more area clients. “Since we’re giving the
“I hope you never stop aspiring to do what you love, and you continue being your unique selves. The world out there is a mess, but maybe you can fix it by making everyone look fabulous.” Brooke Shields, addressing the Class of 2015 at the Fashion Institute of Technology on May 21
local individual the full offer of Chanel, they don’t have to hop on the plane and fly to Miami or Atlanta or Palm Beach to see everything,” she said. Designer Peter Marino’s vision adheres to the brand’s retail aesthetic of Coco Chanel’s apartment but reflects Orlando’s resort flavor. Alas, there are no Mickey or Minnie Mouse decor references. — JESSICA IREDALE
RETRO GLAMOUR
Revisiting the Riviera O In its newest exhibition, London’s Fashion and Textile Museum is chronicling the history of cruise wear, from voluminous Edwardian bathing bloomers to today’s body-sculpting swimsuits. The most striking part of the exhibition — called “Riviera Style: Resort & Swimwear Since 1900” — is a tableau of Fifties- and Sixties-era swimsuits and two-pieces, which the curators have set up on mannequins to resemble models at a beauty pageant. The show also charts how resorts in England and the South of France crafted stylish imagery to entice the growing middle class with the promise of a glamorous resort vacation. Curator Christine Boydell noted that what unites the designs over the decades is a willingness to experiment with resort fashion. “People feel they can be glamorous in a way on [vacation] that they can’t at home,” she said. “I think it allows people to have a little fantasy life for two weeks.” — NINA JONES
Brooke Shields: Thomas Iannaccone. Chanel Orlando: Sam Frost. Capezio: Sinisha Nisevic. Riviera: Couple under umbrella: National Railway Museum/Pictorial Collection/Science & Society Picture Library. Others: Courtesy of the Leicestershire County Council Museum Service
Fashion Agenda
appointing Font — who doesn’t have a stake in the company — more than three years ago, the goal was to turn the brand, which until then had only been sold in Spain, into a globally recognized luxury label. Delpozo now counts 56 points of sale in more than 30 countries throughout Europe, Asia and North America — Harvey Nichols, Galeries Lafayette, Browns, Bergdorf Goodman, Kirna Zabête and Lane Crawford among them — and operates two flagships: a 2,500-square-foot store opened in February 2014 in Miami’s Design District, and another on Madrid’s Calle de Lagasca, opened in March 2013. Font said the brand is eyeing a New York outpost next. Product categories are growing as well. Two seasons ago, with its fall 2014 collection, Delpozo launched a footwear line, which is made in Italy. A fragrance, which Font has been quietly developing in Paris for two years, is in the works, too. The brand will also show its first pre-fall collection next season with private appointments in New York and Paris. All of this — in addition to the unique point of view that Font has brought to the label — has not gone unnoticed. Moda Operandi, an early supporter of Delpozo, hosted the brand’s first trunk show in the fall of 2012. “Many of our young designers are inspired by nightlife or subcultures, showing all-black, street-inspired looks,” said Lauren Santo Domingo, the online retailer’s cofounder. “At a time when it seemed many had stopped showing evening altogether, Delpozo gave us a fairy tale with unparalleled quality and craftsmanship.” Bergdorf Goodman picked up the collection for the first time this spring. “There is a fantastical, dreamlike quality to Josep’s designs, and yet they are feminine and wearable,” said senior vice president and general merchandise manager Elizabeth von der Goltz. “There is nothing like it in the market.” Every move Delpozo makes, from editorial requests to Instagram posts — where the brand boasts 266,000 followers — gets filtered through Font. “It’s really important to me that everything the brand does, in terms of the design of the stores, the different categories, from dresses to blouses to shoes, has one vision,” he said. “And that it’s not disjointed.” This philosophy extends to dressing celebrities. “It has to be a certain event and a certain woman,” Font said, counting actresses Julianne Moore, Cate Blanchett, Hilary Swank and Kate Mara among his red carpet clients. And for Font, that vision is less about aesthetics and more about an attitude. “It’s about how she carries herself,” he said, when asked to describe the Delpozo Woman. “Having seen the customers coming into the stores — we see the mothers come in, but also the daughters and the daughters’ friends….Ultimately, it’s someone who’s really looking for quality.” Quality, naturally, means a hefty price tag. A blush silk twill and tulle gown embellished with beads and conch shells, currently on Net-a-porter.com, costs a cool $19,650, though most items are priced from $2,000 to $10,000, with footwear around $1,100. Like the label he designs for, Font feels a sense of revival. “For a while, I was bored by fashion,” he said. “There wasn’t that freshness and newness in the collections. What I mean to do with Delpozo is to give fashion a new take. I want people to see something fresh, clean and new, and to make sure that the quality of the clothing stands out above all.”■
RetailAgenda
EDITED BY EVAN CLARK
O
utlets, coupons and e-commerce are here to stay, but the future of retailing is being invented right now in behind-thescenes innovation labs. These “ilabs,” for short, have emerged at retailers and mall developers over the last four years. They’re where digital teams, merchandisers, engineers and marketers vet ideas and test gadgets, apps, visual formats and shopping tools, like “magic” mirrors in fitting rooms, 3-D mall directories and beacons that transmit signals to mobile phones and notify shoppers about deals as they cross the store threshold. “Staples, Nordstrom, Home Depot, Wal-Mart, Target, Zappos, Westfield, Sephora, Amazon, Kohl’s, Sears, VF Corp., McDonald’s, Lowe’s and Visa are the big guys with labs,” said Mortimer Singer, president and chief executive officer of Marvin Traub Associates. “If you distill all of what’s going on, it boils down to customer centricity — making the shopping experience more fun, interesting and simple.” Fears that brick-and-mortar stores are continuing to lose business to the Internet, declining mall traffic and a sense that malls need reinvention have fueled the formation of ilabs. So has the iPhone, introduced in 2007, and a convergence of technologies advancing how radio frequency identification, video, apps and mobile devices can be applied to retail settings. “Should I even have retail stores anymore?” is the question Al Sambar, managing partner of Kurt Salmon’s consumer and retail practice, keeps hearing clients ask. “We believe that great physical retailing should continue to exist into the future. The point of our 1:1 Retailing Lab is to educate and brainstorm on projects,” and bring the personalized experience of online shopping to the physical store. For Kurt Salmon, the store of the future has a platform for customer presence awareness, product recognition, connected marketing, recommendations on products and services tailored to the shopper in the store. That means store personnel would know what products are being brought into fitting rooms and examined on shelves and that stores could send customers messages on deals, products and events just when people are shopping. “We’ve been piloting new experiences,” said Kevin McKenzie, chief digital officer at Westfield Corp., which opened its ilab in October 2012 at the Westfield San Francisco Centre. Among its pilots: a program to preorder meals from food courts for delivery, and an app that directs drivers to the nearest available parking spot and lets them prepay fees to avoid the attendant. On Thursday, Westfield officially unveils Bespoke, a 37,000-square-foot space transforming a big section of the San Francisco center into “an incubator for innovation,” featuring a demo area with robots for video conferencing; interactive digital walls; space to create a pop-up shop; open seating, and private work areas for retailers and tech firms to brainstorm. Bespoke also is being considered for the Westfield World Trade Center mall in Manhattan and reflects the new ► Photographs by WINNI WINTERMEYER
Westfield uses its Bespoke ilab in San Francisco to brainstorm new ideas.
Future Think
Retailers and real estate developers are turning to innovation labs to supercharge their evolution. By DAVID MOIN
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Retail Agenda
Michael Dodd of 10x Management, which works with tech professionals.
Westfield’s Bespoke ilab offers space for retailers and tech firms to work together.
philosophy at the group, among the world’s largest shopping-center operators. “Retailers have been our customers. Now we’ve got to think about the experience and the consumer,” McKenzie said. At Macy’s Inc., the Idea Lab formed last summer developed a “group” gifting service that makes it easy for people to chip in on gifts and unnecessary for any one person to do the math. Last year, Macy’s rolled out “image search” technology so customers can snap photos of outfits with their mobile phones, upload them and have the same or similar items from the retailer’s inventory pop up for immediate purchase. “E-gifting” launched last holiday on macys.com, where a shopper can pick a gift, pay for it, write a note, and send an e-mail, which appears in the form of a gift box that unwraps graphically until the item emerges. If it’s a sweater, for example, the person receiving the gift can change the size or color, or use the value of the gift to select something else online. The recipient can also e-mail back a thank-you note. Macy’s Idea Lab is “a process, rather than a place,” store officials said. Employees submit ideas about what customers might like, such as a new service or online feature. Ideas are voted on and the most popular ideas are vetted through “a shark tank” process, where those pitching the idea make their case before an executive panel. If approved, the concept advances to the Idea Lab within Macy’s technology offices in San Francisco, where programmers, marketers, software developers, as well as outside tech start-ups get together for two weeks to create a working prototype. If management likes the prototype, a six-week “lean development” process to perfect the concept and get it operating occurs, and then it advances to the testing phase among a small customer set. “There has always been an attitude at Macy’s about innovation. It’s harder to find the way to do it right,” said Michael Robinson, the retailer’s executive vice president for digital technology and customer experience. “This process is actually allowing us to change the DNA of our product development philosophy, product management philosophy and coding philosophy. We probably have five or six things in the pipeline at any one time. At the core of it, we are trying to find really interesting ways to improve the customer journey and find ways to make that journey more seamless. Our philosophy was not to do what some of our competitors do. Idea Lab is a philosophy encouraging ideas from everyone. Group gifting is a perfect example. It was a great idea that sprung from our finance organization. We had people in finance leave their day jobs for two weeks and enter the Idea Lab.”
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Emily Fallon Baum of tech/fine jewelry firm Keyrious.
“There has been a high level of innovation throughout the industry. I don’t think it’s going to slow down. It’s going to increase.” Erik Nordstrom Nordstrom Inc.
W
al-Mart sees itself transcending the lab space. “They are trying to think of themselves as another Facebook or Google and have been in huge acquisition mode,” said Vicki Cantrell, senior vice president, communities, and executive director of Shop.org at the National Retail Federation. In San Bruno, Calif., WalmartLabs, the discounter’s massive tech-innovation center and the technical component of Wal-Mart Global E-commerce, was formed in 2011 through the acquisition of shopping search engine Kosmix. Wal-Mart, which has since purchased 13 other tech companies primarily to acquire talent, is focused on developing mobile apps, rolling out centers for online fulfillment and thwarting Amazon and its ever-widening merchandise range. Among Wal-Mart’s most important innovations: the launch of a mobile app for the iPhone,
considering 65 percent of Wal-Mart customers have smartphones and about half use them to shop inside Wal-Mart or prepare for a visit; geo fencing, an app that, when opened, prompts consumers to enter a store mode to get coupons and product information, and opening fulfillment centers around the country to get online orders delivered faster. In several markets, Wal-Mart is testing online ordering of groceries that shoppers can pick up without getting out of their car. The company’s technology team at its home office in Bentonville, Ark., is testing technologies to improve deliveries, distribution and transportation practices, and help associates with stocking shelves. Keeping up with the customer is something retailers of all stripes are interested in. “There has been a high level of innovation throughout the industry,” Erik Nordstrom, copresident of Nordstrom Inc., told WWD. “I don’t think it’s going to slow down. It’s going to increase. We get inspired by things our competitors do all the time. Everyone is trying to catch up to the customer. They’re ahead of us.” “Either you innovate or you are going to be looking obsolete pretty quickly,” said Faisal Masud, executive vice president of global e-commerce for Staples, which generates more than $11 billion in sales a year online, making the retailer the fourth-largest e-commerce business in the U.S. next to Amazon, Apple and Wal-Mart. “We are trying to execute faster than in the past,” Masud said. “With whatever changes we make for the
RetailBriefs
customer experience, or for digital assets online, our previous model involved a lot of outsourcing. Our new model involves bringing in the talent,” and opening labs where the talent resides.
Nordstrom photograph by Kyle Ericksen
A
mong the big ideas stirring up ilab activity: personalizing in-store shopping; creating consistent omnichannel shopping experiences; finding cost-efficient same-day delivery solutions; mobile payment solutions; wearable tech; reacting in real time to customers when they are in the store with product suggestions and special offers, and making mobile devices increasingly integral to everyday life at home. “It’s about keeping your life organized and together,” said NRF’s Cantrell. “Creating an omnichannel shopping experience that’s seamless — we are all trying to figure that out,” Nordstrom observed. “The foundation would be being able to locate merchandise no matter where it sits, in the online warehouse or a store. We’ve had that for a number of years. It’s a simple-sounding thing, but it’s a big investment in technology to enable that. The next step is being able to return online orders to stores. It’s pretty much a customer expectation now, but there are operational issues you’ve got to get through. Moving forward, we know the majority of traffic to our Web site does not result in sales online, but starts ‘a shopping journey’ from online to stores. How do we make that shopping journey seamless?” Nordstrom’s 10,000-square-foot Customer Experience Center, opened in 2013, is a modular warehouse space to test concepts in a storelike environment, from redesigning departments to visual merchandising, technology and formats, like a new beauty format. Nordstrom customers come to the CEC so the company can learn what works for them or what doesn’t. A new beauty format featuring a beauty concierge, a trending-now station and a play bar was developed at CEC and is in 19 locations currently and will be in 25 by yearend. They’re all in new or renovated stores. “It feels light, clean and more Erik Nordstrom manageable to shop,” said Nordstrom, noting that the project involved teams from the beauty and customer service departments as well as the CEC and the ilab. “We saw the conversation about ilabs really take off in 2011 and 2012,” said Kurt Salmon’s Sambar, noting that around that time, Nordstrom put a video of its lab on YouTube telegraphing the notion of innovation in the works; Burberry launched its “store of the future” in London with a lot of digital bells and whistles, and “showrooming” became a hot topic. Around that time, Simon Property Group, the world’s largest shopping center developer, formed the Simon Innovation Group. “We’re lean, agile and our approach is different. Shopkick was our first big foray a year ago,” said Mikael Thygesen, chief marketing officer of Simon Property Group and a member of the innovation group. Simon has also partnered with Ziploop, which does receipt captures, to create a loyalty program that entitles shoppers to free parking, valet, prizes and special offers at retailers, as well as with eBay on “connected mall” technology seen in the Stanford Shopping Center. It’s a 3-D mapping directory that will roll out to 20 to 30 centers over the next year. “We like to partner with firms, large and small,” Thygesen said. “We are focused, quick to market and quick to test. We didn’t want to create a large team. We recognized that we couldn’t be experts in every area. It’s better to network.” ■
FIRST SHOP
Simone Rocha to Hit Mount Street O Simone Rocha is stepping into the retail ring with plans to open her first store on Mount Street, the London thoroughfare that’s home to hot young British and international labels. Rocha plans to open in September during London Fashion Week across the street from Scott’s restaurant. She’s been working with her father, designer John Rocha, on the interiors. “It will be a very personal, intimate, interesting and inspiring retail experience with evolving installations with different seasons,” Rocha told WWD, adding that it will also be a platform for ideas.
“I really have a vision for my collections to be in a special, unique place, a very personal creative space with my own identity,” she said. “I felt that with my dad’s experience and his sensitivity to space, together we could create a store very personal to me, and to give the clothes a sense of place.” Rocha is the latest London designer to land on the street, and the opening will come a few weeks after fellow London designer Erdem Moralioglu opens his first shop around the corner, on South Audley Street. Over the past 18 months alone, labels such as
Roksanda, Christopher Kane, Delfina Delettrez and Céline have opened units, joining Nicholas Kirkwood, Marc Jacobs, Double RL, Solange, Roland Mouret, Lanvin and Oscar de la Renta on and around the street. The 28-year-old Rocha said Mount Street “feels like a really international place to be and I think the mix of London designers and international inspiring designers like Delfina Delettrez, Marc Jacobs and Céline on the street is what makes it a very special place to be.” She declined to say whether this would be the first of many stores: “I have a plan going forward, and I am always trying to push things forward with my collections.” The opening marks yet another milestone in what has been a rapid-fire career for the designer. She unveiled her collection for fall 2010 at London Fashion Week, the same year she received her M.A. degree, and is stocked at stores including Dover Street Market, Browns, Selfridges, Ikram and Colette. In December, she scooped the New Establishment prize at the British Fashion Awards, and in 2013 picked up the Emerging Talent Award. Her aesthetic is a flurry of contrasts: Classic and avant-garde, hard and soft, sweet and sinister. — SAMANTHA CONTI
THE QUOTE
“Our Achilles heel has been inconsistency in carrying product strength, season after season, across all of our brands." Art Peck Gap Inc. ceo
THE CHART
Deflated No More EURO ZONE CONSUMER PRICE CHANGES
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O After four worrisome months of deflation, consumer prices in the euro zone were flat in April. The improvement — a welcome sign for retailers and the overall economy — was attributed to a strengthening of energy and food prices. The European Central Bank is working to keep prices on the rise and IHS Global Insight expects increases of 1 percent by the end of the year. If prices are rising across the economy, retailers have more leeway to charge more.
GIVING AND TAKING
Currency Hits Bottom Lines, Boosts Travel
Luxe brands might be getting pinched by currency swings — Burberry said the difference between the U.S. dollar and pound would hurt full-year profits — but tourists are loving it. That ultimately could be an opportunity for brands looking for new shoppers. Global Blue said tourist spending shot up 50.1 percent in April as Chinese shoppers abroad boosted their spend by 92.4 percent. WWD.COM MAY 2015, NO. 4
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BeautyAgenda
EDITED BY PETE BORN
O
n Monday at 11:55 a.m., consumers anxiously sit at their desks across the country waiting for the clock to strike noon. The world comes to a halt for two minutes as riders strategically pick their bikes for the week at SoulCycle because it’s just as important as applying their all-natural night cream before bed. Beauty doesn’t just come packaged in a jar anymore, unless it’s a healthy shot of juice. Consumers are investing in themselves more than ever and have gravitated toward a healthy regimen that includes a raw-food diet and a consistent workout routine at their favorite boutique fitness studio, and are de-stressing with a facial massage on a month-to-month basis to lift their cheekbones. The traditional beauty industry is finding itself in the unexpected position of having to run competitive laps with the health and wellness crowd. And it’s showing its age. The hot spots where Millennials get their daily fix include the unavoidable SoulCycle, AKT InMotion, CityRow and Physique 57. “Holistic health is one of the biggest trends across all categories at the moment,” declared Claire Hobson, executive vice president and global business director of The Future Laboratory, during the CEW Global Trends Report presentation Future Focus: Long Beauty. “It’s important that when we talk about cosmetics, we talk about beauty, we talk about wellness and we talk about health in a converged environment now. It’s not about being perfect. It’s about feeling good and looking good.” She’s right, and consumers now view beauty as holistic, rather than cosmetic.
Beauty’s New Mandate:
Wellness Thanks to consumers’ interest, the beauty industry is headed in a new, healthy direction.
By JAYME CYK Photographs by GEORGE CHINSEE Styled by RACHEL STICKLEY
28 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
Kaiser photograph courtesy of AKT inMotion
“Beauty brands are really competing with a share of wallets with $34 SoulCycle classes and Lululemon hoodies,” said Maureen Mullen, cofounder and head of research at L2 Inc. “Those are a lot of the trade-offs that consumers are making right now,” she said, speaking primarily of Millennials. One fact is clear, however. Natural beauty brands best exemplify how health and wellness are becoming one entity. “Naturals is the attribute that consumers are looking to pay a premium for and it’s driven by Millennials,” said James Russo, senior vice president of consumer global insights for Nielsen. “What I like about the health and beauty angle is that it’s not just specific to beauty, it’s becoming increasingly pertinent in the way we buy and live. It should give companies confidence to move forward.” A brand that is breaking ground in the natural space is new brand Pursoma, a self-described beauty wellness company. “Pursoma is a beauty brand, but we function as a wellness company,” said Shannon Vaughn, founder of Pursoma, an all-natural bath and body Tata Harper line that combats urban toxicity. “We create products that make people feel better. When we’re dealing with a new retailer I’ll tell them don’t just put us in your beauty category and don’t just put us in the wellness section. Let’s create a new category Anna Kaiser called beauty wellness.” That category seems to be resonating. Pursoma, which went into full-scale distribution in November and has had sales triple since, is sold at indie beauty boutiques like Shen Beauty and Cap Beauty, as well as juice bars like The Butcher’s Daughter in New York. “We think [that natural beauty products] are the next thing people start looking at after they analyze their food and health,” said Kerrilynn Pamer, cofounder of Cap Beauty. “They really start looking at the products they are putting on their bodies.” Meanwhile, Pai Skincare, a certified organic skin-care line based in the U.K., is all about creating a lifestyle for its consumers. “We don’t just sell products, we sell a complete service,” said Sarah Brown, founder of Pai Skincare. “We have a phenomenal customer support system. We have extended hours so people can call up and ask what shampoos we recommend even though we don’t sell shampoos. We are positioning ourselves as experts to help people navigate the natural beauty sector.” According to Nielsen, in the last 52 weeks ended last November, natural and organic beauty products grew by 24 percent. “Companies are looking for growth,” said Russo, adding that the natural beauty sector generated $345 million in 2014 with a 12 percent increase versus a year ago. “[And natural beauty is] really driving growth.” Furthermore, Tata Harper believes that there’s a movement taking place where consumers are trying to live better. “There’s more people exercising, there’s more people meditating and trying to do things that are better for themselves,” said Harper, founder of the namesake skin-care line. “It’s all coming together along with the antiaging qualities of exercise.” Anna Kaiser, celebrity trainer and founder of AKT InMotion agrees. “Fitness isn’t just about the
workout anymore, it’s about what you’re eating, beauty and massage,” she said. Kaiser’s studio is one of the top boutique fitness trend spots that have exploded on the market. The classes include cardio dance routines, strength intervals with yoga poses and flexibility in between. “I really want to maintain the integrity of the workout and the result and provide a quality service that brings together a community,” Kaiser said. “It’s not just a sweat-and-go workout, which I believe is coming to an end. People are really valuing their time.” “We see at SoulCycle every day across the country that people are putting their health first,” said Elizabeth Cutler, cofounder of SoulCycle, who added that the company has more than 12,000 riders a day. “It’s the meeting of physical strength, mental health and spiritual well-being that signifies SoulCycle as a lifestyle brand. Also, feeling
she saw improvement in firmness as a result of her weekly FaceLove Fitness appointments. “One of the skin’s main functions is to eliminate the impurities in your body and that just activates your skin’s mechanism and metabolism more. So it really is great skin care.” She added that there were a couple of studies recently done at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, that measured skin on a body that exercised versus a nonexercised body. The exercised body had thicker skin and higher levels of collagen. Traditional spas are also incorporating elements of wellness beyond just facials. Bliss is becoming a lifestyle brand and entering multiple categories. Heyday, a facial concept, sort of like a Drybar for faces, opening now in the Flatiron District in New York, is planning to bring facials out of the spa and into people’s lives by having its aestheticians create customized treatments with a variety of
“It’s important that when we talk about cosmetics, we talk about beauty, we talk about wellness and we talk about health in a converged environment now.”
brands at an affordable price. “The whole concept of Heyday is being your best from the inside out,” said Adam Ross, cofounder and ceo of Heyday. “That gives us a huge opportunity to be a wellness brand.” Also, Shen Beauty, which operates as an indie beauty boutique and spa, brought in health experts like nutritionist Katrine van Wyk and “Eat Pretty” author Jolene Hart to educate consumers. “Jolene Hart spoke about what you can eat to have beautiful, healthy skin,” said Jessica Richards, owner of Shen Beauty. “Katrine van Wyk talked about green smoothies and green drinks and she made them for our customers. Because it’s not just about what you put on your skin, a lot has to do with what you eat.” E-commerce site Shop Zoe Life started out as an online all-natural beauty retailer and has recently expanded into ath-leisure due to the impact of beauty wellness. “Natural beauty is booming,” said Zoe Twitt, founder of Shop Zoe Life. “Since I launched a year ago I’ve seen a lot of new e-commerce sites launch natural and organic beauty. But they’re not offering the whole package. They’re focused on beauty, but they’re not focused on all categories, like health and fitness.” Twitt has a clear vision of bringing all aspects of wellness under one roof. And according to Nielsen’s Russo, she’s on the right path. “The main dynamic here is that wellness is not a fad,” Russo said. “It’s a long-standing trend.” ■
CLAIRE HOBSON The Future Laboratory
good is something that people want to quantify. You find the best version of yourself on the bike and people want to live that way.” With this umbrella of beauty wellness comes new categories, such as facial fitness. In December, Rachel Lang, an aesthetician, Kate Gyllenhaal, a personal trainer, and Heidi Frederick, a massage therapist, came together to launch FaceLove Fitness, a gym that’s, well, for one’s face. Located in downtown Manhattan, the experience utilizes massage and physical touch to strengthen and tone the facial muscles. “Fitness raises endorphins, your pain blockers, healing cells, it boosts your immune system and purifies your body,” said Lang, who noted that one of her clients postponed getting Botox because
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BeautyBriefs JAMES GAGER
Taking a Star Turn at Pratt
O As direct-to-consumer sales have become the hot spot for beauty brand distribution, MDSolarSciences is relaunching its Web site this week. Although the brand is sold at retailers like Sephora and Space NK, MDSolarSciences wants to build a deeper relationship with its consumers. “E-commerce is so important,” said Mary F. Rodrigues, president of MDSolarSciences. “In this age, there are so many places where you can have your brand sold, but you need your own Web site to not only find information, but build a relationship, and that’s what we’re focusing on.” — JAYME CYK
STORE SEARCH
Well, Naturally O Denver has a new beauty destination: natural beauty retailer Aillea, which just opened in the city’s Larimer Square shopping area. Kathryn Murray, Aillea’s founder and owner, launched an online business in January. Murray, who was vice president of marketing and sales for Vincent Longo Cosmetics for seven years, was moved to open her own boutique after relocating to Colorado and being diagnosed with severe food allergies.
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“It led me to understand that what I put on my skin is as important as what I ingest,” said Murray. “Many retailers offer just a smattering of organic beauty options, but they are often hidden among the more visible, yet potentially harmful, products.” The 500-square-foot boutique opened with 20 brands, including RMS, Kjaer Weis, Pure & True, Lily Lolo Cosmetics, Suki Cleansing Lotion, DrJ Organics, Ilia, W3ll People, Indie Lee, Rahua, Josh Rosebrook, Kypris, Suntegrity, AILA, Priti NYC and Lurk. — JULIE NAUGHTON
SONIA KASHUK
Skin Is In O Even as a makeup artist, Sonia Kashuk is fully aware that without skin care, makeup doesn’t mean a thing. “To me, makeup isn’t going to look good unless your skin looks great,” said Kashuk. In August, she will embrace that mantra with her first range of skin care. “Because I was a makeup artist, the first foray [into product] was going to be color,” she noted. “But [skin care] is such an important aspect.” Exclusive to Target, the collection will consist of four stockkeeping units: Resurface Exfoliating Wash, $14.99, Renew Micro Exfoliating Toner, $14.99, and Detox Purifying Black Mask, $15.99; the Dissolve Gel to Oil Makeup Removing Cleanser, $14.99, will launch in November. Kashuk added, “We’re staying true to the mission of ‘luxury doesn’t have to be a guilty pleasure.’”
James Gager, Marc Rosen, Jennifer Balbier and John Demsey. the school is establishing a Scholarship for Packaging Design in his name, covering full tuition costs — the only full ride in the school — for two students in the two-year graduate communications design program, beginning in 2016. The school also is creating a design symposium for Rosen. John Demsey, a group president of Lauder, introduced Gager, describing his friend as “extraordinary” and “a legend.” He asserted, “Our company wouldn’t be where it is without James Gager’s vision.” Demsey described Gager as “one part Philip Johnson, one part Alexander Liberman
and one part Walt Disney.” The honoree responded with: “I would like to share this award with everyone here tonight.” After thanking more than a dozen people, Gager talked about growing up different and the need to defend that difference, citing Lady Gaga’s song “Born This Way.” He recalled getting a kite-building lesson in school. His model was beautiful, Gager asserted. When the wind gusted, though, his handiwork didn’t rise. But he was not discouraged. Despite advice to the contrary, he declared, “beauty does fly.” — PETE BORN
WHAT’S SELLING WHERE
Lip Service Which lipsticks do Sephora shoppers around the world buy? Here, the standout sellers. — ANNA DYSINGER U.S. Canada Bite Beauty Luminous Crème Lipstick Duo in Fig/Date, $12
Mexico Kat Von D Everlasting Liquid Lipstick in Outlaw, $20
Kat Von D Studded Kiss Lipstick in Lolita, $21
France Sephora Collection Color Lip Last in Royal Raspberry, $13
Italy Brazil Sephora Collection Rouge Cream Lipstick in Crush, $12.50
Too Faced Melted Liquified Long Wear Lipstick in Fuchsia, $21
— J.C.
BEAUTY SELL-OFF
What’s Next From P&G O Following the sale of its Fekkai hair-care business last week, Procter & Gamble Co. set the stage for divesting
more brands from the vast beauty holdings, which the company had amassed over the course of two decades. There has been plenty of speculation about Cover Girl and Max Factor, with Coty Inc. and Revlon mentioned
as suitors. When discussion turns to Wella and Clairol, fingers point to Henkel AG, Unilever and Kao Corp. There is also the block of prestige fragrance brands, including Gucci and Dolce & Gabbana. So it starts.
Sonia product photographs by George Chinsee; Gager by Steve Eichner
Digital Overhaul
O It was a homecoming, of sorts, for James Gager, who received the 2015 Art of Packaging Award last week from Pratt Institute, the same school he graduated from in 1963 with a bachelor’s degree in industrial design and a master’s in packaging design. “It feels amazing to be honored by the school I went to,” said Gager, who is now senior vice president and group creative director at MAC Cosmetics and Jo Malone Worldwide at the Estée Lauder Cos. Inc. “It is a great, great honor,” he said before the festivities began. With a hint of humility in his voice, Gager continued, “I usually don’t like to be in the limelight; I’d rather be working in the shadows.” Instead, he found himself at a podium, with a warm reception welling up. The Baroque dining room at Manhattan’s University Club was filled to capacity with 365 people and a record $400,000 was raised for the Marc Rosen Scholarship Fund. As an honor to Rosen,
EDITED BY ARTHUR ZACZKIEWICZ
MarketsAgenda
Hefty Loot
Strong dollar: good for consumers, bad for business and stocks? By ARTHUR ZACZKIEWICZ
I
t seems counterintuitive (from a Western-centric perspective), but a strong dollar is often bad for business — at least if you’re a U.S. company with business overseas — or one dependent on foreign tourists buying your products in America. If you’re a consumer traveling and spending money abroad, or a company exporting to the U.S., a robust dollar against other currencies is a sweet deal. And if you’re an investor in the retail and fashion apparel space, a strong dollar is one of the increasingly important metrics impacting stock algorithms — along with consumer confidence, retail sales, consumer expenditures, interest rates, fuel prices, credit and student loan debt, housing prices and inflation.
Photograph by DAVID BRANDON GEETING
As retailers and vendors report their quarterly results, the strong dollar is increasingly a bugbear impacting profits — and one that is likely to hang around for the foreseeable future. Recent quarterly reports from Macy’s Inc., Ralph Lauren Corp., Gildan Activewear Inc. and Elizabeth Arden Inc. all mentioned the impact of currency translations. The impacts vary, and range from $2 million to $10 million — depending upon the size of the company. In its report earlier this month, Elizabeth Arden said its bottom line was saddled with $2.9 million of losses relating to currency translations. These charges will continue, companies said. Jacki Nemerov, president and chief operating officer at Ralph Lauren, said in the quarterly report that “exchange and global consumer spending remain unpredictable, and we are planning our business accordingly.” The company revised its outlook, and said for its fiscal fourth quarter, management “expects consolidated net revenues to increase at a midsingle-digit rate in constant currency. Based on current rates, the net negative impact from foreign currency translation is estimated at approximately 550 basis points.” For the full-year period, sales
are expected to decline 200 basis points on currency issues alone. Nor is it only U.S. firms feeling the stronger dollar’s squeeze. Burberry last week said if exchange rates remained as they are now, the firm’s retail and wholesale profits would be only 10 million pounds, or $15.6 million, higher than last year. The statement hit Burberry’s stock since the profit figure was 40 million pounds, or $62.3 million, lower than the guidance the company offered in April. Combined with weak economic data in the U.S. (lower employment numbers and stagnant retail sales), the strong dollar has been one of the primary forces behind a 5 percent decline in the WWD Global Stock Tracker since early March. The only thing keeping the index from plunging lower is the European components, which have been rallying due to the robust dollar and weakness of the euro. A strong dollar, though, and its negative impact on top- and bottom-line results is the woe du jour for many companies. Moreover, currency exchange fluctuations and the market volatility it creates are here to stay, say analysts and economists. Two weeks ago, for example, the dollar significantly weakened against the euro after a long bull run that began last July. Economists expect the dollar to bounce back as fears of deflation in the euro zone countries ease and governments there continue to force inflation up as a way to pump up the economy. On that last note, policy makers at the ► WWD.COM MAY 2015, No. 4
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“Currency volatility — at a minimum — is here to stay, and may even increase along with currency wars.” Wolfgang Koester chief executive officer at FireApps
The positives also come with risks. Iannaccone cautioned against European companies entering into long-term agreements that could be impacted by currency exchange fluctuations. Materials costs are also affected by currency volatility so forecasting has to include mitigating risks in that regard. John Paul DeJoria, cofounder and chief executive officer of Paul Mitchell and owner of The Patrón Spirits Company, said that the frequency of visitors to beauty salons by customers is a good overall economic indicator of current conditions as well as measuring the impact of currency fluctuations. “When times get rough people visit salons less frequently, but in Europe we’re seeing little of this,” he said, adding that as a supplier, the strong dollar is clearly impacting business. “As a result we have to adjust the prices to distributors to maintain cost consistency with the consumer. And yes, we absorb that cost.” DeJoria said he expects the dollar-euro valuation dance to continue for some time. He’s seen it before, and said it comes in cycles — recalling when the euro was on par with the dollar, once briefly in 2000 and then again in 2002. With a strong dollar, the industry has also been down this road before. During the late Eighties,
32 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
Fair Fashion
GCU launches center to foster sustainability work.
S for example, the dollar overpowered many currencies — especially European ones, said Andrew Nelson, U.S. chief economist for global real estate firm Colliers International. Nelson’s expertise is in the consumer and retail sector. For his part, Nelson said the strength of the dollar and its “headwinds to exports will be more than offset by the domestic boost from lower prices, greater spending and more savings.” Nelson also said the “value of the dollar is not particularly high by historical standards and will likely not cause a significant impact on exports.” Nelson said the dollar is “still well below levels reached in 2002 and especially in 1985, and the recent rise pales compared to run-ups seen in the mid-Eighties and late Nineties. Plus, many American manufacturers will benefit from the drop in the cost of inputs they import.” Nelson said despite volatility in currency valuations, the dollar is positioned to remain stronger than other currencies — at least through the end of the year as U.S. economic conditions improve in the second half, he said. Nelson added that companies with currency exposure issues are likely taking hits to their bottom line — and in some cases, their top line too. Wolfgang Koester, chief executive officer at FireApps, which helps companies hedge their exposure to foreign currency volatility and has clients that include Google, Nike, Accenture and Merck, said, “It’s all about understanding your flow of product and matching that with the right currency. The key is to understand your exposure, and then to forecast — and hedge — against it straight through from the revenue stream to the balance sheet.” Koester said a strong dollar might be impacting sales to tourists in the U.S. — a factor cited by Macy’s in its recent quarterly report — but really the issue is “one of financial risk management and not one of a product demand risk management.” Koester said companies must “be able to clearly define the foreign exchange exposure when developing their forecast.” And data analytics is the tool to do just that. In regard to how long these conditions will last, Koester said, “currency volatility — at a minimum — is here to stay, and may even increase along with currency wars.” Jay Silver, managing director at CBIZ Inc. with a focus on the apparel sector, agreed. “The strong dollar is really affecting the cost of manufacturing and the sourcing of goods,” he said. “And there is concern that volatility is a real and lasting problem.” ■
ustainable business approaches are essential for the fashion industry, but without collaboration and sharing of best practices, implementation is hard to achieve. That’s the premise behind Glasgow Caledonian University New York’s launch of the Fair Fashion Center in New York. The university, well-known in the industry for its fashion and executive education programs, said it is opening the center “as both a repository and conduit of information,” where participants “will examine the business case for sustainability in the fashion industry.” The center will concentrate on “business practices that produce positive financial, societal and environmental results.” This approach is already resonating with key industry leaders. “The Fair Fashion Center recognizes the roles and opportunities that fashion companies might play to improve sustainability in manufacturing, packaging, shipping, etc., of products from our industry,” said Terry J. Lundgren, chairman and chief executive officer of Macy’s Inc. Moreover, a university setting is likely to be an ideal one for fostering collaboration, say college officials. And the timing is right, said Laurent Claquin, head of Kering Americas. “At Kering, we believe in the power of collaboration to scale sustainable solutions beyond our own Terry J. Lundgren business and supply chains, to contribute to a better world economically, socially and environmentally,” Claquin said. “There is no greater time for the Fair Fashion Center to be launched to support our industry through research and a sharing of best practices.” GCU chancellor and Nobel Laureate professor Muhammad Yunus said the “fashion industry has always impacted more than just itself. So many companies have started evolving toward sustainability and I am pleased that GCU and the Fair Fashion Center will help the industry find sustainable solutions for the world’s challenges.” Cara Smyth, vice president of GCU New York, said “there are fantastic initiatives under way and we need to capture them, understand the best practices and the greatest opportunities to scale.” The center is already working with industry leaders and will form partnerships with the Sustainable Apparel Coalition, United Nations Global Compact and the United Nations Principles for Responsible Management Education, among others. ■ Photograph by DAVID BRANDON GEETING
Lundgren photograph by Steve Eichner
MarketsAgenda
European Central Bank were thrown into a tizzy by the euro bounce-back and reiterated to economists and the press that the bank is fully deploying its quantitative easing program, which involves gobbling up billions of debt — public and private — to fuel inflation and keep the euro weaker than it has been, according to IHS Global Insight chief economist Howard Archer in a research report last week. “The weak euro has been a very important factor in boosting euro zone growth and inflation prospects,” Archer said in the report. “While the euro is still at a very competitive level, the more it rises, the more the downside risks to euro zone growth and inflation increase. By stressing that it remains committed to full QE implementation, the ECB is clearly looking to fuel inflation expectations in the euro zone, which are now rising. The ECB may well also see boosting market expectations of QE as a way of keeping a lid on the euro’s recent rally.” Mark Tan, a financial analyst at Thrivent Financial, said the ECB’s actions “are already impacting the equity markets in Europe” and the euro declined against the dollar early last week on the policy maker’s reiteration of implementing its program. “There are no guarantees, though,” Tan said, adding that Japan has used similar tactics to force inflation and lower its currency, but it has not been sustainable in the long run. Giuliano Iannaccone, partner at law firm Tarter Krinsky & Drogin, said in an interview that,“in regard to a strong dollar, there are positives and negatives. For foreign companies doing business in the U.S., there are clear advantages.” Iannaccone said exporters to the U.S. are lined up for some unique opportunities that didn’t exist before. The stronger dollar is allowing certain companies to expand, “at a time when the European domestic economy is not that good. So the strong dollar adds a lot of stability,” he said.
MarketsBriefs MarketsBriefs GOVERNMENT
TPP’s Strange Bedfellows O The debacle over President Obama’s support of the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal making its way through the U.S. Senate puts a spotlight on issues of concern to a broad band of special interest groups as well as average citizens. As a result of TPP, these groups have aligned against the President, making for some strange bedfellows. Obama’s opponents include Tea Party members, environmentalists, labor groups and U.S.-based
manufacturers (many who said they were harmed by prior trade agreements such as NAFTA). It’s like Ted Cruz, board members of the Sierra Club and the AFL-CIO all meeting at the headquarters of the Ford Motor Co. to discuss TPP opposition. Hard to imagine, but that’s exactly what happened on numerous blogs, social media channels and Web sites (such as obamatrade.com). One reoccurring theme in the rally cry against TPP, which is strongly supported by U.S. retailers, is the negative impact on wages. U.S. workers were burned before by global trade deals, the opponents say, and cite a 2007 report from the Economic Policy Institute that said the “impact of trade flows [from globalization] increased the inequality of [household] earnings by roughly 7 percent…[an] amount that rivals the entire federal income tax bill paid by the household.”
WHAT RETAIL SAID
“I really enjoyed listening to our Yihaodian customer focus group and following one of our associates around as we delivered orders to apartments in Shanghai. There are new, exciting developments happening in retail. And I’m encouraged that we’re in the thick of it, but I was also reminded that the same basic tenets of our business, like value for money, a great assortment and customer service are what they are after.”
MARKET INSIGHTS
Brands Shunned by Millennials O Are college kids shrugging Uggs? According to the Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business’ inaugural FIndex (Fashion Innovation Index), fashion-savvy students are giving up the boots as a favorite along with Abercrombie & Fitch, Hollister Co., Timberland and Michael Kors. The 600 brand mavens surveyed “said they are tired of several brands and trends that previously were go-to items,” according to the university’s research report.
Doug McMillon president and ceo of Wal-Mart Stores Inc., on a recent visit to China
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Agenda
EDITED BY JEAN E. PALMIERI AND ALEX BADIA
Welcome to the Club
Club Monaco has evolved substantially since its chinos and T-shirt days. By JEAN E. PALMIERI
The fall collection from Club Monaco continues to redefine the brand’s youthful, yet elegant aesthetic.
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WWD.COM
Photograph by RUDOLFO MARTINEZ
Mehas photograph by Danny Kim
J
ohn Mehas has been chief executive officer of Club Monaco for more than 12 years. Surprised? It’s intentional that he has kept a low profile since joining the retailer from The Gap in 2000. “For me, it’s all about the store and what we create, not the personality,” Mehas said during an interview. Although he’s personally elusive, his impact on the 64-unit chain speaks volumes. When he started, Club Monaco was “all chinos and T-shirts,” he said over coffee and a croissant at the Gansevoort Market, one of his favorite New York City haunts. “Now, it’s affordable urban luxury.” The company’s on-trend mix of apparel and accessories, combined with its out-of-the-box merchandising strategies that include coffee shops, bookstores and whiskey bars, is helping Club Monaco put heat on its specialty store competitors. J. Crew last month reported a net loss of $30.6 million in the fourth quarter ended Jan. 31 due in part to slowing sales in women’s wear and increased markdowns. Banana Republic posted flat comparable-store sales during 2014. To be fair, Club Monaco is a fraction of the size of Banana, which has well over 600 stores and sales of more than $2.4 billion, and J. Crew, which has more than 400 stores and sales of $2.6 billion. Plus, ferreting out concrete financial details about Club Monaco is next to impossible. Ralph Lauren Corp., which purchased the retailer for $52.5 million in 1999, is notoriously tight-lipped about the company that was founded in Canada in 1985 by Joe Mimran — who would go on to found fashion retailer Joe Fresh. In Lauren’s 2014 annual report, the only mention of Club Monaco was to give the store count — 119 concession shops in addition to the 64 company-owned stores in North America and Europe — and say that it “designs and markets its own clothing and accessories for men and women, offering key fashion pieces with modern, urban sophistication and a selection of updated classics.” Asked for a comment about the company’s performance and its place within the larger corporation, Christopher H. Peterson, president of Global Brands at Ralph Lauren Corp., said, “Club Monaco product is resonating well with consumers around the world.” He said the business has a very strong position in the U.S., Canada and China. Jackwyn Nemerov, president and chief operating officer of Ralph Lauren Corp., said on the recent fourth-quarter earnings call that Club Monaco is operated as “a separate brand. The front of the house functions distinctly, while the back of the house is linked into [the back-office platform].” Analyst comments about Club Monaco are also rare, except for one report from Wells Fargo Securities in February that said the business had sales of $165 million in 2014 and a solid operating margin rate of 10 percent. The margin figure is lower than Ralph Lauren’s midtier brands (Polo, Lauren, Denim & Supply at 14.9 percent) and lower-end (Chaps at 11 percent), Wells Fargo said, but better than the 5 percent margin generated by its luxury businesses. For Mehas, who declined to discuss financials, Club Monaco’s small size is part of what gives the company an advantage. “We only have 30 stores in America, which is a tiny footprint,” he said. Instead of subscribing to the old-fashioned notion of opening 3,000- to 5,000-square-foot stores in every mall in the country, Club Monaco has chosen a different strategy.
Since opening its first “lifestyle” store in New York’s Flatiron District in 2013, most new stores are street locations in unique or historic locations. They range in size from 500 to 5,000 square feet. For instance, a men’s-only store in a century-old bookstore in Montreal still sells books and has a bakery, and the Southampton, N.Y., unit is merchandised with flea-market finds — all of which are for sale. When the company opens its newest unit on Bloor Street in Toronto this summer, it will create a farmer’s market in the store that will operate year-round. The newly opened Chiltern Street store in London has a café in the rear and is serving American whiskey as well, and a shop in South
“For me, it’s not about the clothes, but the environment and the extensions. All the stores are artisanal and different.” JOHN MEHAS chief executive officer, Club Monaco
Korea will offer the company’s first-ever men’s grooming station. Perhaps its most innovative idea came in February when Club Monaco installed a pop-up boutique inside Noma, a top restaurant in Copenhagen, offering men’s and women’s apparel, accessories, vintage and home pieces, books, coffee and wine. “We’re inspired by architecture, art, photography and food. They all play off of each other,” Mehas said. “And we take a very bespoke approach. We study the design of the buildings and bring them back to what they used to be. “For me, it’s not about the clothes, but the environment and the extensions,” he added. “All the stores are artisanal and different and we partner with the local communities.” That being said, Club Monaco is still first and foremost an apparel retailer, and Mehas works closely with men’s designer Aaron Levine and women’s designer Caroline Belhumeur to ensure the fashion is on target. The retailer also has a program it calls Makers & Muse where it partners with third-party brands such as Lardini, an Italian tailored clothing manufacturer, to bring “the most inspiring product” and “an elevated assortment” to the stores. Other brands that have participated in this series include Lotuff and Allen Edmonds.
John Mehas in one of his favorite spots: the Gansevoort Market in New York City.
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Agenda
Redchurch The London men’s location is in a former gun and rifle shop.
5th Ave. The store is like an elegant New York City apartment.
Noma The pop-up shop in Copenhagen was in a worldclass restaurant.
Montreal This shop is in an historic 100-year-old bookstore.
Prices can be significantly higher on this product. For instance, a Lardini reversible trench retails for $1,000, while a Club Monaco bonded trench will sell for $389. Overall, Mehas described Club Monaco’s aesthetic as “very real — not costumey. It’s how people want to dress today.” He said he believes the men who had embraced Club Monaco for chinos and T-shirts in the early days have grown up and are now buying sportswear and tailored looks to wear to work. “People shop high and low today,” the ceo said. “Mass to couture and everything in between. It’s very mixed.” Rampant price promotions are also not part of the equation.
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“You can’t be inexpensive enough and you can’t win solely on price,” he said. “Where you can win is on creativity, brand DNA and storytelling.” In general, Club Monaco targets a 25-to-40-yearold and its sales are around one-third men’s wear to two-thirds women’s. But Mehas sees men’s as a major growth area. “In some countries, men’s is almost 50 percent of the business,” he said. “And almost 40 percent of the stores we’re opening over the next two years will be men’s stores.” Mehas said beyond men’s, growth plans for the future include expansion in Asia, Europe and North America. “We’re excited about our opportunities in Europe. We just opened our fourth store in London
and we’ll be opening soon in Paris,” he said. E-commerce is also seen as an opportunity. “We’ve made inroads online, but there’s more progress to be made. You’ll see a dramatic difference on the Web over the next year with more storytelling versus just selling clothes.” So where does Mehas see Club Monaco in five years? He shook his head, saying he couldn’t predict the future. “We’re in home, books, coffee, flowers, liquor and haircutting salons. We have third-party representation and an eclectic store model. Five years ago I never would have articulated that, so the opportunity is there to dramatically evolve the brand and take it to the next level through further extension of the lifestyle.” ■ — With contributions from Vicki M. Young
Briefs Q&A: Nick Wooster
Wooster photograph by Dave Tacon; Craig Green runway by Giovanni Giannoni
O Fashion influencer and former Bergdorf Goodman fashion director Nick Wooster was recently in China to promote the launch of his Lardini capsule collection at luxury men’s boutique Strasburgo, first in Beijing’s Parkview Green and then in Shanghai’s Yifeng Galleria. WWD spoke to Wooster at the store in Shanghai as he prepared for a day of meet-and-greets and personalized style consultations. Were you aware of your prominence in Chinese social media? Only insofar as when I was at the airport, Tiananmen Square, in the Forbidden City on the street and people recognized me and asked to take my photo. And I’ve been told that there is a name for me. It’s something to the effect of “fashion uncle.” I’m not quite sure how I feel about that, but I’m going to assume it’s a good thing.
What are your impressions of the local fashion scene? I’ve had the good fortune to have pretty much been around the world, and the surprise that I have for everyone is — it’s kind of the same. What I got to see in Beijing were three major tourist destinations, but in terms of being in Parkview Green in Beijing versus being here in Shanghai, the customers do seem to have the same style as I’ve seen elsewhere.
It was your first time in Beijing. Any highlights? The history, and the scale. I also went to this amazing restaurant called The Temple, which was one of the most unbelievable meals I’ve ever had. Just super beautiful, super well done, super glamorous.
Did you see any discernible trends or patterns, particularly in men’s fashion? The street style guys here look exactly like they would look in Tokyo, London, Brooklyn. They all have the same kind of sneakers, the same kind of backpacks, the same kind of outerwear. That was sort of an eye-opener.
You’ve been to Shanghai once before. Did you see or try anything new this time? Not yet. I’m a terrible guest in a host country because I am so particular about the food. I grew up in Kansas. I like steak. I’m embarrassed, really. I wish I were as adventurous with food as I am with clothes, but sadly, I am not.
Which piece in your collection might do especially well here? The sneakers, because I think sneakers are universal, and it’s also the most accessible. Everybody can pretty much have a piece of the sneaker pie.
RETAIL
Saks Partnering With Pitti O The retailer has teamed up with the Italian Trade Commission on an initiative inspired by the Pitti Uomo
The different faces of Paul Stanley.
— CINDY KUAN
trade show titled Italian Sartorial Style. It will include a 22-page feature shot in Florence for its Father’s Day catalogue, as well as a special gift guide, in-store visuals and windows. “We’ve been faithful Pitti Uomo-goers for years,” said Tom Ott, senior vice president and general merchandise manager of men’s wear for Saks. “And it’s become almost a fashion event itself.” He said the show draws “a bunch of peacocks” who strut around in “cool, hip, contemporary classics in great colors, seasonal fabrics and accessories.” Although Ott admitted that the average guy on the street might not know what Pitti Uomo is, “the right customer does. If you look at blogs, social media and fashion magazines, they’re all referencing Pitti Uomo.” Six windows at the flagship will feature sketches from Yooco Tanimoto, illustrator of the book “Pitti People: Portraits of the Italian Dandy,” which will be available for sale as well. Saks will also cohost an event on June 18 during Pitti in Florence. There’s a charity tie-in: From June 14 to 21, 5 percent of the proceeds from the sale of Saks Fifth Avenue Men’s Collection merchandise will be donated to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
Hot Item Craig Green’s conceptual cottons and deconstructed outerwear fastened with multiple ties that can be transformed into different looks are a hot seller at Dover Street Market in New York. “Craig Green is so talented and is one of our best-selling men’s designers. This spring collection was very soughtafter and these blue pieces sold out in a few days,” said general manager James Gilchrist. — LUIS CAMPUZANO
— JEAN E. PALMIERI
THE CHART
Summertime Stats O Now that the summer has unofficially kicked off, thoughts are naturally turning to beaches, pools — and swimsuits. And while women’s swimwear sales still dwarf men’s, the combined figure for men’s is still substantial: $2.25 billion.
$13.25 billion
Global annual swimwear industry revenue
$15.62
Average price for a men’s bathing suit Boys’ 4%
LABEL LAUNCH
The Next KISS Brand O Paul Stanley, singer and guitarist of KISS, wants to be the next Martha Stewart — sort of. The rocker is partnering with branding firm Epic Rights to develop and launch a lifestyle brand called Paul Stanley: Royals and Rebels. Epic Rights will build the brand through a licensing program that will include men’s apparel and accessories, footwear, food, spirits, home decor, cookware and more. The line will hit stores in fall 2016. As the band sings, “Nothin’ to lose.” — ARIA HUGHES
Girls’ 10%
Swimwear Market Share
Men’s 17% Women’s 70%
SOURCE: NPD Group
Quilted jacket: $1,335 Quilted trouser: $825 Sold at Dover Street Market, New York WWD.COM MAY 2015, No. 4
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BEN LERER MEDIA PEOPLE
When we think of investing in media, we think of investing in people we believe are going to build organizations that create good content.”
By ALEXANDRA STEIGRAD
B
en Lerer is the managing director of venture capital firm Lerer Hippeau Ventures and cofounder and chief executive officer of The Thrillist Media Group. Along with his father, Ken Lerer, who cofounded The Huffington Post, Ben, 33, has made more than 300 investments in some of the buzziest companies in media and retail, including Birchbox, Buzzfeed, BaubleBar, Refinery29, Mic, Warby Parker and Into the Gloss. Lerer launched Thrillist 10 years ago, and acquired men’s wear brand Jack Threads in 2010, turning the lifestyle site into a hybrid e-commerce play. From Thrillists’ headquarters in SoHo, Lerer told WWD that The Thrillist Media Group will likely realize more than $100 million in revenue, with about 75 percent of that coming from commerce and the rest from advertising. What makes a good media investment? What do you look for? For our media investments, we’re early-stage investors, so we’re always first money into a company, seed-stage checks. What that means is that we don’t have a ton of data to make a decision around business performance. We believe that it’s a really good time to invest in media because we’re at a place now where the pipes have been laid in the digital world. The world is smaller, thanks to search and social. Good content can get discovered and can spread quickly. Ten years ago, that wasn’t the case on the Internet. When we think of investing in media, we think of investing in people we believe are going to build organizations that create great content. So you focus on the people behind the company? People are the number-one thing for every sector that we invest in, but specifically for media, you want to invest in people with a vision for what they want to create. That means a focus on a specific audience or a specific category of content. It means somebody who is sensitive to the user’s needs and is customer-centric in the way that they carry themselves and operate. You want some sort of special sauce if you can. You want to think about a business that is better at something than everyone else. What’s an example? Buzzfeed. The secret sauce at Buzzfeed was that they were going to understand how to make content go social better than anybody else, and they had proven that. [Buzzfeed founder] Jonah [Peretti] had proven that at another one of our
38 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
Photographs by STEVE EICHNER
media investments, The Huffington Post. The secret sauce there was the way that they used contributors and bloggers and high-profile people who had real followings to come in and create content, and create that community. They had a strong voice in liberal politics in an important time, which was the first campaign that Obama was running. They really stood for something that established a strong brand and a voice that allowed them to move into all these other verticals. What do you make of the crazy valuations of some of these digital companies? Buzzfeed is valued at $850 million and Vice at more than $2.5 billion. There are a few different ways to look at these businesses — one is the size of the business as it exists today. How much revenue or profit do they have or what does their growth rate look like or what are their margins? Some of those metrics make it difficult to get to the big valuations that you see in the market. On the flip side, I would say, think about these as brands. What do they represent and how do you attribute value there for the ways that the brands will be able to extend themselves into different businesses or be able to grow in the future? I don’t think media is overvalued right now because it’s the early days of advertising dollars coming to digital. When will those ad dollars come online? It’s already happening. The bottom is not going to fall out one day. I think we’re all like: “How is print still holding on?” Brands are slow about how they think about shifting dollars, and then you’ll see big companies make some big decisions at some point. Some big luxury advertiser is going to say that they’re done with print, and then the dominoes will fall. That may not happen for a really long time. Is there a bubble of digital media firms? I don’t know that there’s so many. There’s like 20 leading businesses total — the digital media companies that are doing more than $25 million in advertising revenue digitally — and they are not overlapping in the same category. My dad talks about the comparison to now and what it felt like in the Eighties when you had the move from broadcast to cable, and when you went from a few big networks to vertical cable channels. I think you’re going to see the same thing online, digital destinations, brands that will be built in really important categories. Can companies like The New York Times, Time Inc., Hearst and Condé Nast make the transition to the digital age? Those are all very different cases. I think The New York Times is making that transition. It is still the most important content brand in the world. The biggest problem that The New York Times has is that it still has so much of the overhead that is from a different time. Their challenge is to right-size the cost structure for the digital world, and let the digital dollars catch up over the next five or 10 years. They will probably eventually be able to support the infrastructure that they used to have, but I think The New York Times has done a great job. Who hasn’t done a good job? Time Inc. I hate to say specific brands, but there are certain publications that they own that have done a terrific job digitally. You can find other ones that have done terribly, that while they were the leading print brand in a category, in a digital world they are not relevant. For those traditional guys, they just have to be comfortable with the idea that their print businesses are not going to be there to support them forever. They need to be very serious about investing in new forms of monetization.
“Within a year, revenue from [ Jack Threads] e-commerce was more than revenue from our ad business.” Traditional firms are looking to e-commerce again. Condé Nast is making a big push. How do they succeed this time? I don’t think that the way they are doing it will work. I don’t believe that the way that content and commerce fits today is that magazines make every article or every story that they write shoppable. The solution is more centered around the idea that media companies need to own their biggest advertisers or some of their own advertisers. Media companies need to get into businesses other than content creation and selling ads. Retail is one of the businesses that I think more media companies will begin owning — not necessarily directly integrating retail into the pages of their magazine. That’s the biggest mistake most make.
When you say “owning,” do you mean investing? Or outright owning them — operating them separately — the way a Time Inc. might operate Sports Illustrated and Entertainment Weekly independently of one another. Not all media companies have that kind of capital sitting around. Time Inc. has that capital. Some other companies absolutely have the capital. Some of them can start these companies. Condé Nast has tried to transform Lucky into an e-commerce play, and they are trying something similar with Style.com. These are examples of doing what feels like it could work without necessarily really doing the proper amount of thinking about if they should work. If you were put in charge of Lucky tomorrow, what would you do? The first thing I would do is go to their Web site for the first time in my life, then see if they have a print magazine still, and pick that up for the first time in my life. Then, I would go and see if they own any of their own social handles, and see if they are creating any of their own content. What I would do with any of these businesses is think about what the customer actually wants, and not what the business model theoretically or potentially says it can or should or might be able to be. I’d back up a step and say, “What problem are we solving? What hole are we filling in the customers’ life? What can we do that doesn’t exist that will make this awesome for our target audience?” Not, “Let’s jerry-rig our existing business to squeeze money out of something.” I can say this because I’ve been guilty of jerry-rigging and corner-cutting and everything that I think a lot of these traditional media companies are guilty of. It’s a short-term fix that doesn’t address a long-term problem, which is that a lot of these traditional companies own brands that used to create relevant content that now ride on the coattails of what they used to do [well]. They don’t actually know how to talk to modern consumers in the platforms and places that modern consumers communicate. When you acquired Jack Threads, how long did it take for e-commerce revenue to overtake ad revenue? It happened right away. Within a year, revenue from e-commerce was more than revenue from our ad business. What traditional or digital media companies are you impressed with that you aren’t invested in? Scripps is doing a really good job in the way that they kicked categories of content that have real communities around them and deep areas of interest. They’ve created strong brands that have multiplatform destinations, and have elegantly spanned content and commerce in a way I haven’t seen other traditional media companies do necessarily. For digital, I really like Brian Sugar’s business at Pop Sugar. He’s really built monetization that isn’t only reliant on brand advertising, but that spans into commerce. What about that digital juggernaut, Vice. Is it expanding too fast? They are the prettiest girl at the party and money just shows up all day long. Everybody says this about Vice, that they are better at building relationships with marketers than consumers right now; that’s not to say they don’t have great relationships with consumers, they are just really good at selling ads. They’ve built a cool brand at Vice. They’ve built something that feels really big and I’m sure it feels bigger than it is, but perception is reality. ■ WWD.COM MAY 2015, No. 4
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TULA | VITA LIBERATA | WEN
Lara Stone, Cyril Chapuy, Doutzen Kroes, Eva Longoria, Natasha Poly and Isabeli Fontana.
MON-THURS MAY 18-21
Cannes Film Festival
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One Last Party Before ‘Au Revoir!’ WWD.COM MAY 2015, No. 4
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Kendall Jenner in Calvin Klein Collection.
Xavier Dolan
Last Dance
Cannes closed with star-studded parties by amfAR, Chanel and Calvin Klein. Photographs by Stéphane Feugère
Jake Gyllenhaal with Emily Blunt in Calvin Klein Collection.
Karl Lagerfeld
At Cannes, all roads eventually lead to Antibes. As the film festival wound down on Thursday night, Hollywood royalty, fashion designers, music stars and more Victoria’s Secret models than you can count on one hand conga-lined to the Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc for amfAR’s annual Cinema Against AIDS gala. It’s there you would have found Leonardo DiCaprio, Marion Cotillard, Jake Gyllenhaal, Sienna Miller, Tom Ford, David Gandy and Marisa Berenson bidding on pricey art, gawking at some of the world’s most famous models in a fashion show organized by Carine Roitfeld, or taking in performances from acts as varied as Mary J. Blige and Andrea Bocelli. Robin Thicke battled it out with Eva Longoria for a Warhol — she won — while others were left to MAY 18-21
Gigi Hadid in Tom Ford.
42 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
watch helplessly as a Koons sculpture climbed in price in increments of a million euros. (The gala eventually raised 30 million euros, or $33.6 million, for HIV and AIDS research.) “I always say, ‘When you’re in this room you have to look good and do good,’” said amfAR chairman Kenneth Cole. Though mainly, it didn’t need to be stressed, look good. The night before, it was Karl Lagerfeld who ruled the Côte d’Azur, holding court, as he does every year, at Chanel and Vanity Fair’s dinner at Chez Tétou. He was surrounded by his kind of crowd — Gyllenhaal, Cara Delevingne, Annie Clark of St. Vincent, Juliette Lewis, Julie Gayet and Xavier Dolan. “Vanity Fair invites only people I like. So I’m not lost in the middle of nowhere,” Lagerfeld said. Meanwhile, with women’s ►
Lara Lieto and Adrien Brody
Dita Von Teese in Ulyana Sergeenko with Peter Brant Jr.
Chris Tucker and Petra Nemcova
Rita Ora in Marchesa with Sienna Miller in Ralph Lauren Collection.
Toni Garrn in Elie Saab.
Joséphine de La Baume and Mark Ronson
Anja Rubik with Dean and Dan Caten.
empowerment the unexpected cause célèbre of the festival, the likes of Miller, Emily Blunt, Rachel Weisz, Isabelle Huppert and Mélanie Laurent took center stage at Calvin Klein’s splashy party on Monday night at a hilltop villa in Cannes. “Women are being much more recognized.…I think little by little, a lot of people are getting behind it and voices are getting heard,” Francisco Costa said. Judging from the strong leading ladies in attendance, the fairer sex is doing just fine. Blunt was at the festival with “Sicario,” where she
plays an FBI agent. “She packs a gun. She’s not sitting at a desk. She’s on a SWAT team, you know? She’s the real deal,” the actress said. A surprising guest was Natalia Vodianova, who 10 years after her debut as the face of Euphoria is now back with the campaign. “Actually, I look younger. It’s really funny,” the model said. Funny, indeed. In a room full of longtime Professionally Beautiful People, everyone would say the same thing — about themselves. — PAULINA SZMYDKE AND JOELLE DIDERICH
Mélanie Laurent and Rachel Weisz in Calvin Klein Collection.
Tom Ford and Carine Roitfeld
WWD.COM MAY 2015, No. 4
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Arts & Culture
“You don’t sugarcoat anything. If anything, it’s the opposite.” — Sophie Elgort to her father.
Sophie Elgort with her father in 1989, here, and in 2015, below.
Daddy & Me Sophie Elgort is following in dad Arthur’s footsteps behind the camera. Inside Arthur Elgort’s whitewashed studio in SoHo, Sophie, his only daughter and eldest child, is setting up a camera tripod. “Where’d you get that?” he wonders aloud. “It’s yours!” trills the baby-faced blonde. It’s safe to say she knows her way around. “She’s been here since she was born,” he says. From kindergarten on, Sophie would get dropped off after school. “Or when I didn’t go to school and played hooky,” she deadpans. It was also here that her training, in a sense, began, as she played dress up with the famous models in the studio and trailed the man she knew as “dad” but fashion knew as one of its great photographers. And “we would practice,” the proud father beams. Eventually, Sophie, now 29, turned those hours of preparation into a profession, and she’s become a photographer in her own right. In the coming weeks, she’s raising the stakes by
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launching a lifestyle Web site. “I think you have to approach it differently,” she says of the project. “You can’t only do photos anymore. Now it’s, like, OK, we want to shoot you shooting. We want to shoot the behind the scenes. We want to make sure you Instagram.” On a recent afternoon, father and daughter are at the sun-filled studio, reminiscing about past photo shoots with the original supes (“No one thought [Christy Turlington] was good,” remembers Arthur. “Somebody at Ford Agency said, ‘We have much better girls in here.’” ) and Sophie’s childhood. Growing up, instead of cereal boxes, cameras lined the kitchen table, and the family — which includes brothers Ansel, the actor, and Warren, a filmmaker, and mom Grethe Barrett Holby — would often snap portraits before sitting down to eat.
“I would make my friends dress up. And my brothers, I’d dress them up like girls,” she says. She didn’t immediately fall into photography. At Brown University, she registered as premed before eventually swiveling back to her adolescent calling. “In college I got nervous about not having a path. But then I got back to New York and saw my parents doing what they loved and I went, ‘You know what? I don’t have to do this,’” she says. She picked up the camera again at 23, and landed professional jobs — her last name probably helped — shooting for brands such as Alice + Olivia during New York Fashion Week, as well as Topshop, Theory, Bloomingdale’s and vintage clothing line Aliomi, which was started by a group of her high school friends. “To tell you the truth, they were good,” Arthur says of those early images. “[If not] I would have said, don’t be a photographer.” Sophie laughs. She knows her dad well. “You don’t sugarcoat anything,” she tells him. “If anything, it’s the opposite.” After she launched a Web site to showcase her portfolio in 2010, interest in her own work, separate from her father’s, grew. “I get all these questions on my social media from aspiring young photographers or designers,” she says. “Everything from the amateur who wants to know what type of camera they should buy for their trip to China to aspiring young photographers who are in high school and ask how I got started.” When the site relaunches, it will carry more frequent posts, answers to fans’ questions as well as entries on Elgort’s travels and style. “I remember being that age and I was lucky enough to have access to the industry, so I could be on shoots and meet with different editors and talk to them about how things were going and ask my questions — a lot of people don’t have that opportunity,” she says. Or, needless to say, a father who is an established photographer. “So it’s really nice to give that to people who wouldn’t get it otherwise. You never know who’s going to be the next great person or designer or artist.” In setting up the site, she’s following in the footsteps of her father, who was always her greatest cheerleader and mentor. “He always said do something that you really loved to do,” she says, looking at Arthur. “You always said that if you take one good picture every day, at the end of the week you have seven good pictures.” Hearing this, Arthur lights up. He seems to have an idea. “I always take pictures,” he says, mischievously. “I haven’t taken one yet today….” Sophie takes the lead in setting up a father-daughter self-portrait. “What do you think?” she asks dad. Arthur just looks at her and shrugs. “You’re the photographer,” he says. ■
1989 and present-day self-portrait photographs courtesy of Arthur Elgort studio
BY ALLY BETKER
Report Card
Julia Sizzles, Dave Puzzles
With looks ranging from soigné star (George) to pageant princess (Paris), here are the hits and misses of the week.
D Her hair is effortless and sexy.
Rockwell photograph by Dustin Harris/Getty Images; Clooney by Stuart C. Wilson/Getty Images; Grenier by Gustavo Caballero/Getty Images; Letterman by Ron Asadorian/Splash News/Corbis; Hilton by Ian Gavan/Getty Images; Baldwin by Ian Gavan/Getty Images; Vikander by Ian Gavan/Getty Images; Louis-Dreyfus by John Lamparksi/Getty Images
DThis is a fit that she knows works for her. The neckline is seductive but tasteful and the lace-up detail and shoulder slits add an edge. The mini peplum gives it a slight flirtiness.
DGray is a refreshingly offbeat choice for a manicure-pedicure and complements the outfit’s vibe.
A
Julia Louis-Dreyfus
DHe channels vintage movie star like no one else. His natural wrinkles and gray hair exude silver fox status and play up his everpresent charisma.
DHis dark gray suit is very Cary Grant in “Charade.” He’s timeless, though a bit boring, but the tonal shirt infuses youthfulness and modernity into the traditional look. DThe subtle black wingtip worn with the same color belt continues to show that although he is not a fashion risktaker, he knows his style basics.
A-
George Clooney
DWe’ll miss Dave, but we won’t miss this outfit. DHis instinct to mix a rock-band T-shirt and a tuxedo blazer is right, but the execution is off, especially for a man of his maturity. The slouchy creamcolored blazer paired with the light yellow T-shirt and baggy striped fivepocket pants make him look more like his pal Bill Murray. He should leave that look to him. DThere’s nothing wrong with the sneakers, but a simple white pair would have been better. These are tricked-out orthopedics.
D
David Letterman
DOn its own, her beauty look is nice. Makeup is fresh; the braided updo shows off her cool ear cuff, etc. But with the outfit, she could be mistaken for one of Khaleesi’s handmaidens. DLove this modified crop top. It’s on trend, not too cropped and flatters her upper body. The shoulder embellishment is interesting. It’s feminine but still tough. DWe would’ve styled this with flats (forbidden at Cannes). Guess she’s not as badass as the outfit suggests.
B-
Alicia Vikander
DThe darker shade is a plus, but the makeup is too shiny. She needs some mattifying face powder. DIs it a Frederick’s of Hollywood or a “Like a Virgin” homage? The tulle looks cheap and it’s really wrinkled. Maybe her steamer broke? The naked dress thing needs to die and if this look doesn’t put a nail in that coffin, we don’t know what will.
DThe shoes could not be more tacky. They almost upstage the dress in that regard.
FAIL Hailey Baldwin DHe needs to minimize the volume of his hair. It might help balance his head-body ratio. But nice teeth. DUntil he hits the gym and adds some muscle, he should opt for anything with shoulder pads. And this shirt is not meant to be worn untucked. Dude, we can read the lot number. If he forces us to see this, make sure he rolls up the sleeves and buys a steamer. D The skinny black jeans fit him well and reinforce the casualness of his “Entourage” character.
C-
Adrian Grenier
D The “Poltergeist” actor seems spooked about the remake. Some conditioner and grooming cream would help with the frizzy mess. The heavy plastic frames do wonders for the look, but they’re not enough to minimize the unkempt beard and hair. DThe gray shadowstriped suit fits him well, but he could do with a shorter sleeve. A tonal gray shirt would elevate the ensemble. DThe heavy pant crease elongates his 5-foot, 9-inch silhouette and keeps the look sharp.
B-
Sam Rockwell
D The hair is an ordeal. Pageant contestant meets mermaid and she should have tossed half the extensions overboard.
DThe bling is too much — diamonds are a girl’s best frenemy in this case. DVery “Under the Sea” dress choice, too. It’s cheesy, but at least she’s bucking the “nude” trend with a lined garment.
D-
Paris Hilton
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FAIRCHILD MEDIA
PHOTOGRAPHS BY
Sasha Maslov SITTINGS EDITOR
Alex Badia
C F DA FA S H I O N AWA R D S
WWD asked the nominees: “What do you feel distinguished your work this year?”
The Nominees Womenswear Designer of the Year JOSEPH ALTUZARRA MARC JACOBS MICHAEL KORS JACK MCCOLLOUGH & LAZARO HERNANDEZ, Proenza Schouler ASHLEY OLSEN & MARY-KATE OLSEN, The Row
Menswear Designer of the Year DAO-YI CHOW & MAXWELL OSBORNE, Public School MARCUS WAINWRIGHT & DAVID NEVILLE, Rag & Bone THOM BROWNE TIM COPPENS TOM FORD
Accessories Designer of the Year ALEXANDER WANG IRENE NEUWIRTH JACK MCCOLLOUGH & LAZARO HERNANDEZ, Proenza Schouler TABITHA SIMMONS ASHLEY OLSEN & MARY-KATE OLSEN, The Row
Swarovski Award for Womenswear DAO-YI CHOW & MAXWELL OSBORNE, Public School ROSIE ASSOULIN RYAN ROCHE
Swarovski Award for Menswear SHANE OLIVER, Hood By Air ALEX, MATTHEW AND SAMANTHA ORLEY, Orley SHIMON AND ARIEL OVADIA, Ovadia & Sons
Swarovski Award for Accessory Design EVA FEHREN RACHEL MANSUR & FLORIAN GAVRIEL, Mansur Gavriel PAUL ANDREW
The Honorees Geoffrey Beene Lifetime Achievement Award BETSEY JOHNSON
International Award MARIA GRAZIA CHIURI & PIERPAOLO PICCIOLI, Valentino
The Founders Award in Honor of Eleanor Lambert MILLARD “MICKEY” DREXLER
The Media Award in Honor of Eugenia Sheppard INSTAGRAM
Fashion Icon Award PHARRELL WILLIAMS WWD.COM MONTH 2015, No.1tk
00
marcjacobs.com
MARC JACOBS ¬ WOMENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
THE
“What distinguished my work this year? I have no idea.”
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MICHAEL KORS ¬ WOMENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
NOMINEES
“This year’s collections were very me. Not that I’m planning on wearing them, but I think we managed to strike this yin and yang balance. Personally, I’m the most casual person, but at the same time the most extravagant. I’m pragmatic, but I’m indulgent. I think it came out in the collections.”
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JACK McCOLLOUGH & LAZARO HERNANDEZ for Proenza Schouler
¬ WOMENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR ¬ ACCESSORY DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“Especially with this last season, we’re starting to approach our creative process differently and trying to be a little less rigid with it. In the past, we built out groups and created this specific run of show. What you saw in the drawings was exactly what you’d see in the show. We’re trying to be a bit freer and let things evolve in the fittings — cutting and slashing in the fittings, starting with a basic double-breasted coat, cutting into it and slicing up the sides, creating all these vents and flaps. Being a little looser and having more freedom in the process will, I think, work to our advantage.” — Jack McCollough on ready-to-wear “We brought onboard a whole new accessories team a year-and-a-half ago, maybe. I think this year we really saw the fruits of their labor, specifically with shoes — that’s been a runaway success. Our espadrilles are sold out now, so that made a big splash on the retail level. On the show level, the shoes have sold well. For the first time, we have our own dedicated shoe space at Barneys, next to Louboutin. So we’re a proper shoe business now.” — Lazaro Hernandez on accessories
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JOSEPH ALTUZARRA ¬ WOMENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“Both collections were evolutions of spring. I was inspired by ‘Rosemary’s Baby,’ and the idea of very saccharine beauty — very sweet and naïve, very feminine. Hence, all the gingham and flowers. It was inspired by the idea of American beauty epitomized by Grace Kelly — so pristine, so pure and perfect it’s almost a bit perverse….The idea of taking the clothes that would fit that persona and starting to dishevel them and slice and reveal skin and unravel the perfection. “For fall, I became interested in the Truman Capote swans, especially Gloria Vanderbilt. Again, that idea of American beauty. I wanted to treat that era, which is very Seventies but neo-Victorian, in a way that felt modern. We did a lot more fabric development than in the past with velvet devorés and lacquered laces. And the bags [which launched for fall] — I started working on them a year before they hit the runway and it got me thinking about functionality. It sort of translated to the clothes, not in obvious ways, but I was much more aware of the end use of the garment.”
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MARY-KATE OLSEN & ASHLEY OLSEN for The Row
¬ WOMENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR ¬ ACCESSORY DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“I like to think that we’re nominated for our consistency. They were two very different seasons with two different feelings. The [show] locations had a lot to do with how the story was told. Spring started with this idea of raw silks and romanticism and a more natural approach. The silhouette was fuller, more skirts, more dresses. Our goal is for someone to have an emotional reaction either way. From the music and the way the fabric moved to the hair, the makeup, the sound — just to play with all of your senses. You had fans on your seat because it was warm; the tea that you were drinking. “Fall was sort of the ultimate New York moment in the Seagram Building. I don’t know how this happened because [our show is] always on a Monday, but it was also a holiday so we had the entire building to ourselves.” — Mary-Kate Olsen
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TOM FORD ¬ MENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“I think the important thing as a designer is to always react with one’s intuition. So when I have collections that are particularly strong, that consumers and the press respond to in a positive way, I feel proud that my instincts were right. It is always important to try to anticipate what the customer will want and to create that product before they even realize that they need it. I think I did that these past few seasons with my men’s collections. They felt focused, and I am very proud of them.”
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THOM BROWNE ¬ MENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“It’s very rewarding just to know that we are being recognized, that we are all doing our own thing that differentiates each other.”
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DAO-YI CHOW & MAXWELL OSBORNE
for Public School ¬ MENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR ¬ SWAROVSKI AWARD FOR WOMENSWEAR
“The work was more personal, not only about the idea of what Public School is, but specific trips down memory lane. We referenced our adolescence a lot, times that really helped shape who we are today.”
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TIM COPPENS ¬ MENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“We have established a consistent signature athletic style — streamlined, sporty, directional and cool.”
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DAVID NEVILLE & MARCUS WAINWRIGHT for Rag & Bone
¬ MENSWEAR DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“We’ve been pushing our boundaries, from the fabrics to the finishes, and [with] creative initiatives in how we present our collections; from the photography series to our concept film with Mikhail Baryshnikov and Lil Buck. We always have been big proponents of individualism, so it’s important to show that our clothing can be worn by any guy and look great.” — Marcus Wainwright, founder and managing partner “From spring to fall, there’s been a cohesive thread throughout, with a focus on the cuts, right down to the color palettes. These aren’t buy-now-and-wear-now pieces, they’re buy-now-and-wear-forever pieces that any guy would want.” — David Neville, managing partner
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IRENE NEUWIRTH ¬ ACCESSORY DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“[Opening my first store] really allowed me to push myself as a designer. I focused on taking my work to the next level and gave myself more freedom creatively. I took more risks in the designs, incorporating signature stones like opal and chrysoprase but putting more emphasis on finer stones like sapphires, emeralds, tanzanite and tourmalines.”
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FA S T E R . F U R T H E R . F R E E R .
TABITHA SIMMONS ¬ ACCESSORY DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“The expansion of my line, specifically to my wholesale business, plus building the team by bringing on a ceo, helped me to realize goals of a larger price range, more core styles and stronger deliveries. Key to all this growth is the strength of the team and its belief in the brand, which remains solidly based in a timeless approach to quality design. Whether I win or not, participating is still like getting a ribbon in the race.”
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ALEXANDER WANG ¬ ACCESSORY DESIGNER OF THE YEAR
“Every season, accessories are usually the first to be designed. Function and ease are important elements. However, for fall, eccentricity was definitely on my mind. I explored the aesthetics of certain subcultures, specifically the hard-edge sensibility of goth and heavy metal, both playing a literal and abstract role. “For spring, sneakers and sneaker culture [were the] starting point. Opposing the notion of dressing down, the collection uses popular sneaker iconography, materials and graphics to create sculpted silhouettes. Handbags are illustrated with custom paneling, lace stitching, toe boxes, basketball mesh and ‘air bubble’ outsoles, while footwear digresses the sneaker references. Footwear strips down all structural facets, giving skeletal and skewed proportions.” WWD.COM MONTH 2015, No.1tk
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Photograph Robin Broadbent SWAROVSKIGROUP.COM
T H E S WA R OV S K I N O M I N E E S
Rosie Assoulin
Rachel Mansur and Floriana Gavriel, for Mansur Gavriel
¬ SWAROVSKI AWARD FOR WOMENSWEAR
¬ SWAROVSKI AWARD FOR ACCESSORY DESIGN
“For spring, we kept looking back at works by Georgia O’Keeffe and sculptor Betty Woodman and worked with a lot of hats and hat materials, and then worked those materials into garments like our straw tops and skirt. For fall, we played with shapes and scale and the idea of lightness and weight. We looked at different architectural inspirations and organic shapes and tried to meld those together using tailoring and draping.”
“From the beginning, our [goal] was the idea of high-quality materials and an accessible price point. We pride ourselves on the fact that all materials are from Italy, the bags are made in Italy, every part of production is from Italy. We always aim to go for the most luxurious and interesting material. The leather [and] canvas we use are really special — we feel distinct in the contemporary world. For the first time, we have the internal structure in place, so we have more opportunity to expand our offering.” — RACHEL MANSUR
Alex, Matthew and Samantha Orley, for Orley
Ryan Roche
¬ SWAROVSKI AWARD FOR MENSWEAR
¬ SWAROVSKI AWARD FOR WOMENSWEAR
“We have achieved a lot this year. We pushed the technical aspects of our collection — custom yarn developments and specialized fabrics — that helped us build on the aesthetic that we’ve become known for in an individualized way. Being recognized in the past year by the Vogue Fashion Fund, as well as the LVMH Prize and now the Swarovski Award nomination, has all been really validating.”
“I’m interested in creating modern, minimal, feminine clothes for women. Although I was so eager to leave where I grew up — Idaho — Idaho can be beautiful, all the space. I think that’s something I always look back to and am drawn to now, pairing [the look] back and creating the perfect essence of something. The last two seasons have been a representation of me doing that. There’s restraint, but never without luxe and super beauty.”
Paul Andrew
Shayne Oliver, for Hood by Air
¬ SWAROVSKI AWARD FOR ACCESSORY DESIGN
¬ SWAROVSKI AWARD FOR MENSWEAR
“Winning this year’s Vogue Fashion Fund award has led to more brand awareness, exclusive styles for retailers, better sell-through at retail and, strangely, to being recognized on the street. I took my first trip to Asia this year and…being recognized on the street by passersby in such a faraway place was exciting and surreal, and also humbling.”
“This year, more than ever, was about being international. It started a new discussion for us, which became a leading force in the design process. Working, traveling and showing collections abroad opened my eyes to how people engage with fashion and the brand.”
Eva Fehren
Shimon and Ariel Ovadia, for Ovadia & Sons
¬ SWAROVSKI AWARD FOR ACCESSORY DESIGN
¬ SWAROVSKI AWARD FOR MENSWEAR
“[What distinguished my work was] my elaborate presentation of models’ body parts protruding through a mesh wall bedecked in my designs during New York Fashion Week in September. I also launched Eva Fehren White, a collection for the modern bride. I still have much to learn in order to establish longevity, but at the very least, this past year has given me the opportunity to reflect on my brand identity and business strategy and push my creative process beyond my comfort zone.”
“The brand evolved and we pushed the collections in a fresh, new direction that represents what’s exciting in American men’s wear.”
BETSEY JOHNSON ¬ GEOFFREY BEENE LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
THE
It’s no surprise that in tracking down Betsey Johnson for a comment on her Lifetime Achievement Award, one finds her in a fitting for the dress she plans to wear to the CFDA’s gala. Johnson’s main concern is that it be fit for her famous cartwheel. “I really need to do my cartwheel,” she says. “I haven’t done it in a long time, but hopefully it’ll be like magic.” Everyone knows Johnson’s runway acrobatics, but in reflecting on 50 years in fashion, she hopes her lasting impression is as “a friendly girl next door, girlfriend, up-close-and-personal with my fans,” says Johnson, 72. With this award, “I can die and go to heaven.” “I’ve just had the best life with my career. My career has held my life together, inspired my life and kept me extremely happy. The only other person that went a little beyond making me that happy — or a lot beyond — is my daughter, Lulu.” — Jessica Iredale
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HONOREES
MARIA GRAZIA CHIURI & PIERPAOLO PICCIOLI
Valentino
¬ INTERNATIONAL AWARD
“An Oscar for best director seemed more reachable to me,” says Pierpaolo Piccioli. “It was entirely unexpected and had not ever been a goal.” As creative directors of Valentino since 2008, Piccioli and Maria Grazia Chiuri have renewed the brand and added their own romantic style with an edge. “When we started as artistic directors, [we opted] for a concept of grace and beauty, more discreet and modest,” says Chiuri. “At first this was criticized, as it was far from the glamorous origins of the brand, but we feel we have enhanced the craftsmanship. There are no rules to be beautiful and elegant. This is another point of view.” Led by chief executive officer Stefano Sassi and under the ownership of Qatar-based Mayhoola for Investments, Chiuri and Piccioli have helped to more than double sales since 2010, to 664 million euros, or $883.1 million. — Luisa Zargani WWD.COM MONTH 2015, No.1tk
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MILLARD “MICKEY” DREXLER ¬ FOUNDER’S AWARD IN HONOR OF ELEANOR LAMBERT
In fashion retailing, there’s no one more outspoken, or as recognized as a true merchant prince, than Millard “Mickey” Drexler, chairman and chief executive officer of J. Crew Group. Known for handpicking styles and ignoring demographic data in favor of one-on-one interaction with customers, Drexler has proven himself adept at both building businesses and turning them around when needed. He reinvented J. Crew from a cultlike preppy catalogue into an international, multichannel phenomenon. He has Madewell on a roll, while the J. Crew brand is undergoing a fashion fix. His philosophy of management: Create offices with no walls, think small, have products and people that embody the “It” factor and regularly visit selling floors to fix what’s wrong or improve what’s not. Drexler, 70, spent 18 years at Gap Inc., where he became ceo in 1995 and catapulted the company from $400 million to $14 billion in sales and launched Old Navy, before getting shown the door in fall 2002. He joined J. Crew in January 2003, and launched Madewell in fall 2006. “There are very few companies today that put the integrity of their product first and force themselves to be innovative and creative to exceed their customer expectations,” Drexler said at the January 2013 WWD CEO Summit. “It starts and ends with the product and the team that makes those products. Too many people overlook the importance of beautiful product and the fact that creativity drives growth in any business, not just fashion.” — David Moin
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FA S T E R . F U R T H E R . F R E E R .
THE CFDA HONOREES
PHARRELL WILLIAMS ¬ FASHION ICON AWARD
Pharrell Williams wears many (oversize) hats. The latest of which will be an official inductee into the innermost sanctum of American fashion, when he receives the CFDA’s 2015 Fashion Icon Award. “I suppose it’s all been a dream, it’s felt like a dream this whole entire time. That’s as close as I can come to the reality of it,” he says of the honor. “I suppose the recognition is never something that I ever expected. It’s really hard to react to it in any other way besides with gratitude.” The music mogul inched his way into the embraces of the industry over the years via his ever-evolving, at times daring, sartorial prowess supplemented by a panoply of design collaborations: developing jeans for G-Star Raw, a capsule for Moncler, the Adidas range and a lineup for Uniqlo among them. Of his collaborations, he notes: “Conversations with designers are much like most other people. The last thing they want to do is talk to you about fashion. You end up talking about other things and that’s why those conversations are so interesting. It’s cool to find the parallels between a person’s conversation and their work when they are not talking about their work. Everybody is still a human being. You’ll always find differences and similarities between groups of people. The fashion industry is no different than the music industry…at least for me. Wink.” — Taylor Harris
CFDA SCHOLARSHIPS Designer nominees won’t be the only ones waiting for their crowning moments at this year’s CFDA Awards. Three students in the crowd will earn honors when the Council’s Steven Kolb reveals this year’s scholarship winners. Sanglim Lee will be awarded the CFDA/Teen Vogue Scholarship, in partnership with Target, Noa Loewald Hu the Liz Claiborne Design Scholarship and Heather Rhee the Geoffrey Beene Design Scholarship. Schools were allowed to nominate up to three full-time students for the scholarships. Next year marks the program’s 20th anniversary; the CFDA Scholarship Program has donated $1.4 million to date. Jack McCollough, Chris Benz, Peter Som, Brandon Sun and Michelle Ochs are among the designers to have benefited from CFDA scholarships. Many other former scholarship winners now hold top positions in the industry’s leading companies, according to the CFDA executive editor Lisa Smilor. With that in mind, a “Where Are They Now…” series focused on the beneficiaries of these scholarships will bow in 2016. “It is extremely gratifying to have a hand in identifying future ‘stars’ at such an early stage in their career,” Smilor says. “With the rising cost of tuition and increased enrollments across the board, each scholarship is very competitive.” Kolb will also clue in the crowd to the new Eileen Fisher Social Innovator Award, though no winner will be announced. — Rosemary Feitelberg
INSTAGRAM ¬ MEDIA AWARD IN HONOR OF EUGENIA SHEPPARD
@caradelevingne y #RIHunion #MetBall
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“The Instagram community has opened a window into fashion that transports us to the most interesting moments in fashion,” says Kevin Systrom, cofounder of Instagram. The platform has become the unofficial social network for the industry, with millions of users scrolling through their feeds to see what people were wearing at the Met Ball, Coachella, the Cannes Film Festival and more. This marks the first time a company — not a person — has received this award. “With a community made up of makeup artists, emerging designers, models and iconic fashion houses, the world has more access to fashion than ever before,” Systrom adds. “We hope to inspire and help everyone find their visual voice, and thanks to the fashion world, Instagram has been placed at the center of this revolution.” — Rachel Strugatz
THE COUNCIL OF FASHION DESIGNERS OF AMERICA AND THE CFDA FOUNDATION INC. B OA R D O F D I R E C T O R S DIANE VON FURSTENBERG President MICHAEL KORS Vice President
MARCUS WAINWRIGHT Vice President
MIMI SO Treasurer
VERA WANG Secretary
B OA R D M E M B E R S TORY BURCH GEORGINA CHAPMAN PHILIP CRANGI PRABAL GURUNG STAN HERMAN LAZARO HERNANDEZ TOMMY HILFIGER CAROLE HOCHMAN MARC JACOBS NORMA KAMALI REED KRAKOFF DEREK LAM RALPH LAUREN DEBORAH LLOYD JENNA LYONS JACK MCCOLLOUGH ASHLEY OLSEN TRACY REESE KARA ROSS ITALO ZUCCHELLI
MEMBERSHIP Amsale Aberra Reem Acra Alexa Adams Adolfo Babi Ahluwalia Sachin Ahluwalia Waris Ahluwalia Steven Alan Marc Alary Simon Alcantara Fred Allard Linda Allard Joseph Altuzarra Carolina Amato Ron Anderson Miho Aoki Greg Armas Nak Armstrong Brian Atwood Lisa Axelson Lubov Azria Max Azria Yigal Azrouël Mark Badgley Linda Balti Jeffrey Banks Leigh Bantivoglio Jhane Barnes John Bartlett Victoria Bartlett Gaby Basora Dennis Basso Michael Bastian Shane Baum Bradley Bayou Veronica Miele Beard Veronica Swanson Beard Erin Beatty Susan Beischel Stacey Bendet Richard Bengtsson Magda Berliner Coomi Bhasin Alexandre Birman Alexis Bittar Kenneth Bonavitacola Sully Bonnelly Eddie Borgo Monica Botkier Marc Bouwer Barry Bricken Thom Browne Dana Buchman Andrew Buckler Sophie Buhai Ben Burkman Doug Burkman Stephen Burrows Anthony Camargo Carlos Campos Kevin Carrigan Liliana Casabal Edmundo Castillo Kristy Caylor Jean-Michel Cazabat Salvatore Cesarani Richard Chai Greg Chait Amy Chan Natalie Chanin Kip Chapelle Ron Chereskin Wenlan Chia Susie Cho Dao-Yi Chow David Chu Eva Chun Chow Doo-Ri Chung
Patricia Clyne Peter Cohen Kenneth Cole Michael Colovos Nicole Colovos Sean Combs Rachel Comey Martin Cooper Tim Coppens Anna Corinna Sellinger Maria Cornejo Esteban Cortazar Francisco Costa Victor Costa Jeffrey Costello Erica Courtney Steven Cox Keren Craig Angela Cummings Emily Current Carly Cushnie Sandy Dalal Robert Danes Mark Davis Ruthie Davis Donald Deal Louis Dell’Olio Pamela Dennis Lyn Devon Kathryn Dianos Rachel Dooley Keanan Duffty Randolph Duke Stephen Dweck Marc Ecko Libby Edelman Sam Edelman Lola Ehrlich Mark Eisen Meritt Elliott Karen Erickson Patrik Ervell George Esquivel Steve Fabrikant Pina Ferlisi Luis Fernandez Erin Fetherston Andrew Fezza Cheryl Finnegan Eileen Fisher Jennifer Fisher Dana Foley Tom Ford Istvan Francer Isaac Franco R. Scott French Shane Gabier James Galanos Judy Geib Nancy Geist Robert Geller Geri Gerard Gai Gherardi Tess Giberson Flora Gill Justin Giunta Adriano Goldschmied Gary Graham Nick Graham Rogan Gregory Henry Grethel Ulrich Grimm Joy Gryson George Gublo
Scott Hahn Jeff Halmos Douglas Hannant Cathy Hardwick Karen Harman Dean Harris Johnson Hartig Sylvia Heisel Joan Helpern Carolina Herrera Mara Hoffman Swaim Hutson Sang A Im-Propp Alejandro Ingelmo Henry Jacobson Eric Javits Lisa Jenks Betsey Johnson Ulla Johnson Alexander Julian Gemma Kahng Donna Karan Jen Kao Kasper Ken Kaufman Jenni Kayne Shaun Kearney Liya Kebede Anthony Keegan Rod Keenan Pat Kerr Naeem Khan Sharon Khazzam Barry Kieselstein-Cord Eugenia Kim Adam Kimmel Calvin Klein Monica Rich Kosann Fiona Kotur Marin Grant Krajecki Michel Kramer-Metraux Regina Kravitz Devi Kroell Nikki Kule Christopher Kunz Nicholas Kunz Blake Kuwahara Steven Lagos Richard Lambertson Adrienne Landau Liz Lange Eunice Lee Jussara Lee Larry Leight Nanette Lepore Michael Leva Natalie Levy Monique Lhuillier Andrea Lieberman Phillip Lim Johan Lindeberg Marcella Lindeberg Adam Lippes Elizabeth Locke Dana Lorenz Nili Lotan Pamela Love Tina Lutz Sarah Lytvinenko Victor Lytvinenko
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WWD.COM MAY 2015, No. 4
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2015 CFDA FASHION AWARDS
IN COLLABORATION WITH SWAROVSKI M O N D A Y, J U N E 1 , 2 0 1 5 ALICE TULLY HALL AT LINCOLN CENTER The Council of Fashion Designers of America would like to thank Swarovski for its collaboration on the 2015 CFDA Fashion Awards. The 2015 CFDA Fashion Awards will be digitally Webcast on Tuesday, June 2 on CFDA.com. IN ADDITION, THE CFDA ACKNOWLEDGES THE FOLLOWING COMPANIES:
SPONSORS
Ernst & Young LLP, Official Voting Firm Google Play, Official Partner Lexus, Official Automotive Sponsor MAC Cosmetics, Official Beauty Sponsor Maestro Dobel, Official Spirit Sponsor Veuve Clicquot, Official Champagne Partner Refinery29, cohost of the official after party
PAT R O N S
American Express Coach Condé Nast DVF Studio LLC Hudson’s Bay Co./Saks Fifth Avenue/Lord & Taylor IMG Fashion J. Crew MAC Cosmetics Marc Jacobs Michael Kors Steve Madden The Estée Lauder Cos. Inc.
SUPPORTERS
24 Seven Alice + Olivia Amazon Fashion Banana Republic Barneys New York Bloomingdale’s Buro 24/7 Camuto Group Century 21 Department Stores Coty Inc. Donna Karan New York Farfetch Geoffrey Beene Foundation Global Brands Group
H&M Hand Baldachin & Amburgey LLP Hilldun Corp. HL Group InStyle Kara Ross Karen Harvey Consulting Group Kate Spade New York Kenneth Cole Productions Kohl’s LaForce + Stevens Lorraine E. Schwartz Inc. Louis Vuitton Luxottica USA
LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton Inc. Malone Souliers Marie Claire Mattel Inc. MyHabit Neapolitan Collection Neiman Marcus Group Net-a-porter.com Nordstrom Oscar de la Renta LLC Rachel Roy Ralph Lauren Samsung Fashion & Design Fund Shopbop
Sidney Garber Stuart Weitzman Sycamore Partners Target The Natori Co. The Woolmark Co. Theory Tommy Hilfiger Tory Burch Valentino SpA Vera Wang Westfield World Trade Center
C F DA S C H O L A R S H I P S Nominees and Honorees Shot at INDUSTRIA STUDIOS
THE GEOFFREY BEENE DESIGN SCHOLARSHIP HEATHER RHEE, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
Makeup by CLARISSA LUNA and MARY GUTHRIE for ABTP.com Hair by BENNETT GREY for ABTP.com Photo Assistant KYLE MAY Digital Tech ALEX HOPKINS
THE LIZ CLAIBORNE DESIGN SCHOLARSHIP NOA LOEWALD HU, School of the Art Institute of Chicago CFDA/TEEN VOGUE SCHOLARSHIP IN PARTNERSHIP WITH TARGET SANGLIM LEE, Savannah College of Art and Design EDUCATIONAL AND PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMS
Set Design by NICOLE WATTS STUDIO
PHOTO STUDIOS
Eileen Fisher Social Innovator Award The CFDA + Lexus Forward Fashion Initiative
EVENT SPACE
EQUIPMENT RENTAL
THE FULL-SERVICE STUDIO SINCE 1991
78 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM
Think Tank
TPP: It’s a Good Thing And It’s About Time By David Spooner
Illustration by Andrea Manzati
In the midst of the final round of the Central America Free Trade Agreement negotiations in 2003, U.S. Trade Representative Bob Zoellick called my cell. “Get back here,” Zoellick said. The apparel and agriculture negotiations were the only remaining “open” tables in the CAFTA talks, and Zoellick wanted an update and he wanted it now. So, running out of the Mayflower hotel, which was hosting the negotiations, I flung open the door of a cab. The door bounced back. It whacked me in the forehead. Blood dribbled onto my white dress shirt as the cabbie, driving, flung tissues into the backseat. Back at USTR, Zoellick didn’t comment on my blood-stained shirt as he launched into questions about the CAFTA endgame, grilling me on possible compromises. It was this kind of pressure — not only from Zoellick (the best boss I’ve ever had), but also from his Central American trade minister colleagues — that pushed the negotiations over the finish line. It was also an important lesson. Negotiators must get the policy right, but any tough negotiation, in business or government, requires a boss who is pushing his or her employees relentlessly, at the appropriate moment, to wrap things up. In CAFTA, this meant the agriculture negotiator and I got a couple hours of sleep every night and were pushed to make tough compromises and to be creative. We were going to finish a free-trade agreement with Central America that week, and we were going to do whatever it took to do it. I hear that the current U.S. Trade Representative, Michael Froman, is a lot like Bob Zoellick. I hope he is. As the Obama administration seeks to wrap up the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement, it will require a hard-charging U.S. trade representative, a trade representative who knows the policy as well as the negotiators themselves and who can challenge the negotiators to move beyond their comfort zones. The TPP talks are seven years in the making. It is high time we finished. The TPP would eliminate tariffs and dramatically lower nontariff barriers between the U.S. and 12 Pacific Rim nations — from Japan, Vietnam and Australia in Asia, to Mexico and Canada closer to home. These countries account for a whopping 39 percent of the world’s gross domestic product. At a time when we are struggling at home with anemic economic growth and worrying about declining U.S. influence abroad, we need an agreement that opens markets to the U.S. throughout the Pacific Rim and that
While Senators such as Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) decry “job-killing” trade agreements, the facts belie their rhetoric.
fosters transparency and good governance. Once the TPP goes into effect, it will be a shot in the arm to the U.S. economy. While senators such as Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) decry “job-killing” trade agreements, the facts belie their rhetoric. Other countries maintain much higher trade barriers than the U.S., so free-trade agreements level the playing field for American companies. In the dairy sector, to cite just one example, the U.S. applies a 19 percent tariff on imports, while Canada applies a 247 percent tariff and Japan applies a 179 percent tariff. Putting aside import taxes, other countries also maintain a host of nontariff barriers (think Japanese autos) that exclude our products from their markets. It doesn’t hurt middle-class Americans to eliminate these disparities. It helps our struggling farmers and blue-collar workers. It is for this reason that the U.S. runs a significant trade surplus with our free-trade agreement partners. In 2014, the U.S. enjoyed a $55 billion surplus in manufactured goods trade with our free-trade partners, and ran a $579 billion deficit with countries with which the U.S. does not have a trade agreement. The U.S. has free-trade agreements with 20 countries. We run a trade surplus with 15 of these 20 countries. These facts are astounding. They should put to rest the cries of “job-sucking” trade agreements from protectionist naysayers in Congress. Now, the TPP’s apparel provisions are far from perfect. As things stand, the provisions are so restrictive that, in the short term, knowledgeable brands and retailers are skeptical they will be of much benefit. Often, the TPP will require apparel producers to ship yarns and fabrics from the U.S. to places like Vietnam. Most alarmingly, the TPP’s apparel provisions may lack an amendment provision which would permit future governments to adapt the agreement to changing circumstances. The negotiations are not over, and there is still time to craft commercially meaningful apparel provisions. Hopefully, in the end, the TPP will include apparel provisions that complement the agreement’s other, more forward-looking provisions for other sectors. So, as the TPP countries recently gathered in South Asia, let’s hope that current trade representative Froman mercilessly browbeat a couple of beleaguered U.S. negotiators, absent the bloodied shirt, and that the other TPP trade ministers do the same. America will be better off for it. It has been eight years since the U.S. last entered into a trade agreement, and our economy, and our standing in the world, could use a boost. ■ David Spooner, a partner at Barnes & Thornburg LLP, was the chief textile and apparel negotiator at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative from 2002 to 2006. WWD.COM MAY 2015, No. 4
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REMEMBER
Prize-Winning O Colorful, quirky fabrics — and that eternal signpost of cool denim — carried the day on May 22 when Marta Marques and Paulo Almeida, the Portuguese designers behind the quirky Londonbased Marques’Almeida label, scooped up the second annual LVMH Prize.
Dyer to Retire O David Dyer said he will retire as president and chief executive officer of Chico’s FAS Inc. at the end of the current fiscal year. Dyer, 65, who has held the post since 2009, will remain ceo until the appointment of his successor and then remain with the firm as vice chairman and a director before stepping down from those roles in June 2016. Dyer’s departure will mark his second retirement episode, the first coming after he left Tommy Hilfiger Corp. in 2006. He joined Chico’s as a director the following year.
Marta Marques and Paulo Almeida
CALENDAR
Earnings Roll On O Many of retailing’s biggest names have weighed in with first-quarter results, but there’s still plenty of reporting left in the aftermath of Memorial Day. On average, analysts expect Chico’s FAS Inc. to report adjusted earnings of 27 cents a share on May 27. Michael Kors Holdings Ltd. is expected to grow to 91 cents when it reports its final quarterly results of the year the same day. Signet Jewelers Ltd., bolstered by last year’s purchase of Zale, is expected to post EPS of $1.62 on May 28, when Abercrombie & Fitch Co.’s anticipated loss is seen doubling to 34 cents a share.
so much you need to invest more if you want to take that momentum and grow.”
M.M.: “Absolutely, we still are:
What are the next steps for your business?
It’s an unbelievable process to meet them all, talk to them and get their feedback on our work. It’s all the people that we’ve admired since we were students.” Any idea how you’ll spend the 300,000 euros? M.M.: “We have a few things in
mind. We need more people because we are a very small team and the brand has grown quite significantly. We need to invest in developing more, growing the range, doing more experiments. We also want to invest in portraying our identity as best as possible through shows and showrooms, on special projects.” In terms of coaching and expertise, what do you need most to take your company to the next level?
Marlow Exiting Urban O Tedford “Ted” Marlow is set to retire in August as chief executive officer of Urban Outfitters Inc.’s Urban Outfitters Group, bringing to a close his second stint as head of the brand. Marlow was president of the Urban brand from 2001 to 2010. He returned as ceo of the Urban Outfitters Group in 2012, one month after Glen Senk stepped down as ceo of the Philadelphia-based parent company.
famous jurors: Karl, Marc, Raf, Nicolas, Riccardo, Phoebe, etc.?
M.M.: “We were just talking
While they cut their teeth at Vivienne Westwood and Preen, respectively, Marques and Almeida joined forces at Central Saint Martins and ultimately launched their label in 2011, winning several distinctions and sponsorships in their home base of London. Here, they talk about the award coup and the next steps for their brand. What do you think caught
the jury’s attention? MARTA MARQUES: “One of
the things I said was that we work on instinct and it’s kind of a feeling, mood, attitude and point of view. The jury noted that it came quite natural to us, and that it felt quite authentic and that was a huge compliment.” Were you star struck or nervous dealing with the
about this; LVMH is such a huge source of knowledge, we need to get our questions ready. I mean definitely about production, the putting together of shows. We are definitely going to need all the help we can get. Business and managing are going to be a huge part of it.” What are the biggest challenges you face as an indie brand? M.M.: “Funding is a huge issue
we have, always. London is quite good in terms of sourcing, funding and things like that, but at some point when the brand is growing
M.M.: “E-commerce is coming
up, actually. In the next two or three weeks we’ll have an e-commerce platform up and running. We’re also showing our first resort collection in June and then we are getting ready for our spring show in September, which will be the first on our own without support from the British Fashion Council.” About 1,000 designers entered the contest. Why do you think fashion prizes are so popular, and vital? M.M.: “I think that being a de-
signer and especially building your own brand, it’s a hugely challenging task. PAULA ALMEIDA: “Especially because nowadays studying fashion is such an expensive thing to do, when you finish all your studies, you are in so much debt that you are probably scared to start your own brand.”
You two have always designed as a team? P.A.: “We studied together. We
met 10 years ago at fashion school in Portugal and then we worked on separate projects. But when we were doing our master’s degree in women’s wear at Central Saint Martins we started working together, actually doing just one joint graduate collection. We don’t know how to work any other way. Our course director always said we’re joined at the hip.” — MILES SOCHA
Remembering Rockefeller O Happy Rockefeller died last week at age 88. Born Margaretta Large Fitler, she was the second child of William Wonderly Fitler Jr., who inherited an $8 million fortune. Her marriage to Nelson Rockefeller in 1963 caused a scandal at the time, but with her wholesome good looks she lived up to her nickname, which she had been given as a child because of her
upbeat disposition. As for her style, Norman Norell, whose clothes she often wore, said, “She has that good family, Ivy League look. She will always look right — never gussied up, never silly. She is not interested in excitement for excitement’s sake.” In addition to Norell, she also wore designs by Oscar de la Renta, Bill Blass, Chanel, Grès, Dior Boutique, Valentino and Donald Brooks.
Marion Javits, Happy Rockefeller, Oscar de la Renta and John B. Fairchild, 1972.
WWD IS A REGISTERED TRADEMARK OF FAIRCHILD PUBLISHING, LLC. COPYRIGHT ©2015 FAIRCHILD PUBLISHING, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. PRINTED IN THE U.S.A. VOLUME 209, NO. 90. Wednesday, May 27, 2015. WWD (USPS 689-960, ISSN 0149-5380) is published weekly, with one additional issue in February, March, June, October, November and December, and two additional issues in April and August by Fairchild Publishing, LLC, which is a division of Penske Business Media, LLC. PRINCIPAL OFFICE: 475 Fifth Ave, New York, NY 10017. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY, and at additional mailing offices. Canada Post: return undeliverable Canadian addresses to P.O. Box 503, RPO West Beaver Cre, Rich-Hill, ON L4B 4R6. POSTMASTER: SEND ADDRESS CHANGES TO WWD, P.O. Box 6356, Harlan, IA, 51593. FOR SUBSCRIPTIONS, ADDRESS CHANGES, ADJUSTMENTS, OR BACK ISSUE INQUIRIES: Please write to WWD, P.O. Box 6356, Harlan, IA, 51593, call 866-401-7801, or e-mail customer service at wwdPrint@cdsfulfillment.com. Please include both new and old addresses as printed on most recent label. For New York Hand Delivery Service address changes or inquiries, please contact Mitchell’s NY at 1-800-662-2275, option 7. Subscribers: If the Post Office alerts us that your magazine is undeliverable, we have no further obligation unless we receive a corrected address within one year. If during your subscription term or up to one year after the magazine becomes undeliverable, you are ever dissatisfied with your subscription, let us know. You will receive a full refund on all unmailed issues. First copy of new subscription will be mailed within four weeks after receipt of order. We reserve the right to change the number of issues contained in a subscription term and/or the way the product is delivered. Address all editorial, business, and production correspondence to WWD, 475 5th Ave, 15th Floor, New York, NY 10017. For permissions requests, please call 212-630-5656 or fax request to 212630-5883. For reprints, please e-mail FFM_Reprints@pmc.com or call Wright’s Media 877-652-5295. For reuse permissions, please e-mail FFM_Contenlicensing@pmc.com or call 800-897-8666. Visit us online at www.wwd.com. To subscribe to other Fairchild Media, LLC magazines on the World Wide Web, visit www.wwd.com/subscriptions. WWD IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE RETURN OR LOSS OF, OR FOR DAMAGE OR ANY OTHER INJURY TO, UNSOLICITED MANUSCRIPTS, UNSOLICITED ART WORK (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, DRAWINGS, PHOTOGRAPHS, AND TRANSPARENCIES), OR ANY OTHER UNSOLICITED MATERIALS. THOSE SUBMITTING MANUSCRIPTS, PHOTOGRAPHS, ART WORK, OR OTHER MATERIALS FOR CONSIDERATION SHOULD NOT SEND ORIGINALS, UNLESS SPECIFICALLY REQUESTED TO DO SO BY WWD IN WRITING. MANUSCRIPTS , PHOTOGRAPHS, AND OTHER MATERIALS SUBMITTED MUST BE ACCOMPANIED BY A SELF-ADDRESSED STAMPED ENVELOPE.
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Rockefeller photograph by Tony Palmieri; Marques by Dominique Maître
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81
FINALE
Just Super
Photograph by Thomas Iannaccone
O Today, any model who lands a second job is referred to among the uninformed as a “supermodel.” But for fashion purists, the sobriquet applies to the original quartet: Naomi Campbell, Linda Evangelista, Christy Turlington and Cindy Crawford. At the time, they commanded a stratospheric $50,000 for a single runway appearance. Today, that’s a mere blogger’s fee just to show up and tweet a brand promo. Here, WWD caught Turlington and Evangelista doing their super thing at the 1993 CFDA Awards.
82 MAY 2015, No. 4 WWD.COM