Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Helmut Lang sans Lang

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts
  • rach2jlc
    Senior Member
    • Sep 2006
    • 265

    Helmut Lang sans Lang



    I guess technically this could go under the "Helmut Lang" thread we've already got... but then again, since that one has more to do with Lang himself, I think it's fair to start a new one. Plus, the purist in me doesn't want the following discussion anywhere NEAR Helmut himself, haha.



    Anyway, as the times draws closer for Link Theory tounveil their Helmut Lang collection (NOT designed by Lang), does anybody else think that they really made a boneheaded decision to buy the brand? I know that the proof is in the pudding, but is there ANY buzz whatsoever related to these new designers and what they will do with the brand?I mean, if there is, please tell me. I hear tons about Raf for Jil, Viktor&Rolf, Junya, Tom Ford, etc... but nothing more than"eh,whatever" when it comes to this.



    It seems to me that nobody is really talking about it, most everybodyisambivalent, and nearly everybody expects it to be like Theory + 20% retail price. And, I for one have never been impressed with Theory's retail or pricing model (Basic stuff that is made in China and about 10x's too expensive at retail, to be picked up after the sales for 80% off).



    I just don't see how they will win this one. Two lackluster jeans designers at an eponymous brand where the namesake is long gone, now owned by a large, boring business conglomerate? WOW! I'll be the first waiting in line.... (not!) The only thing I MIGHT pick up is if they are smart enough to release a few standard models of Helmut's classic black suit (with that strange Austrianmix of slimness and boxiness). But, if they charge the same $1500+ retail and make the thing with cheap stretch wools in China, no way.



    In actuality, what I think we'll see are just more of Helmut's basics, easily manufactured and "popular." My guesses? Lots of jeans (they'll def. be made in China and will be $150-175), tshirts (slim cut but no longer Egyptian Cotton... probably will be $80 or so), button fronts that are just like the Theory button fronts, only with PERHAPS the Lang higher-cut armholes ($250), and some stretch-wool and stretch-cotton flat front dresspants. And a few accessories like a few scarfs, pairs of gloves, etc. In other words... boring.

  • Faust
    kitsch killer
    • Sep 2006
    • 37852

    #2
    Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang



    I absolutely agree - it's got "huge flop" written all over it. Helmut has always been a niche market. Not a lot of people outside of the 90's era will pay a lot of money for minimalism, especially in this day and age of philistines with money. Today, people want dangly things or a big name (preferably both) if they are shelling out cash. So, the only way for Theory to make money on this as far as I can see is hiring the best PR company and the best advertising agency in the world. This will need cramming ads down people's throat to get attention.



    BTW, I was just reading the new Wallpaper 10yr anniversary issue, and they had a list of 10 things they miss from the 90's - Helmut Lang was the last on that list :-) So, no, not everyone forgot, but the people who remember will not buy this new shit.



    To be honest I don't know who will buy the new Jil Sander either. I don't see Raf targeting that gallery owner/architect/design journalist set that needs to look smart but not flamboyant with his boxy jackets (I am talking the menswear part of the label). What do they buy now? My guess is Margiela and maybe sometimes Viktor & Rolf.

    Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months - Oscar Wilde

    StyleZeitgeist Magazine

    Comment

    • macuser3of5
      Senior Member
      • Sep 2006
      • 276

      #3
      Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang

      Count me in as not buying either. Helmut Lang is a designer label before anything else, it survived on the brand image and Helmut's persona which were intertwined to the point of near-indistinguishability. The clothing and marketing was so idiosyncratic, mixing classic-modern garments with strange pseudo-utilitarian flourishes, you really got the sense of being in someone's private Bauhausian playroom. Helmut Lang as a label is not simply high-end basics label, and I don't think any other designer, regardless of talent, could keep the same level of austere wonkyness.Prada made out well here: After Helmut left, they understood the label in their hands was as good as dead, and they basically got rid of some unusable rubbish and had someone pay for it.

      edit: removed a sentence fragment (woops)

      Comment

      • rach2jlc
        Senior Member
        • Sep 2006
        • 265

        #4
        Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang



        ...and paid 20,000,000 Euros for it, no less. That's the craziest thing of all...

        Comment

        • casem
          Senior Member
          • Sep 2006
          • 2590

          #5
          Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang

          I agree this is a bad idea, I'm actually glad Helmut Lang himself is staying away, I think he knows as well as everyone else it's a sinking ship. Maybe after it flops they'll sell his name back to him at a discounted rate?

          What I really don't understand is why Theory would pay so much for a name that is relatively unknown. The type of consumer that Theory will be targeting with lower price points (like bloomingdales or nordstrom shoppers) will have no idea who Helmut Lang is. So why pay all that for a name that most people don't recognize? They've got to know that the former HL clientele is not going to be happy about a new more mass produced product not even designed by Helmut Lang himself, so I don't know who they are trying to target by using his name.

          It sounds like with HL's status as one of the original sellers of high price jeans, and the hiring of Habitual's creators that they are going to be another high end jean brand. We need another high end denim brand like we need a hole in the head. The market is definitely oversaturated and they're coming in late in the game.
          As for Theory itself, the clothes are incredibly boring, I've noticed they also rip off a lot of Prada's ideas a season or two later. They charge way too much, you don't have to pay that much more to get "real" designer clothes. I've heard people say they like theory cause the fit is nice and slim, but everything I've tried on has been too big for me.
          I guess we'll just have to wait and see. Maybe we'll be happily surprised, but I have a feeling our predictions will be true.
          music

          Comment

          • rach2jlc
            Senior Member
            • Sep 2006
            • 265

            #6
            Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang



            Funny what you mention about the retail prices; I've always found it odd thatTheory wants $235 for a button front shirt in stretch cotton that copies the Prada designs when you can get the real thing for $275 (but, at least with the Prada, you won't get low-end MOP buttons that are so brittle that they break at the first cleaning).



            All in all, I don't find Theory to be much better in terms of quality than some of the upper end Express shirts, which also have stretch cottons and brittle MOP buttons but are only about $50.



            Anyway, I'm glad to see that I'm not alone in my thought about the new Lang.

            Comment

            • xcoldricex
              Senior Member
              • Sep 2006
              • 1347

              #7
              Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang



              i always wondered how is theory actually survivies? do people actually buy it?



              Comment

              • Faust
                kitsch killer
                • Sep 2006
                • 37852

                #8
                Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang

                [quote user="xcoldricex"]

                i always wondered how is theory actually survivies? do people actually buy it?



                [/quote]



                So have I. My buest guess is they survive because of the incredible markups they charge. They do have a clientelle of young professionals who buy their clothes to wear to the office, because Banana Republic just does not do it for them.

                Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months - Oscar Wilde

                StyleZeitgeist Magazine

                Comment

                • rach2jlc
                  Senior Member
                  • Sep 2006
                  • 265

                  #9
                  Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang



                  Add me to the bewilderment. I have several friends who work in boutiques that stock/have stocked Theory (on more than one continent, no less!) and they ALWAYS say how much of the stuff is left on the shelves and how little moves. People see the pared down, simple aesthetic, think it looks neat, and then look at the price tags and say, "I'll wait until the sales."

                  Comment

                  • Faust
                    kitsch killer
                    • Sep 2006
                    • 37852

                    #10
                    Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang



                    From NYTimes.




                    After Helmut










                    A FEW weeks ago in Paris, just as the vestiges of the last Helmut Lang
                    store were being papered over with gold foil for Miu Miu, the new
                    tenant in the space on the Rue St.-Honoré, the dormant Helmut Lang Web
                    site was updated to announce “S/S07 coming soon.” The subtly nuanced
                    usage of Mr. Lang’s code language for the next spring-summer season,
                    repeated in a handwritten invitation to view a new Helmut Lang
                    collection, suggested that that it had come from the desk of Mr. Lang.




                    By February, stores will again be stocked with narrow-lapel jackets
                    made of crinkly fabrics, art-house T-shirts with superfluously detailed
                    seams and anoraks in parachute fabrics that not only suggest Helmut
                    Lang, but also have his name on the label. Ever since Mr. Lang’s
                    jarringly succinct act of corporate insubordination — he sold his
                    business to Prada Group, then resigned a few months later — his
                    devotees have clung to the faint hope of a return, and his occasional
                    cryptic remarks about his future encouraged that belief.




                    But the Helmut Lang clothes returning to stores like Barneys New
                    York, Fred Segal and Scoop will have precious little to do with the man
                    who changed fashion in the 1990s, who now spends his days in
                    pseudo-retirement at an East Hampton estate minding a brood of pet
                    chickens.




                    After Mr. Lang left his label in January 2005, Prada dismantled the
                    money-bleeding brand and its stores, then sold the trademark to Link
                    Theory Holdings, a Tokyo-based company that also owns the Theory
                    clothing brand. The American subsidiary of Link Theory is now reviving
                    the label with a sportswear collection designed by Michael and Nicole
                    Colovos, the founders of Habitual, the denim label in Los Angeles, with
                    no involvement from Mr. Lang. It is one of the most interesting
                    experiments in recent fashion memory, an attempt to achieve the balance
                    of salability and creativity that eluded Mr. Lang by lowering the
                    prices and making the designs, well, less like those of Mr. Lang.




                    “I want to make clothes that are accessible,” said Andrew Rosen, a
                    chief executive of Link Theory’s American division, “not just so I am
                    impressing some fashion impresario.”




                    For Mr. Lang’s loyalists — stylish women like the French Vogue
                    editor Carine Roitfeld, the artist Jenny Holzer or the stylist Melanie
                    Ward — and for the many customers who committed themselves to Mr.
                    Lang’s severe aesthetic, the prospect of deriving the same sense of
                    urbane satisfaction from a contemporary Helmut Lang collection will
                    seem hopelessly anachronistic. Those who have held on to more than a
                    few of his original pieces are not likely to be enticed by a reprise,
                    which is aimed at a different breed of customer.




                    “I have no interest in the new Helmut,” said Tony Melillo, a
                    designer who bought clothes from the old Helmut. “Helmut is so great,
                    and I’ll always be loyal to him. But I’m a fashion person responding,
                    so my answer will be different.”




                    The difference between old Helmut and new Helmut could be
                    illustrated in a single pair of jeans. Mr. Lang, who pioneered the
                    market for designer denim, cut his jeans with a low rise in the front
                    and skinny, straight legs, a look that customers like Mr. Melillo swore
                    by. But Mr. Rosen, who is 50, the same age as Mr. Lang, said it was
                    unflattering to someone with an average physique. So the Colovos jeans
                    for Helmut Lang include two versions: a slouchier skinny jean and
                    another with a looser body and narrow legs.




                    Mr. Rosen, a third-generation clothing maker, started Theory with
                    the designer Elie Tahari in 1996, when retailers were developing the
                    category known as contemporary sportswear to satisfy demand for
                    separates and more casual career clothes. The label now dominates those
                    departments with sales of $500 million annually, half in stores in the
                    United States, although its growth has slowed as its customers have
                    matured. In 2003, Mr. Rosen and Mr. Tahari sold Theory to its Japanese
                    licensee, which later was listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange and then acquired Helmut Lang.




                    After the deal was completed, Mr. Rosen approached Mr. Lang about
                    returning to work for him, but the designer, he said, “respectfully
                    declined.” Mr. Rosen now believes the Helmut Lang brand could be a
                    model for the next generation of contemporary sportswear.




                    “The beauty of Helmut Lang is that you had the incredible heritage
                    and legacy, but you didn’t have anything else,” he said. “There was no
                    inventory, no people, no stores. You could reshape the whole business.”




                    In May, Mr. Rosen, on the recommendation of editors from Vogue,
                    hired Michael Colovos, 35, and Nicole Colovos, 36, the husband-and-wife
                    team who, in a story eerily parallel to Mr. Lang’s, had just resigned
                    from Habitual, which they founded in 2001. Mr. Colovos, who once
                    designed under his name, and Ms. Colovos, a former market editor from
                    Harper’s Bazaar who met Mr. Colovos on an appointment to review his
                    line, were both fans of Mr. Lang. And that made them anxious about
                    creating a collection under his name.




                    “When he sold his name, he made the decision to leave,” Ms. Colovos
                    said. “That was important to us. We would not have come into this
                    position if we felt there had been some continuing animosity.”




                    The Colovoses, who look and dress the part, with pale features and
                    wardrobes full of bleak minimalism, returned to New York and began
                    designing in a raw gallery space in West Chelsea that looks similar to
                    the Helmut Lang showroom beneath his former store on Greene Street in
                    SoHo. The Helmut Lang logo at the door is cast in the same black block
                    letters, and the décor seems authentic, with raw light bulbs hanging
                    from an exposed sprinkler system, padded chairs with the upholstery
                    roughly ripped away and rolling racks made from industrial pipes. There
                    are reminders of Mr. Lang in the clothes as well, though they are not
                    directly analogous.




                    “We are so respectful of Helmut Lang,” Ms. Colovos said. “So we are not trying to recreate what he did.”




                    Mr. Colovos added: “What we tried to take from him was only his modernity.”




                    From the nearly 20 years of Mr. Lang’s work, the designers reviewed
                    only a smattering of the archives, because they wanted their concept to
                    feel natural, making reference to his aesthetic in terms of minimalism,
                    androgynous and utilitarian details as well as his rigorously tailored
                    construction.




                    For men, there are unlined blazers made of linen viscose or waxed
                    cotton. The sleeves of a gray dress shirt close with an elastic band
                    rather than a button so they push up and down easily on the arms. A
                    cotton parka is woven with steel threads to give it a scrunchy,
                    wrinkled effect.




                    The women’s collection has man-tailored suits in similar fabrics,
                    papery parachute jackets with knotted bows at the hems and patchwork
                    tank dresses made of ribbed cotton jersey. What looked most like the
                    work of Mr. Lang was a piece Ms. Colovos wore: a short cotton poplin
                    dress with pockets hidden beneath origami pleats at the waist, offering
                    a cool contrast of hard and soft.




                    “We know it won’t appeal to everybody, but it appealed to us,” Mr.
                    Colovos said. Dresses in the new line will sell for about $380, anoraks
                    for $620 and jeans for $185 to $240.




                    There is a natural sense of trepidation at how the collection will
                    be received without the original designer, though it has been endorsed
                    by several retailers, including some that carried the original line.
                    Stefani Greenfield, the owner of Scoop, noted that the Colovos
                    collection has the clean, linear lines of the original and incorporates
                    similar fabrics. “What they did effectively is that they didn’t try to
                    be Helmut Lang,” she said. “They designed within the spirit of his
                    collections, but they still look like Michael and Nicole.”




                    The afterlife of Helmut Lang is further evidence of the power of
                    designer names, ones that have barely been dented by death, retirement
                    or unfortunate artistic temperament. “I don’t think it matters whether
                    everything at Chanel is designed by Karl Lagerfeld or everything at Chloé is designed by Chloé,” Mr. Rosen said. “Helmut Lang created the sandbox for us to play in.”




                    In Mr. Lang’s first formal interview since he left the company,
                    published in the fall issue of the impenetrable Dutch fashion magazine
                    Fantastic Man, he did not address what had happened to the Helmut Lang
                    brand in his absence. His most revealing remarks offered some
                    explanation for the ambiguity about his own plans. In actuality, he had
                    “planned nothing.”




                    “My idea was not to be up to anything in particular,” he said, in references to his circumstances one year ago.




                    In discussing his reluctance to disband the team of design
                    assistants he left behind at Prada Group, Mr. Lang described his
                    prospects for returning to fashion as descending initially from “you
                    never know” to “pretty sure I wouldn’t take it up again in the same
                    form” just six months later. Mr. Lang is now involved in several
                    ongoing art projects.




                    To fashion people, the return of Helmut Lang — the clothes — will be
                    viewed as weirdly sad given the designer’s resistance to attempts by
                    Prada to make his line more commercial by adding lucrative accessories
                    and luxury pieces that could be repeated seasonally. But Mr. Lang’s
                    unwavering dedication to his creative vision and his distinctive, if
                    uncomfortably masochistic, bondage references will ultimately be
                    recorded as the cause of his failure. At least that will be the case if
                    the collection designed in his absence, a commercial reduction of his
                    fashion identity, becomes a success on a par with that of Theory.








                    Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months - Oscar Wilde

                    StyleZeitgeist Magazine

                    Comment

                    • Faust
                      kitsch killer
                      • Sep 2006
                      • 37852

                      #11
                      Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang



                      Well, nothing new here. What can I say, except, "there goes the neigborhood."



                      BTW, it would serve Mrs. Colovos well if she learned the differences between terms Modernity and Modernism.

                      Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months - Oscar Wilde

                      StyleZeitgeist Magazine

                      Comment

                      • Tafkap
                        Senior Member
                        • Oct 2006
                        • 106

                        #12
                        Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang



                        Habitual wasn't that great but I think they might do better with Helmut's ideas and foundation.



                        I don't know why, but it almost brings a tear to my eye, i can't wait.

                        Comment

                        • Faust
                          kitsch killer
                          • Sep 2006
                          • 37852

                          #13
                          Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang

                          [quote user="Tafkap"]

                          I don't know why, but it almost brings a tear to my eye, i can't wait...



                          [/quote]



                          ... to puke on it.

                          Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months - Oscar Wilde

                          StyleZeitgeist Magazine

                          Comment

                          • rach2jlc
                            Senior Member
                            • Sep 2006
                            • 265

                            #14
                            Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang



                            Agreed, Faust. I mean, two different cuts for the jeans? The cut of HL jeans is what made them great. The denim fabric itself was so-so, but it was the cut that made them unique. Making them more "democratic" is just going to make them like Levi's. And, since Theory will probably make them in China, they really WILL be like Levi's.



                            Comment

                            • Tafkap
                              Senior Member
                              • Oct 2006
                              • 106

                              #15
                              Re: Helmut Lang sans Lang

                              Believe me, I want to hate it. Being from L.A. I def want to puke thinking about a husband and wife duo taking over Helmut Lang. I mean, in a way they seem like your typical L.A. designers...(not that good, ignorant, etc.)....but Helmut Lang is legendary, there's no one who can take away what he's done. It's better than it being completely over. To tell you the truth, I love Raf but I hate the idea of even him designing for Jil Sander. I think when it boils down to it, it is nice to see some new blood taking over such a big brand. I mean, I hate Karl Lagerfeld for example beacuse he's just too old. He's like Michael Jackson, hanging out with all these young kids, Lindsay, etc. It's gross. I think it is great that Younger people can design for such an established brand. Instead of bringing in old folks. I mean, we're gonna see Hedi Slimane designing for yearssssss...It's nice now, but it's already old to me. Out with the old in with the new.

                              Comment

                              Working...
                              X
                              😀
                              🥰
                              🤢
                              😎
                              😡
                              👍
                              👎