Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

A Revolving Door for Designers

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts
  • Faust
    kitsch killer
    • Sep 2006
    • 37852

    A Revolving Door for Designers



    Doom and gloom from the New York Times






















    April 3, 2008



    The Latest in Fashion: Pink Slips











    WHENEVER a fashion designer
    is fired, it is usually a very big deal, a scandal to be chewed on
    relentlessly by an industry that feasts on the intrigue of disgrace as
    if it were a long-denied buffet.




    That the two most spectacular dismissals in the last five years happen to have involved the same designer, Lars Nilsson, is all the more delicious to fashion insiders. In 2003, Mr. Nilsson was canned from Bill Blass just hours after a poorly received runway show, and this February, he was mysteriously dismissed from Gianfranco Ferré, put out before he had shown even a single look.




    Surely there must be something remarkable about Mr. Nilsson, in
    addition to his considerable talent for tailoring a suit, for him to be
    sacked with such melodramatic flair ? raw meat tossed on a hibachi.




    Rumors that he had been especially demanding in the workrooms of
    Blass and Ferré, and in between at Nina Ricci, where he worked for
    several seasons before resigning for personal reasons (among them that
    Olivier Theyskens was being courted for his job), were never denied by
    Mr. Nilsson. Over lunch last November, shortly after he had accepted
    the position at Ferré, Mr. Nilsson, wearing a shirt, waistcoat and tie
    on a Sunday, said he had never been shy about complaining when the work
    of the seamstresses and tailors did not meet his expectations. He had
    often argued with management over little things, even embroideries, he
    said, because he refused to compromise his designs.




    Isn?t that what a designer is supposed to do?




    Maybe less so today. Designers high and low are facing competitive
    pressures unlike any they have seen in half a century ? and not just
    because of the tightening economy or the dread specter of an ?It? bag
    collapse. Fashion has entered an era in which venerable brands that
    have gone stale expect instant revivals from newly hired designers,
    with little to no tolerance for one who doesn?t sketch a single dress
    without the bottom line in mind.




    If it doesn?t sell, it doesn?t work.




    ?That?s going to become more and more important as there is a
    shakeout at brands that spend too much time on image without focusing
    on the bottom line,? said Betsy Pearce, a lawyer and strategy
    consultant for luxury brands.




    ?What kind of a business,? Ms. Pearce went on, ?would rationalize
    the creation of an entire product line four times a year and then
    produce it on spec??




    The most obvious result of this pressure is that Mr. Nilsson is not
    so singular after all. It is increasingly common for designers to be
    suddenly fired or replaced, as has happened at Anne Klein, Emanuel
    Ungaro, Chloé, Paco Rabanne and, yet again, at Bill Blass, all in the
    last 24 months. Anne Klein closed a collection designed by Isabel
    Toledo after two seasons. At Ungaro, Peter Dundas left after three
    seasons, to be replaced by Esteban Cortazar. Chloé dropped Paulo Melim
    Andersson after three collections. Paco Rabanne stopped producing the
    collections Patrick Robinson had designed for three seasons. And
    Michael Vollbracht, Mr. Nilsson?s successor at Blass, quit abruptly and
    was replaced by Peter Som.




    On Tuesday, Ferré announced its next designers as well, naming
    Tommaso Aquilano and Roberto Rimondi of the label 6267 to replace Mr.
    Nilsson.




    THE frequency of turnovers suggests that cracks are beginning to
    appear in the model of brand reinvention that dominated fashion for
    more than a decade. The transformations at Yves Saint Laurent,
    Lanvin and Burberry, for example, benefited from clever managements
    and, just as important, enough time for the public to embrace the
    reborn brands ? neither of which are in ample supply today.




    ?It really is a case of these big business people who do not
    understand why creativity is valuable in the first place,? said Ruben
    Toledo, the illustrator.




    His wife, Ms. Toledo, was, until November, attempting to restore a
    prestige image to the Anne Klein label, designing an expensive version
    that was sold at Barneys New York.




    After just two seasons, Jones Apparel Group,
    which owns Anne Klein, decided to return its focus to mainstream
    sportswear and ended its contract with Ms. Toledo. Despite enthusiastic
    reviews, there wasn?t time for her to change the public impression of
    Anne Klein and also make a profit.




    Mr. Toledo decried the decreasing odds that creativity can flourish
    within a corporate environment. ?Big business people think: ?Oh, do we
    have to go with a creative person? Can?t we just fill the job with a
    merchandiser?? ? he said. ?You don?t put a scientist into the kitchen
    of a chef.?




    Corporate executives have argued that it is difficult to find a
    designer who has both creative and managerial skills, and also an
    ability to understand market directions. They see a shrinking talent
    pool of potential Tom Fords. ?You need somebody who understands the
    customer base,? said Michael Groveman, the chief executive of Bill
    Blass. ?In today?s world, it?s not enough to have a critically
    acclaimed talent. You need a commercial talent as well.?




    Ms. Toledo suggested that the problem did not lie with the designers? skill sets.




    ?Designers can design till the cows come home,? she said, ?but if
    you don?t have good business people, good design does not reach its
    full potential.?




    The circumstances may be different enough to discourage
    generalizing about the fate of fashion, but they do illustrate a deeper
    regard for commerce than for creativity. Such an impression is also
    left by the Liz Claiborne company?s recent decision to downgrade Dana Buchman from an upscale department store label to one sold at Kohl?s; or the persistent sense in John Galliano?s
    ready-to-wear collections for Dior that the designer is checking off a
    list: four coats, six suits, three day dresses, 19 handbags, et cetera.




    At Anne Klein, Peter Boneparth, the executive who had championed Ms.
    Toledo, resigned from Jones after a disagreement with its board,
    leaving the expensive strategy of building a designer brand without an
    effective proponent. Jones cut its losses. At Ungaro, Mr. Dundas, whose
    sexpot sequins were championed by the severely styled editors of
    several French magazines but less appreciated by a more sober American
    audience, left in July after the company changed the stylist for his
    shows.




    Meanwhile, the announcement three weeks ago that Mr. Andersson
    (formerly of Marni) had been dropped at Chloé and replaced by Hannah
    MacGibbon, an assistant, did not surprise anyone who ever wondered if a
    square peg would fit a round hole.




    ?The problem is that the talent pool is too young for some of these
    big positions,? said Kim Vernon, a luxury brand consultant. ?They never
    learned how to be creative and design into a business.?




    What concerns Ms. Vernon is that there are fewer seasoned designers
    than available positions. Ungaro, a company with $250 million in sales
    and numerous licenses to support, raised eyebrows when it replaced Mr.
    Dundas with Mr. Cortazar, a 23-year-old design prodigy. As Mounir
    Moufarrige, the chief executive of Ungaro, told Women?s Wear Daily at
    the time, ?The brand has aged, and it needs buzz ? and fast.?




    Mr. Cortazar is no dummy. He recognizes the potential peril in his
    decision to move to Paris only eight months after moving to New York.
    But the opportunity was too good to miss. ?This is on my shoulders,? he
    said. ?But there has been such a revolving door at Ungaro that I think
    the owners feel this is a time to nurture someone and make it work. All
    that jumping around was hurting the company.?




    At Ferré, the circumstances are more complicated. The company may
    have moved too quickly in naming a successor less than three months
    after Mr. Ferré died last summer. Mr. Ferré was revered in Milan, most
    dearly by the employees who remained loyal to his company and did not
    entirely welcome Mr. Nilsson. In fact, several of them were crying when
    the new designer was introduced.




    According to three employees at Ferré, who did not want their names
    to be used because they are forbidden to talk about the circumstances
    that led to Mr. Nilsson?s dismissal, it quickly became clear that the
    changes Mr. Nilsson wanted to make were not in line with their ideal of
    the architectural drama of Ferré. He had asked for creative control
    over certain aspects of the house, including its men?s wear and myriad
    licenses, for children?s clothes and fur coats, they said, and so they
    iced him out.




    Although his departure from Ferré was indeed noteworthy for its
    haste, it lacked the Shakespearean undertones of his experience at
    Blass, where a colleague had been designing an alternative collection
    simultaneously to his, then secretly showed it to retailers before Mr.
    Nilsson was dismissed.




    ?Maybe these companies are feeling they need to radically change to
    survive,? said Kim Hastreiter, an editor of Paper magazine. ?It?s a
    defensive position instead of an offensive position. They are not
    willing to give it the long haul.?











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

    StyleZeitgeist Magazine
  • zamb
    Senior Member
    • Nov 2006
    • 5834

    #2
    Re: A Revolving Door for Designers



    They should give me the Job at Ferre,



    thanks for the Article Faust, bit the writer of the article also seems out of touch with the real problems surrounding issues of this Nature

    “You know,” he says, with a resilient smile, “it is a hard world for poets.”
    .................................................. .......................


    Zam Barrett Spring 2017 Now in stock

    Comment

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