Fashion Industry News Roundup: 01/30/09

1.) As If I Needed A Reason:
"If you're out on a date, have as much gourmet food and wine as your purse will permit, including all kinds of shellfish and vintage red wines. The reason? Gourmet foods contain pheromones and so you will increase your personal level of pheromones."

Then I'll have the Kobe steak, rare, and the lobster mashed potatoes smothered in a Foie Gras reduction sauce please . . . oh, and bacon!

2.) Can Couture Save Us From Our Gloomy Selves?:
"As sure as each passing season, (haute couture) becomes more of an anachronism, (but) its defenders leap to justify its existence. They wax on about its magical, fantastical nature - how important it is to experiment with the limits of fabric and cut and drape, how important it is to escape the realities of a sometimes hard-knock world . . . John Galliano told reporters: 'There is a credit crunch, not a creative crunch. Of course, everyone is being more careful with their discretionary purchases. I am. But it's our job to make people dream, and to provide the value in quality, cut and imagination.'"

Oh Mr. John, let's cut the bull, shall we? It's not your job to just make people dream -- it's your job to make people dream of BUYING DIOR and so add value to LVMH stock. There's a big fat difference. Video clip below of Galliano's Dior dream, Spring Couture 2009:

Counterpoint -- Couture's not hopelessly irrelevant, it's defiantly decadent: "Either John Galliano's head is buried so deeply in the sand that he has rendered himself oblivious to all things recession-related, or he understands that if there's one sector of society utterly unaffected by economic woes, it's the tiny handful of people who can afford to buy a dress the price of a small house. I'm guessing it's the latter."

Speaking of irrelevant couture, LVMH has announced that it's putting its financial clout behind British designer Gareth Pugh. I'm not so certain I'd call this an "investment" so much as a frivolous indulgence (Delphine Arnault, daughter of billionaire LVMH head Bernard Arnault, is the one who lobbied for Pugh). Pugh's Fall/Winter 2009/2010 Menswear collection below:

Yeah, that'll sell like hotcakes.

In related news, Olivier Theysken has been booted from his position as head designer at Nina Ricci. Below is the Spring/Summer '09 collection that got Theysken axed:

3.) Bulgari Suffers a 4th Quarter Smackdown:
As darling daughter Delphine is busy shoveling daddy's (and LVMH stockholders') money into the black-hole of Gareth Pugh, LVMH brand Bulgari gets the sales rug pulled right out from underneath it -- "Bulgari SpA, the world's third- largest jeweler, said fourth-quarter revenue fell 10 percent on shrinking demand for Assioma watches and Astrale necklaces . . . 'Bulgari is suffering from high exposure to the Italian market and underperformance in Japan and in watches,' said John Guy, an analyst with MF Global Securities Ltd. in London . . . Sales from Japan, the source of about a fifth of the total, declined 6.9 percent .. Sales from the Americas decreased 4.8 percent, while in Europe revenue dropped 17 percent, dragged down by an 18 percent decline in the Italian market, the company said."

It appears that LVMH wants to give the impression to the pubic that a recession isn't a problem for its bottom line, when every quarterly report obviously shows that a problem exists, and is only getting worse. When luxury brand jewelry sales plunge like this, it's a clear indicator that discretionary spending is skidding to a halt.

The one bright spot: "(While) Bulgari's fourth-quarter watch sales fell 21 percent and jewelry revenue dropped 13 percent . . . Accessories sales climbed 5 percent and fragrances and cosmetics revenue rose 4.8 percent."

I can hear the Bulgari management now -- "More perfumes, please!"

4.) China Cries Foul over Auction of Yves St. Laurent Art Collection:
"China is trying to block the sale in Paris of two 18th-century bronze animal heads from the collection of Yves Saint Laurent, the late French couturier, because they were looted from Beijing by a marauding Franco-British army . . . The items, the heads of a rat and a rabbit that were taken in 1860 from the Yuan Ming Yuan garden, the Imperial Summer Palace, on the edge of Beijing, have an estimated sale price of between £16-20million."

Because if there's one thing the Chinese government understands and respects, it's property rights. Excuse me while I dissolve into a fit of irony induced giggles.

5.) Stella McCartney Opens Her First Boutique in Paris:
On January 28th, the British designer opened her first store in Paris in the Jardins du Palais Royal at 114-121 Galerie de Valois. Editors dropped by for tea in the afternoon, but the more relevant happening was in the evening, when the socialites and supporters came out to play (expected were the likes of Paul McCartney, Stefano Pilati, Catherine Deneuve, Marianne Faithfull, Azzedine Alaia and PPR head Francois-Henri Pinault.)

It's a good bet Heather Mills won't be darkening the doorstep, like, ever.

6.) Karl Lagerfeld Debuts Chanel Spring Couture Collection to Near Unanimous Praise:
"Inspired by children's pop-up books, Lagerfeld overlayed the classic Chanel silhouette -- a boxy jacket and A-line skirt -- with bugle beading, embroidery, and hand-cut petals and leaves. The collection showcased the creativity of Chanel's "petit mains" (little hands), the artisans who realise Lagerfeld's fantastical visions. A single perceline cotton dress embroidered with pearls and sequins and trimmed with leaves and flowers by hand took 800 hours to complete."

Video clip below of the Chanel "White-Pages" collection:

If anyone knows how to give the people what they want while socking money into the bottom line, it's Mr. Lagerfeld. It should prove interesting (not to mention enlightening) to watch as he strives to maintain balance in a time of economic crisis.

Case in point: "Chanel did not rent out the Grand Palais in Paris, as it had in previous years, settling instead for the smaller Rue Cambron venue in the city's 1st arrondissement, and Karl Lagerfeld finished a much-vaunted "Chanel Mobile Art" world tour before its scheduled end to save on costs."

In related news, Tom Ford reacts to the recession by introducing a line of $990.00 jeans: "What man wouldn't mind spending $990 dollars on a pair of jeans? Especially if said jeans have an 18k gold-plated front button and special pockets lined in silk . . . Oh Tom. What will you think of next? Diamond studded socks? Cashmere swim trunks?"

7.) Kanye West Muses a Name Change -- Martin Louis the King, Jr.:
"Maybe this is all a ploy to distract us from the sleepers (as we've taken to calling the bleh red kicks - [his incredibly boring monochromatic sneakers for Louis Vuitton . . . ed.]). And that's fine, and maybe even kind of smart. But we're taking a stand on this whole name change issue. MLK is taken (but) Massively Over-Inflated Ego, Project Runway Wannabe, and Tragically Color Blind are all still available."

Or maybe he's just insecure and afraid of death: 'Materialistic consumers with anxiety about their existence are especially in need of the symbolic security that brand connections provide,' write researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and University of Virginia."

Whatever. My bet is on Massively Over-Inflated Ego.

Speaking of Massively Over-Inflated Egos, Sean P-Diddy Puff-Daddy Combs has been served with a lawsuit over the bottle design for his Unforgivable cologne: "In a lawsuit filed Wednesday in US District Court in Springfield, Tom Patti contends that the cologne's packaging - the bottle fits inside a stylish ridged plastic cradle - is a rip-off of two copyrighted tabletop glass sculptures he created in the early 1980s called 'Compacted Gray With Clear and Ribs' and 'Modulated Solar Airframe.'"

The two bottle designers have also been named in the lawsuit. Photos of the bottle and one of the artworks in question below:

Tom Patti art on the left, Unforgivable bottle on the right.

The BF thinks it's all just a shakedown by an obscure artist who's dreaming of settlement dollars, usually represented by a law firm that's taken the case on contingency. Should be interesting to see how it turns out. My bet, in this case, is on the settlement dollars (with no admission of wrongdoing by the bottle designers, natch).

8.) American Tourism Dollars Have Gone Missing in Europe:
"Overall, the number of foreign visitors dropped 5 percent from 2007, but the numbers from North America fell the most -- 12 percent . . . The tourism loss has a ripple effect, agents pointed out. A 20 percent dip in Americans can mean as much as a million admissions lost in museums and tourist sites . . . 'The American people used to fly here and then they'd travel by train to Tuscany, to Venice, a lot of places. Even in large groups,' said Sabina Presta, who heads the tourism office near Rome's Spanish Steps . . . On nearby Via dei Condotti, most clerks smiled ruefully when asked about the long-gone big American spender. 'Where are they?' said Andrea Mosso, a salesclerk at Prada. 'We used to see families. Now, nothing.'"

Now, when I start seeing articles about how Japanese tourism has dried up, that's when I'll know the sh*t has really hit the luxury industry's fan.