Capstone Branding Project by Jane Xiang

Project Overview This is a branding simulation of the fictional brand Jaine. The branding focuses on an accessories collection for Fall 2014. The project looks at the product line, competitors, and consumers. Lastly, it features a series of editorial photos for LOVE Magazine UK that visally communicates the character of the brand.

Table Of Contents brand description......................................4 consumer analysis......................................5 inspiration and mood..............................6-9 product examples.................................10-11 flats line up........................................12-13 competitor anylsis...............................14-19 love magazine and editorial..................20-37 technical flats....................................38-46

brand description

Jaine is an accessories brand that geared towards fashion-forward women. The collection offers a directional aesthetic that reflects the personality of the brand. Products are made out of leather and special hardwares. Jaine explores atypical material options to ultimately offer more artistic products. The brandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s personality is best shown through ad campaigns and magazine editorials. The magazine LOVE best conveys the direction of the brand, so it is used to convey the themes that inspired this collection. Handbags vary to accomodate the lifestyle of the target customer, who likely lives in the city. There are tote-bags designed for personal use and meant to carry more or larger items. The carry-on bag is designed for the occassional traveler, and measurements accomodate to all airline carry-on requirements. The evening bags are more outgoing and are designed as statement pieces. Pricepoint: $500 - $955

consumer analysis

Name: Anya Age: 25 Income: $155,000 Anya lives in Brooklyn, New York. She works as a creative consultant and travels at least once a month to visit her clients. Her aesthetic is edgy and fashion forward. She likes brands like Thom Browne and Comme des garcons. She needs handbags that will accomodate her schedule; one for travel, one for day-to-day work, one for personal use, and one for business dinners. Anya appreciates new brands and independent designers. She looks for innovation, personality, and quality in whatever she buys.

inspiration

mood board

line up

product examples

flats lineup

Jaine

flats lineup

competitors

DEVI KROELL price point: $1,800 - $3,900 CUSTOMER income: $210,000+ age: 27-40 modern and elegant. she is a social person and often attends evening parties and events. she appreciates high-quality handbags with unusual or unique features, like hardware and stones.

DAX GABLER price point: $790-$2,900 CUSTOMER income: $150,000+ age: 25-37 chic and fashion-forward. takes some risk with her style. has a busy lifestyle and needs multiple bags a day to accomodate work, personal use, and evening.

competitors

CHRISTIAN LOUBITIN price point: $995 - $3,295 CUSTOMER income: $130,000+ age: 23-47 very fashion forward and willing to take a risk. she is aware of the name christian loubitin and knows it is synonymous to “luxury,” so she is willing to invest in a bag or shoes; she is wiling to spend more on accessories and coats.

KOTUR price point: $450-$650 CUSTOMER income: $125,000+ age: 25-37 a city socialite, she enjoys going to dinners, attending social events, and taking fashion risks. she has a lot of personality, as does her kotur bag. she likes carrying a brand that not everyone knows of, as it makes her style more unique.

competitors

ALEXANDER WANG price point: $450 - $1,1250 CUSTOMER income: $130,000+ age: 19-35 the younger consumer has a part-time job and gets financial support from her parents. she lives in the city and prefers smaller bags to carry around, as it is more convenient for transport. she is edgy and favors the color black. she considers herself fashionable but not trendy.

brand positioning PERCEPTUAL MAP HIGHER PRICE

DEVI KROELL

CHRISTIAN LOUBITIN DAX GABLER

BASIC

FASHION FORWARD ALEXANDER WANG

JAINE

KOTUR

LOWER PRICE

love magazine editorial

Love Magazine The UK magazine Love features a more directional and artistic perspective for fashion. I believe Love magazine best reflects the type of inspiration from which I derive my accessory designs for Jaine, but is also the type of magazine my the Jaine customer would read. I chose to create a Love magazine editorial that features my products as well as projects from other SCAD students. This editorial is a platform for a stronger statement and theme for my brand.

editorial inspiration

editorial overview

Love Magazineâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s previous covers and editorials are used as a reference for this project. The purpose of the editorial is to reveal a strong story that features my brand and ultimately gives my bran a stronger personality. I found this part of the project important because it is a form of marketing; the Jaine consumer must appreciate the spirit of the brand just as much as she does the products from the brand. The editorial addresses several elements, but all of which relate back to the overriding theme: illusion. The photos first address the idea of Stories. Inspiration is taken from nightmarish stories that were known by children but perhaps meant for adults, such as the Grimm Tales or Panâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Labyrinth. The setting and color theme of the photos are meant to generate a dream-like effect for the viewer. It questions reality versus the world of dream. Secondly, the photos address the idea of Identity, a very relevant topic for the upcoming generation. The images question the roles of each character in the photo - male vs, female, woman vs. child, predator vs. prey. Lastly, the editorial is a testimony to the novel Lolita, which illudes to all the previous ideas mentioned above. The novel, as narrated by the character Humbert Humbert,truly exemplifies the power of illusion. The reader questions the validity of the 40-year-oldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s love for his 12-year-old nymphet girl. The novel investigates love vs. desire, child vs. adult, and reality vs. dream.

LOVE MAGAZINE Issue Ten

SHE WAS LO, LOLA, DOLLY, DOLORES... BUT TO ME SHE WAS

LO. LEE. TA.

illusions

Humbert Humbert. That is the nickname for Vladimir Nabokov’s protagonist in the novel “Lolita.” Humbert cannot separate himself from his childhood. He was only thirteen when his first love, Annabel Leigh, died, leaving him detached from the evolving world. As an older man, Humbert continues to long after ‘nymphets,’ living in his own fantasy world where he remains a monster in his own memoir. He falls in love with his tenant’s daughter, Lolita, and kidnaps her when her mother dies. While at first they seem to be in love, she becomes more and more detached from him as his love becomes more aggressive. A writer himself, Humbert has written a wonderland out of their itinerant journey, caught up in imagination and love. But he realizes that even Lolita will grow old. Upon discovering that everything evolves, even his little Lolita, Humbert ends his memoir as a penitent but deeply adoring man who finally let go of what he loved most. Yet how does one know whether what Humbert loved most was fact or fiction? The novel itself reflects his love for fantasy literature – it is a fairytale with him as the monster and she the princess. Yet, while most people grow out of the genre upon entering adulthood, Humbert remains obsessed. His imagination

is full of story-like, worldly, and literary references. Since stories of magical realms are intended for children, it makes sense that in his memoir such stories be represented as children. Humbert’s passion for young girls translates into his passion for children’s stories. The ‘nymphets’ represent literary texts that Humbert takes special interest in and his relationship with Lolita symbolizes his relationship with a literary text that overwhelmed his life. Nabokov uses their relationship to prove that the genre of fiction is both influential and destructive by exposing the extensive power a writer has to manipulate his reader. As a writer, Humbert has the choice to make his “memoir” a fictional, or metaphorical, account of his life in order to illustrate his relationship in a new way. Lolita is a very detailed account of one man’s life. It apparently dwells deep into his mindset, since the whole novel is from his perspective. Lance Olsen, however, points out in Pawn, Queen, My Poor Little Girl: “Since Humbert’s narrative is told from the first-person point of view, as we have seen, we are never allowed to view Lolita… objectively” (2 - 61). Lolita may well not have been what Humbert said she was. The novel only offers Humbert’s first-person account. Thus, what the reader acknowledges as fact may actually be the imagination of a troubled man. Literary references reign throughout the novel, revealing the influence other texts had on his memoir, further enhanced by his fascination with nymphets who represent the magical stories that children love so much. Like the magical stories, they surround him and inspire him as a writer. Humbert says, “Now I wish to introduce the following idea. Between the age limits of nine

and fourteen there occur maidens who, to certain bewitched travelers, twice or many times older than they, reveal their true nature which is not human, but nymphic (16). Yet Humbert does not evolve away from such imaginations; he remains in awe of these ‘nymphets’ that represent the dreams of young children; stories of the prince who saves the princess and rides away to a castle. Humbert says, “in the possession and thralldom of a nymphet the enchanted traveler stands, as it were, beyond happiness. For there is no other bliss on earth comparable to that of fondling a nymphet” (166). The ‘enchanted traveler’ represents Humbert as well as the reader who journeys through an enchanting story that carries him ‘beyond happiness,’ beyond what reality may offer. To Humbert, no other bliss on earth compares to falling into a magical land where monsters and princesses exist. Lolita the nymphet therefore represents a special story he cannot give up. Humbert’s love for young girls thus symbolizes his love for children’s literature. Humbert’s relationship with Annabel Leigh first made sense of why he was so fascinated with young girls and fantasy literature. At thirteen, while making love to Annabel by the sea, he discovered a pleasure beyond what children are meant to find, but this moment illustrates his discovery of secrets within the text which most young children may not understand. Simply stated, he read between the lines. This discovery fascinated him, and as a young girl, Annabel represented a children’s story with a deeper meaning that Humbert could now comprehend. Yet, at thirteen, children often break away from fairytales and move onto

‘classic’ literary texts. Annabel’s death symbolizes the death of a simple magical story from a child’s point of view. The Annabel Leigh he had once known is no longer the same story now that they made love, just as how some readers mistake Poe’s Annabel Lee as a love story. When Humbert undresses her, he uncovers the truth, or Poe’s implied necrophilia. But Humbert remained in love with fantasy. Having discovered what was behind the words, he began to see works of fiction as young girls with little dresses on – dresses meant to be taken off. Humbert explains that the “gentle and dreamy regions through which I crept were the patrimonies of poets – not crime’s prowling ground” (131). Those ‘dreamy regions,’ as he refers to the girls, were really the ‘patrimonies of poets.’ They are works of fiction, but like most poems, require deep analytical thought to acquire the true meanings. Annabel represents the first true piece of fiction Humbert had enjoyed and comprehended, and after that experience he only wanted more. Humbert’s attraction to Lolita represents the attraction of a reader to a book. When they first met, Humbert was immediately drawn to her small fairy-like body as most readers are to a book-cover that guarantees a good story. He uncovers her as one would a book, getting inside, literally, to know all the details and secrets of the story that readers find so mysterious. His relationship with Lolita was therefore an extension of the one he had with Annabel Leigh. He writes in his memoir: “I am going to tell you something very strange: it was she who seduced me” (132). It is hard to imagine a little girl seducing an old man, but it makes sense for

a book to target its reader. The author of the book intentionally works to seduce its reader. Nabokov himself talks about how at first the book sounds like a “porno,” and people who want to read it are dismayed when they realize it is a deep story. Nabokov starts the book with suggestions of sex to draw readers in, but then forces them to see his story’s message, or rather, to let them learn something. Vladimir Nabokov gets to the reader what he wants them to learn by dangling something they want in front of them: a novel delineating an intimate relationship. In this sense he seduces people into reading the novel, but just as Humbert discovered Lolita to be very different from his Annabel Leigh, the reader discovers Lolita is not a typical drama novel.

“

I am going to tell you something very strange: it was she who seduced me.

”

Lolita’s influence on him symbolizes the influence of a special story on a child, which eventually overwhelms him as their story continues. Lolita represents the ups and downs of a book, and their journey the experience that a reader goes through. The novel itself is a fairytale, but it does not have the happy ending most children look for. Still, the story is memorable and influential, as are certain storybooks to young children; there is always that one special story a child loves and never forgets. In that way Humbert always loved and never forgot Lolita. Throughout the novel Humbert endures confusion, anger, love, happiness, loss, grief, regret – but so does the reader. Humbert’s reaction to Lolita and their journey reflects that of any reader’s. He therefore becomes a reader himself. His book: Lolita. Nabokov’s use of literary references, especially of Annabel Lee, represents actual texts that influence Humbert the writer. Annabel Leigh represents an actual literary text that had a significant influence on him. When Annabel Leigh died, Humbert slept with a girl who looked just like her. Consider also that the novel itself is named Lolita. It is a work of fiction, a fantastical journey, and the title is continuously mentioned throughout the novel. Annabel Leigh refers to Annabel Lee; could Lolita refer to Lolita? Humbert’s relationship with Lolita represents a writer’s love for his own writings that are actually remnants of themselves. Humbert speaks of Lolita as if she were a text, saying, “what is most singular is that she, this Lolita, my Lolita, has individualized the writer’s ancient lust, so that above and over everything there is – Lolita” (45).

dolly

His Lolita has indeed revealed a new meaning of the word lust, but his love is for a book. Lolita is a children’s text that he fell in love with, but it also refers to the novel by Vladimir Nabokov. Humbert writes that ‘above and over everything else there is – Lolita” because his memoir is his life. He has put it down in words with extreme candor that reveals the ‘writer’s ancient lust,’ ancient because such lust dates back to the oldest writer who too felt attached to his own novel. Each literary text is inspired by something personal to the author. Each is a small part of the author’s self put on paper. It is thus, in a way, his offspring. Humbert refers to himself as Lolita’s father not only to prevent public suspicions, but because his memoir is, metaphorically, his child. After an incident in which he drugged and raped Lolita, Humbert says afterwards: “What I had madly possessed was not she, but my own creation, another fanciful Lolita – perhaps, more real than Lolita.”While Lolita represents a special story, she also represents his “own creation.” His love for Lolita is also for his own memoir, and to an extant, for himself. Humbert’s memoir demonstrates the power of fantasy fiction, a power which authors may not really understand is in their hands. Humbert writes of Lolita as “the little deadly demon among the wholesome children; she stands unrecognized by them and unconscious herself of her fantastic power” (17). Her ‘fantastic power’ overwhelms his life, and is so controlling that he even calls it ‘deadly,’ yet Lolita is unaware of her influence over him. But this is only the beginning of the novel. At this point in the novel she represents those writers who are

unaware of the influence they have produced and the power that is still in their hands. Lolita in particular has a strong hold over Humbert. Entranced by her nymphet power, he remains vulnerable to her love, or lack of. A writer has the ability to create, entrap, and sway the minds of his readers, as does Lolita have to power to make Humbert angry, hurt, or happy. As a literary text, Lolita influences Humbert’s mood and mindset as their relationship continues. Humbert’s story demonstrates Nabokov’s understanding and mastery of the writer’s power over his reader’s mind. Humbert’s story and writing captivates the reader into feeling sympathy for a man guilty of an unspeakable crime. When Humbert first says, “I am going to tell you something very strange: it was she who seduced me” (132), the reader perceives Lolita as a young seductress. From his point of view, Lolita approaches Humbert who merely surrenders to her seductive ways. He later says, “I was weak, I was not wise, my school-girl nymphet had me in a thrall…and of this she took advantage” (183). Humbert presents himself as a weak prisoner of her love, of whom she takes advantage. Yet throughout the novel he still indicates that he rapes her every night. Elizabeth Patnoe asks of his readers in Lolita Misrepresented, Lolita Reclaimed: Disclosing the Doubles: “Why isn’t the definition of ‘Lolita’ ‘a molested adolescent girl’ instead of a ‘seductive’ one?” (83). She states that people view Lolita as a seductress and Humbert a lover. Patnoe continues to claim that “our misogynistic culture created and reified a violating Lolita,” as if Lolita were the predator, not a victim of

rape. However, while today’s culture is indeed influential, it is not the source of people’s perception of her. The reader’s ultimate attitude toward Lolita derives from Humbert’s commentary on her. He has victimized himself with self-pity, and as the writer he has charmed the reader into believing that Lolita is the ‘seductress,’ not the poor little girl whose childhood was destroyed. Nabokov uses Humbert the writer to deceive the reader into believing something completely false, thereby proving that writers have the power to manipulate their reader’s minds.

“

What I had madly possessed was not she, but my own creation, another fanciful Lolita – perhaps, more real than Lolita.

”

(Opposite page) Photographer: Regine David Model: Jenna Horton Accessories by Jane Xiang Blouse by Mieko Tominaga MUA: Zak Schiller Hair: Jane Xiang

While Humbert is the magician of his memoir, Nabokov is the ultimate magician behind the entire novel. The author can convince his reader that the continuous rape of a little girl is simply the result of one man’s love. As Olsen points out, Nabokov reveals “perhaps above all else, that splendid enduring image of author as droll magician, with his ability to enchant, to entertain, to teach, and to downright dazzle” (1 - 115). Nabokov turns Humbert into a magician – he has in his power to pull his reader into an imaginary world that enchants those who enter. Humbert charms us with his fairytale creation, but his journey also shocks us, confuses us, and collects our sympathy. As the sole perspective in the novel, Humbert manipulates his readers into believing that something so disturbing and repulsive is just love. The reader is under a spell as he journeys through the book that, as Olsen says, entertains, teaches, and dazzles. Patnoe supportively adds that many “men praise the book’s artistry, Nabokov’s brilliant language” and that one “man seemed so seduced by the book’s form” that he overlooked the story itself; Nabokov’s writing ‘seduced’ him just as Lolita ‘seduced’ Humbert. While Humbert’s story gains him attention, Nabokov’s writing seduces the reader and keeps him attached to the novel. Nabokov’s artistry therefore contributes to his power as a writer to contrive and convince. While most authors often write to convey certain messages, or to persuade their reader over an argument, Nabokov the magician takes over our mind. Humbert’s memoir ultimately exposes the power of imagination as both influential

and destructive through his own captivation by Lolita the girl and the reader’s captivation by Lolita the novel. Humbert’s reaction to Lolita is a reaction first to a children’s story: he falls in love with the beautiful book-cover and is satisfied with what he finds when he opens it up. Lolita’s nymphet body entices Humbert to do what he initially does not want to do. In the beginning of his relationship with her, he wants to protect her purity, but, as he claims, she seduces him. What is not often realized is that, in turn, Humbert seduces the reader. The reader sympathizes with Humbert, thinks he understands him, finds him funny, even pictures him as attractive – but the reader is fooled. As people witness Lolita the girl seduce Humbert, they are simultaneously seduced by Lolita the novel. Nabokov demonstrates the power of imagination with his readers as the subjects. While Humbert is won over by his nymphet, the reader, though he may not acknowledge it, is as well. He does not denounce Humbert’s monstrous ways, but instead thinks about love, what true love really is, and about everlasting love, unaware that Nabokov the magician has just fooled the reader’s mind into believing something he never would have believed before. A writer of fiction can create anything, but, like a magician, these creations are merely illusory. Humbert’s memoir is indeed a work of fiction, yet like other novels it moves the reader who is convinced that this man did kidnap and rape a young girl while loving her adoringly. This is the danger of fiction: the reader is manipulated by something that is not actually there, just as magic is not real. The reader is fooled by illusions when he reads Lolita. Upon finishing the novel,

he is convinced that this rapist is not inherently bad, but rather has good intentions, and that he truly loves this little girl whose childhood he has destroyed. What a dangerous magic trick writing can be. Jane Xiang.

(Opposite page) Photographer: Regine David Model: Jenna Horton Accessories by Jane Xiang MUA: Zak Schiller Hair: Jane Xiang

technical flats