VACHERON CONSTANTIN
Tucked away all the way up on Madison Avenue at 64th Street is the Vacheron Constantin boutique. Usually filled with the latest and greatest modern hits, this summer the brand’s New York City home is exhibiting and selling a selection of remarkable vintage pieces as part of their “Collectionneurs” line.
The boutique has nine fully serviced and authenticated vintage pieces on display (with two more arriving over the next week or so), ranging from a gorgeous platinum minute-repeating pocket watch from 1928 to the stunning reference 4178. All are on view and available now through the end of August. Here’s a selection of a few of them just because we love ’em. Continue reading
NOMINATION AT RICHEMONT
Sophie Guieysse, who joined Compagnie Financière Richemont SA last year as group human resources director, is to become an executive director .
Guieysse, who is already a member of the senior executive committee, is up for election at the group’s annual general meeting in September. If elected, she will report to Jerome Lambert, group chief operating officer and a senior executive committee member. He is also a director on the Richemont board.
Guieysse joined Richemont last October from Dior, where she advised on the future of luxury in a connected world. She also served on the board of directors of Maisons du Monde, the French furniture and home decor company, and was chairman of its nominations and compensation committee. Continue reading
BALMAIN’S SALES A COPY FLOP
Balmain is bolstering its digital reach with the launch of an online flagship serving customers in more than100 markets in partnership with Yoox Net-a-porter Group.
Till now, in terms of its own online store, “the situation was quite poor,” acknowledged Balmain chief executive officer Massimo Piombini in an interview at the brand’s headquarters. Everything was managed in-house “without any real technical expertise, and the possibilities to keep up with the upgrades of the digital business,” he said.
Harnessing the latest technologies in the online business and integrating Balmain’s e-commerce and institutional web sites, the new site, he said, will boost visibility and sales, as well as serve as a powerful communication tool. Features include a click-and-collect service, editorial content including videos, and dedicated capsules. Continue reading
ON AURA TOUT VU
ALEXIS MABILLE PARIS 2018
LONGCHAMPS FASHION SCOOPS
To celebrate the brand’s 70th anniversary, Longchamp is scheduled for September 8, to stage its first official runway Fashion Show in New York this Fall with a tandem with a tandem event scheduled on September 11,for the Opéra Garnier in Paris.
Known for its best-selling “Le Pliage bag”, the French leather goods firm has expanded its ready-to-wear offering over recent years as part of its repositioning as a lifestyle brand.
Meanwhile, Kendall Jenner, the new brand ambassador, is on board for four seasons, beginning with the fall 2018 campaign.
Among other projects Stateside, the brand is preparing to open its first Los Angeles store this fall.
CARLO BENETTON DIES AT 74
MILAN yesterday — Carlo Benetton died on Tuesday in Treviso, Italy, after fighting a cancer for the last six months. He was 74 and the youngest of the Benetton siblings, who also include Luciano, Giuliana and Gilberto and who together founded the Benetton fashion group in 1965, building it into an international powerhouse in the Eighties and Nineties, leveraging a streamlined organization and manufacturing pipeline.
He is survived by his four children: Christian, Massimo, Andrea and Leone. A funeral service will be held on July 13 at 10 a.m. at the Duomo cathedral in Treviso.
Throughout his career at the family group, Carlo Benetton was in charge of the industrial strategies connected to production. He left the group’s board in 2013, two years after its delisting from the Milan Stock Exchange. Continue reading
DOLCE & GABBANA ALTA MODE
EYMERIC FRANCOIS 2019
GUO PEI COUTURE 2018 PARIS
ALEXANDRE VAUTHIER PARIS
Yesterday the homage rendered Rue Cambon with looks pairing black boater hats, tailored jackets, white shirts and black satin bows conjuring a young Inès de La Fressange. Vauthier backstage described it as a celebration of the savoir-faire of France’s métiers d’art.
Alexandre Vauthier’s mission has always been hooked on a less sacred, more approachable take on couture. But he’s never let go of his passion for the genre’s Eighties heyday, and the codes of the couturier.
“When it’s pleated, it’s Lognon; when there are feathers, it’s Lemarié; when it’s embroidered, it’s Lesage; all the hats are Maison Michel, the jewelry is Goossens,”
YUMI KATSURA PARIS 2018
AZULANT AKORA
African Australian designer Azulant Akora embraces unconventional angles and unexpected forms, bold colors and regal silhouettes. Emerging onto the Australian fashion scene in 2013 where she was awarded the Australian Wool Fashion Award, Azulant is a designer on the move.
Her latest collection, AVATAR, is inspired by the movie. The main message is “ All energy is only borrowed, and one day you have to give it back. ” In life, everything is about balance; giving back as much as we take and respecting the Earth. Drawing on its message of respecting our natural resources and connecting with the Earth. Science is unable to keep up with our industrial society. We are destroying species faster than we can classify them.
This collection features the vibrancy of Royal Blue, Royal Purple, Royal Green with hints of metallic silver and gold. Avatar is a collection bound to inspire! Sharp cuts and sexy shapes, power looks for power girls. When structure meets style! Continue reading
JOSSE WORKCRAFT OF SPIRIT
From the rue Vivienne to Herculaneum, the main representative of neoclassical has raised this precision craft to a degree of unprecedented excellence between antique and baroque, like an immemorial style that I would call “the true style” . It is the desire for a return to the roots, which has its origin in the epistemology architect of fashion as Robert Adam, the duo Percier and Fontaine and as sculptors Antonio Canova and Bertel Thorvaldsen. Christophe Josse prints his mark on the amphiteatre de la mode.
Christophe Josse or the story of a passion, he began at Louis Féraud for which he was the assistant during three years. This experience makes him want to continue this job. Very shy, he refuses every interview, but no matter, the few people ever requested. Continue reading
HELEN DAVID LEAVES HARRODS
“After 10 successful years, Helen David is stepping down from her role as chief merchant to pursue new ventures. Helen’s talent and drive have been instrumental in the continued success of Harrods, and she has made an outstanding contribution to the business,” according to the company.
Harrods added that David “decided the time is right to explore other opportunities. We are very grateful for her dedication throughout her tenure, and wish her the best for the future.”
David is thought to be leaving following differences with management, according to industry sources. Known for her business smarts and sharp sense of humor, she was known as a tough negotiator with a fierce work ethic.
She was promoted to chief merchant in August 2016. She joined the store in 2008 and had overseen projects including Shoe Heaven, Superbrands, Mini Superbrands and the refurbishment of the Fine Jewellery rooms. Continue reading
DELVAUX OPENS STORE IN MILANO
Following the opening of a store on London’s Sloane Street last May, Belgian accessories label Delvaux, which was founded in Brussels in 1829, inaugurated on Tuesday its first boutique in Milan.
The flagship, which carries the house’s collection of luxury bags, is located on Via Bagutta, inside the historic Palazzo Reina, a recently restored palazzo in the heart of Milan’s Golden Triangle luxury shopping district.
Combing Belgian interior design with Italian decorative elements, the store welcomes visitors with a curved hallway conceived by Saint-Gilles’ fine arts academy Van Der Kelen, which leads to a space featuring an impressive bookcase by 20th-century Italian designer Ignazio Gardella.
OUTSTANDING MEN’S FASHION WEEK PARIS
After a week that saw the beginning of collections from Virgil Abloh at Louis Vuitton and Kim Jones at Dior, with the rush of star power fueling other designers to up their game with a series of outstanding staged shows.
On Monday, Men’s Fashion Week Paris started with the presentation of Simon Porte Jacquemus who drew the fashion crowd to a beach near Marseille, France, for the launch of his first men’s collection. Continue reading
KTZ MENSWEAR PARIS 2019
HERMÈS NO SPORT IN THE CITY
The shapes were modern based on 181 years of Hermès savoir-faire and 30 years of Nichanian without experience from the School of Chambre Syndicale. So yes there was a tracksuit, but you couldn’t call it sportswear unless your sport of choice is looking like the ultimately understated contemporary man of leisure; the parisian “bobo”.
Cut, like much of the outerwear in this collection, in étrivière lambskin, almost black but with a slight teal hue, and featuring the same zippered detail at the cuffed hem that ran through many of the pants in this collection, it was outrageously neutral in its simpleness. The H-fronted sports sandal below it told you where it was from, if you didn’t have the eye to know already. There were some ridiculously difficult to achieve T-shirts, pants, and a knit cardigan with a front panel in four-color lines of water snake: again the straightforwardness of the silhouette was belied by the technique of the garment. And so it went.
Bags included what looked like an oversized Birkin in blue with gently off-color spray details and versions of the Plume in the same colorway, plus crocodile. Continue reading
VUITTON ABLOH AND WEST
As Virgil Abloh took his bow after his debut men’s wear show for Louis Vuitton, he embraced his mentor, Kanye West, and the two men openly wept tears of joy.
The designer from Rockford, Ill., who four years ago launched his streetwear label Off-White with the aim of revolutionizing high fashion, had a theory about what it meant for him to reach the top rungs of the industry.
The clothes themselves signaled the dawning of a new era. Neither pure streetwear, nor straightforward luxury, they sat somewhere in between, with all the trial and error that comes with mapping new territory.
In a preview at the Louis Vuitton studio, Abloh said he wanted to start with a blank slate. His color scheme was based on white light hitting a prism and separating into a spectrum of hues, with shades ranging from off-white (naturellement) to the multicolored palette of “The Wizard of Oz.”
Abloh likened himself to the character played by Judy Garland, the “farm girl from the Midwest transported to Oz, a fairy-tale land where she experiences things beyond the reach of her imagination.” Along his yellow brick road, he found transfigured basics: a jacket made of white mink; a camel double-faced cashmere hoodie, and a tie-dye T-shirt in white leather. Continue reading
GMBH MENSWEAR PARIS 2019
GIVENCHY AND HUBERT FOREVER
Clare Waight Keller is to dedicate the Givenchy Fall 2018 couture show in Paris on July 1 to house founder Hubert de Givenchy, who died in March at age 91.
Givenchy said the collection would be “an homage to his iconic creations, technique and personal lexicon” and a “celebration of his timeless elegance and grace, imbued with Waight Keller’s fresh take on the Givenchy spirit.” Continue reading
