Geoffrey B. Small

[Geoffrey B. Small]

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Pre-show rehearsal and backstage images of Diana Akimova in Fratelli Piacenza's new Mouline' super 130's incredibly lightweight summer wool handmade bomber jacket ensemble developed by Nicholas Giannelli and Laurine da Boville wearing the new super-shouldered handmade long coat in exquisitely textured superlux cotton woven entirely by hand on 18th century wooden handlooms at Badoere di Morgano by Tessitura La Colombina developed by Lois Dionisio- part of Dario Ruggiero’s beautiful photo essay of 'wait’ in Paris now up exclusively on our official instagram page here.



















We also eagerly await the release here on SZ of Matthew Reeves editorial story, who also photographed the collection backstage before the show in Paris. More coverage and news on the record-breaking collection soon. Cheers, Geoffrey & the team



photos this post © Dario Ruggiero, all rights reserved. www.darioruggiero.com
Visit GBS on instagram https://www.instagram.com/geoffreybsmall


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[Geoffrey B. Small]

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Many thanks to Ahimsa, Faust and SZ for Matthew Reeves runway coverage on SZ-mag (see seasonal collection threads). 'wait' has been one of our most successful collections in Paris to date, setting new records for both press coverage and women's spring/summer season order bookings for a single collection. Against all odds in an industry with a Paris Fashion Week now totally dominated and rigged by LVMH, Kering and a slew of other financial groups and deal-players who seek to imitate them, a tiny truly independent, truly artisanal designer firm continues to express its art, produce and distribute its work to the best clients in the world, and grow at annual rate of 25-30 percent over the past 11 years with no outside financing. And the fact that this is also happening in women's as well men's collection work now is even more remarkable for an independent firm.


And when I say "independent," I mean really independent. Just about every designer doing Paris runway nowadays is working under somebody else's thumb: somebody who owns their brand and name's production, distribution and financing--and in the end calls the shots, perhaps maybe allowing the "designer" the chance at least to take care of the "fluff"… that being their fashion shows and some aspects of image. But, when over 90 percent of a runway show has nothing to do with what is going to be produced and put in the stores or online--that says a lot about what is going on behind the hype. Unfortunately, all too many design and fashion observers and customers fall prey to this hype. And the hype is making far too many actors and "personalities" into perceived designers and artists nowadays at the expense of the few real practitioners who are still fighting for their existence, their work, and their access to the public consciousness at large.

On that note, we are extremely grateful and pleased to be able to extend our warmest welcome to you in viewing 'wait' our 105th, and our most ambitious Paris collection presentation to date via the new video shot and produced by Kris Dionisio in Paris. "wait" is about this summer's all-time global warming milestones, the realization by humanity that we are beyond the point of no return regarding planetary climate change and its consequences, and the terrifying new "microburst" storm systems that are a direct result of this phenomena. The microburst storm's easily recognizable visual form resembles a nuclear bomb explosion and serves as the basis of a new overall shape and silhouette of the collection which we are experimenting with, developing, and proposing as part of a comprehensive effort to determine how clothing design needs to adapt and modify itself to protect and serve our women customers now and in the years ahead. We believe it was one of the most directional, commercially-smart and exclusive women's clothing collections during a historical Paris Fashion Week seemingly dominated by global corporate luxury fashion horse races and attempts for hegemony. And most importantly, the only one directly dealing with the stunning new realities of this rapidly changing world and environment of global warming going out of control.


As always, with many thanks to everyone who has helped us to get this far.
Best wishes,

Geoffrey & the team




https://vimeo.com/292677742

[Ahimsa]

EDITORIAL: IN PRAISE OF SHADOWS (GEOFFREY B. SMALL)
Photography by Matthew Reeves











Full editorial on SZ-Mag

[Geoffrey B. Small]

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Thank you so much Ahimsa, Faust, Matthew Reeves and SZ-mag for the beautiful editorial piece from Paris. It's been a record season for our firm and our workrooms here at Cavarzere Venezia. The remarkable growth and demand for our works has reached almost one million euro at wholesale for a single season and has pushed our firm to expand to over 30 people working at Cavarzere- and reach unprecedented levels of artisanal creation and organizational development that we believe is setting a new model for the industry. With very little time to devote to any posting online over the past few months, we briefly share a few images of some pieces that have been a part of this record extreme handmade technology and artisanal production season. With many thanks to everyone who have helped us to get this far. Geoffrey & the team







Only 3 pieces in the world were made of this handmade GRC04 double-breasted
deep central back pleat button closure long coat w/handmade buttonholes & buttons
in hand dyed L. Parisotto "Grenoble" linen & virgin wool fat diagonal twill weave fabric.
Exclusively now at Liberte in Kobe, Japan.











The GRS08 supershirt in hand-dyed pure 'raso' satin silk exclusively printed for us in Como, the world's leading fine silk producing region. One of 26 exquisite pieces cut, created and dyed one-at-a-time each for Darklands in Berlin, Eth0s in Shanghai, Gullam in Daikanyama, Hues in Fukuoka, Leisure Center in Vancouver, L’Eclaireur Boissy in Paris, Persuade in Bilbao, and Provogue in Nagoya.













GRJ07 handmade jacket in Luigi Parisotto 'India' thick structured weave winter linen with unique hand built buttoned center-back vent. One of 27 pieces made for the world this season now at Atelier NY, Chapter 1 Seoul, Darklands Berlin, Eth0s Shanghai, Gullam Daikanyama, Ink Hong Kong, Leisure Center Vancouver, Liberte Kobe, Looq Zurich, Secret Service Taipei. Images of Davide Gabriele from the feature story shooting for FuckingYoung! magazine in September.




























Hand-built Lanificio Moessmer 'lanacotta' boiled Tyrolean wool GRC05 double-breasted coat with spectacular lining story by E. Ghiringhelli and Tessitura Mauri, one of 29 individually made pieces for the world: Calculus Victoria, Carrefour Jiyujaoka, Darklands Berlins, Hostem Archive London, Hues Fukuoka, JS Luxe Tokyo & Osaka, Liberte Kobe, Provogue Nagoya, Ripe Ark Utsunomiya, Secret Service Taipei, T.O. Kochi.













Detail of the supersoft GRC10 Fratelli Piacenza 1733 pure virgin herringbone fancy coating wool
coat, one of 25 individually made pieces for the world: Arts & Science in Aoyama, Cathedral in
Osaka and Ginza, Darklands in Berlin, Eth0s in Shanghai, Hues in Fukuoka, JS Luxe in Tokyo
and Osaka, Looq in Zurich, Persuade in Bilbao, RipeArk in Utsunomiya.















The incredible jacquard weave lining by Ezio Ghiringhelli on the GRJ14 relaxed blouson jacket in Luigi Parisotto's winter cotton and wool 'bondone' fabric created only for us: Arts & Science Aoyama, Cathedral Osaka & Ginza, Chapter 1 Seoul, Eth0s Shanghai, Hostem Archive London, Hues Fukuoka, Looq Zurich, Persuade Bilbao, RipeArk Utsunomiya, Souterrain Roppongi.
























Closups of collars- the handmade super 120s double-twist Luigi Parisotto luxury cotton shirting GRS11 (8 pieces in the world: Arts & Science, Eth0s, Leisure Center) and GRS02 supershirts (22 pieces made for the world: Atelier NY, Cathedral, Darklands, Eth0s, Leisure Center), both feature rounded neckline concepts, new proportions and beautiful details.















The stunning GRS04 3-in-one detachable collar pure Como silk print handmade supershirt comes
with 2 separate distinct collar design pieces in dark and light for unprecedented versatility and wear
options. (only six pieces made for the world: Eth0s, Leisure Center).




(to be continued-page 1 of 3. more images posting…)

[Geoffrey B. Small]

(continued from above)











GRJ18 & GRP19 extreme advanced handmade suit design with first-in-the-world assymetric single back-vent (technically “impossible” not on seam position) in Fratelli Piacenza 1733’s all new “Sublime” Super 140’s pure wool luxury worsted suiting fabric created at Pollone, Biella. Just 2 made for the world exclusively for Eth0s Shanghai.









GRJ16 & GRP15 extreme advanced handmade suit design with narrow jacket construction side-vented trouser in cutting-edge windowpane “Sublime” Super 140’s pure wool luxury worsted suiting fabric created at Pollone, Biella by Fratelli Piacenza 1733, the world’s oldest wool mill still in operation. 5 suits in the world. Exclusively for Eth0s Shanghai. Leisure Center Vancouver, Gullam Daikanyama.











A glimpse inside the superlux pure 3-ply Fratelli Piacenza Alashan Cashmere GRC08 long coat and its incredible hand dyed pure Como silk lining story. It feels even better than it looks. 8 made for the world: At Chapter 1 in Seoul, Eth0s in Shanghai, Hostem Archive in London, and Souterrain in Roppongi.










Detail view of the GRK02 handmade button-front patchwork hooded 8-button sweater in hand dyed pure extrafine merino wool with Luigi
Parisotto's "Grenoble" linen & virgin wool fat twill detail pieces and handmade buttonholes and buttons. Only at Arts & Science Aoyama,
Carrefour Jiyugaoka, Darklands Berlin, Ink Hong Kong, Leisure Center Vancouver, Liberte Kobe, Persuade Bilbao, Provogue Nagoya,
RipeArk Utsunomiya, Secret Service Taipei.













Last in the world: the super limited edition Piacenza Saxony Emotions Super 150’s superfine wool ETJ08 jacket design is one of only 2 pieces made by hand this year, and due to fabric production availability--very possibly the last of its kind to be made. Created exclusively for Hues in Fukuoka Japan and individually hand dyed in our studios with our extreme handwork artistic technique code-named “accident dye” which took over 2 days to reach the precise final mottled patina color and effect for each piece.


























While some of our designer colleagues are now suddenly “discovering” historical tailoring pieces as inspiration
for their “next” collection, we have been developing, showing and creating them already for our clients now for
over a decade. Example: the exquisite GRWS01 1800’s pleated neckline prairie shirt that combines all its bodice
volume right up into the neckline, stunningly and flawlessly executed by hand in pure Como silk raso satin floral
print made only for us, hand dyed with english tea leaves and large real mother of pearl buttons by Fontana
that will blow your mind when you see and touch them up close. 9 pieces made for the world at Arts & Science,
Darklands, Ink, and Leisure Center.











Handmade reproduction 1890's side-saddle riding skirt (GRWG03) in hand washed Biella Super 120’s Tasmanian extrafine wool, one in the world made for Arts & Science in Aoyoma. GRWJ06 handmade jacket in hand dyed alpaca and merino diagonal twill stripe entirely woven by hand on 18^th century wooden handlooms at Badoere di Morgano by Tessitura La Colombina. 4 pieces each individually cut, constructed and dyed by hand for Arts & Science, Eth0s Shanghai, JS Luxe Tokyo & Osaka, Persuade Bilbao.











Images of visit this month by Claudio & Cinzia Fontana to the GBS Via Spalato Sartoria Workrooms at Cavarzere Venezia celebrating over twelve years of collaboration on our Paris collections and development of the new autumn/winter 2019 collection buttons to be presented in January. Like our own firm, the Fontana 'botonificio' unquestionably stands alone in the industry, both in creativity and material excellence, as the best button maker in the world today. Below a selection of the incredible buttons in real horn and mother-of-pearl created by Fontana and used in our production of the AW2018 production order delivery for Eth0s in Shanghai...














(to be continued- page 2 of 3. more images posting…)

[Geoffrey B. Small]

(continued from above)











Hand dyed LuigiParisotto linen and cashmere GRWC04 handmade early 1900's long double-breasted riding coat reproduction with detachable cape handmade buttonholes and buttons. One of 3 in the world (for Arts & Science in Aoyama, Chapter One in Seoul).









GRZ04 hand made dress mountain shoe by G. Rebesco for GBS in luxurious vegetable tanned Toscano leather.
One of only 7 pairs created in the entire world for Liberte in Kobe and Carrefour in Jiyugaoka Tokyo.













Extreme handmade technology GRWC08 patchwork kimono using all handwoven Tessitura La Colombina alpaca & merino handweave fabrics and Luigi Parisotto cotton lining stories. Each piece requires about 105 working hours to build. 12 pieces made for the world at Arts & Science, Atelier NY, Chapter One in Seoul, Eth0s in Shanghai, Ink in Hong Kong, JS Luxe in Tokyo & Osaka, Leisure in Vancouver, Hostem Archive in London.
























The GRP18 super trouser features extreme handwork technology to the max: handcut patchwork design in a spectacular array of hand dyed Luigi Parisotto organic cotton weave designs and handmade jacket-style side vents- over 70 hours of master expert work to make a single pair. Only 8 in the world. At Calculus Victoria, Darklands Berlin, and Ink Hong Kong




(to be continued- more images posting…)

[Geoffrey B. Small]

(continued from above)

Extreme handmade GBS archive "Examen Reginae" and "Escape" collection pieces
(ESWC04, ESWJ07, ESWG03, ESWS02) in superlux hand woven Tessitura La Colombina
alpaca, merino & cashmere yarn fabrics with pure Como silk blouse and linings. Created
exclusively in the world this season for Journal Standard's Kyoto Mikuracho
traditional Japanese wooden house store with coffee & cake shop in Kyoto Japan..















Workroom views of the handmade GRJ05 fully-reversible 2-in-1 design safari hunting jacket
in hand dyed "Gattopardo" wool, linen & cotton exterior fabric woven by Luigi Parisotto combined with extrafine
Biella Super 120's pure Tasmanian wool interior cloth. 8 pieces made for the world only at Darklands in Berlin
and Cathedral in Osaka and Ginza..

The beautiful GRC07 double-breasted topcoat in Fratelli Piacenza 1733's superb black babycamel hair coating cloth with fancy lining story by E.Ghiringhelli (Varese) and Tessitura Mauri (Como) offers its owner a guarantee of timeless elegance for years to come. One of only ten pieces made for the world. Cathedral in Osaka & Ginza, Darklands in Berlin, L’Eclaireur Boissy in Paris, Provogue in Nagoya, and Eth0s in Shanghai.

Giuseppe Rebesco's stunning reproduction GBS GRZ02 handmade early 20th century "Calciatore" Italian footballer
soccer shoe design in pure vegetable tanned Toscana leather. One of only 4 pairs of its kind created in the entire world
exclusively for Cathedral in Osaka and Ginza

FROM the signing of the pieces, to the type of retailer you will find our work in, to the extreme hand-making and creation technologies we use day and night to build the most labor- and time-intensive designer clothes collection on the market today, everything we do is based upon bringing the value of the intelligent human being back into the clothing experience in a very big and bold way. Continuous record investments in personnel, equipment, training & development, and workroom space improvements and capacities have brought the firm now to over 30 employees (a 30 percent increase over 2017 staff size), and dealer order production levels reaching new records: 1,515 GBS handmade pieces for spring/summer 2018 deliveries, and 1,606 pieces for autumn/winter 2018 deliveries, which are now being completed right up until year-end. This year, not including the four Paris prototype collections which are also created in-house by the same people- over 3,100 individually produced GBS pieces (with an average requirement of some fifty total hours of work to complete each one), have been produced and delivered from our workrooms at Cavarzere Venezia, marking an incredible 27 percent increase over 2017. As a result of this super-human effort and performance, our entire organization has been stretched to the limit-- and due to the continuous growing worldwide demand for our collection pieces, and the extreme amounts of unique artisanal and specialized artistic work and materials required to create each one- we inform SZ readers currently, that our firm is being forced to revise its current distribution situation, and to consider a significant reduction in the number of dealers who will be allowed to purchase and distribute Geoffrey B. Small in the upcoming 2019-2020 seasons.

Midnight in the main Sartoria workroom at Via Spalato in Cavarzere Venezia,
where this year over 3,000 hand built GBS production pieces for the world and no less than four
cutting-edge Paris Prototype collections involving over four hundred all-new research
design pieces were created and made by the GBS Sartoria team.

IN A DAY when DJ's, TV actresses and celebrities pose as designers, and plasticized t-shirts and hoodies made in slavery mass-production factories are being passed as luxury clothing to a generation of consumers who know nothing better than what their corporate-fashion-sponsored screens want them to know-- it remains more than ever, our position that our extreme levels of quality, hand made technology, and artistic design must never be compromised. So, while we are making every effort in both human and economic resources to build our creative capacities, there is a limit to those capacities, and we will be required to make some difficult choices and decisions as a result-- regarding how many dealers, and which dealers, we will be able to serve in the current seasons ahead. The worldwide growth in demand for our work as well as the growing uncertainties regarding geo-political and global trade issues, also comes with a growth in the levels of service, selection, knowledge, commitment and investment required on the part of each and every dealer in our network not just to uphold, but rather, to increase the standards of service, image, and operational excellence required to cultivate and continue to earn the loyalty and continuing patronage of the most discerning and highest-value conscious clientele in the business today. These requirements, and how we feel they are being met by each one of our current dealers are being reviewed across our entire dealership network and will form the basis of our distribution decisions for the current seasons ahead. I truly hope some of you might understand why I believe the thirty persons with whom I have the honor and privilege to work with, make up perhaps the greatest tailoring and handmade design operation in the world today, and why more than ever, their work and their unique value, needs to be respected, appreciated and handled, accordingly. With many thanks to each member of our team, and each of the clients and customers around the world who have continued to support our work and our efforts in this tremendous year of growth and challenge... I thank you from my heart, and look forward to working even harder in the year ahead on building the dream of continuing to elevate the art and the science of making clothes with human hands and human minds.


Best wishes,


Geoffrey

[Geoffrey B. Small]

Fighting the battle for truth in ‘sustainable’ and ethical design


FOR DECADES we have been building a new model for the design and clothing industry based upon the human being, ethical production and environ-mental sustainability and safety. But today, the word 'sustainable' in fashion and textiles is becoming more than just a lie or a coverup. When we hear the word 'sustainable fashion' now and who is using it to describe their practices, we are appalled by their lies, and terrified at their ability to continue to sell and operate by wreaking destruction and misery on the entire world's population at all levels. More than ever, we view our competitive role in the marketplace as one for survival, both in economic and in biological terms. At the end of 2018, our goal to eliminate every molecule of plastic petrochemical material from our clothing came ever closer to reality. After a long and challenging discourse, we were able to convince and develop perhaps the first non-polyester all-natural yarn garment label to be used in the entire designer market today with the leading label-producer for the global luxury industry, Mion Spa in the Euganean hill town of Torreglia Italy. The pure silk beautifully crafted label currently costs our firm about 25 times more than its polyester counterpart, but feels so superior against the skin and continues the supreme mission to try to begin to reverse the insidious microfibre-plastic contamination of the entire world's sea and drinking water by the garment & textile industry that continues to be greenwashed and hushed over by everyone in the game. It is also one of the most beautiful labels seen in ages. And also this year, with the growth of our organization and the incredibly brilliant and dedicated people who are joining it… the firm is now working to also eliminate the last remaining commercial chemical composition dyes from its hand dyeing operations under the research efforts of David Wild, a graduate of Cornell University's design program with special emphasis in sustainable textiles, to develop fully natural compound dye technologies for the firm's cutting-edge handmade clothes production and design. The first techniques using wood, nuts, berry, metal and mud-based recipes and compounds will be introduced to the world press and buyers in Paris, along with the stunning new label next week...

[Mojo1990]

Dear Geoffrey, I always enjoy reading your contributions and updates. It's very therapeutic! I'm reminded that there are people at the very top of their endeavours who genuinely care for the wellbeing of this beautiful Planet. I have noticed over the last year a noticeable rise in awareness for micro plastic contamination and a renewed interest in ethical consumer choices. What makes me worried is the large backlash from corporations (lobbying power) that use poverty as a pretext to renew harmful practises (like in America with fossil fuels).

[Geoffrey B. Small]

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Dear Mojo1990, thanks very much for your comment. We are hurriedly packing for Paris now and always appreciate your support. We are not at the top yet in terms of size, press coverage/recognition or money... but we are building with passion and the more the word gets out the more we will continue to build a new model for the industry, one customer-one piece at a time. And on that note, continuing a collaboration for total excellence... Fratelli Piacenza 1733’s all-new Super 130’s ”Mouliné” 230 gram pure virgin wool natural stretch ultra-lux suiting cloth launches for the first-time-in-the-world this week in Paris with the new super advanced design 2-in-1 convertible-lapel extreme handmade GBS OYJ23 supersuit. Part of the first deliveries of the spring/summer 2019 “Wait” and “On your mark” collections arriving now exclusively at L’Eclaireur Boissy d’Anglas in Paris.







More deliveries coming after Paris worldwide.

A word about our next collection presentation coming up this Saturday night posting soon.

With many thanks to everyone.

Best wishes,
Geoffrey & the team


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[Geoffrey B. Small]

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About The Onion.

Geoffrey B. Small men's autumn/winter mmxix
Paris collection presentation

FOLLOWING our last post, we are extremely grateful and pleased to be able to announce our 106th, and our most ambitious, Paris collection presentation to date. "The Onion" will be a live theatre performance in Russian language and presentation for the very first time in the western world of a selected piece from Fyodor Dostoevsky's legendary novel "The Brothers Karamazov" directed by Brad Sisk and starring Tatiana Anisimova, Graham Newmarch, Sergei Vankevich and Anastasia Glushkova. Continuing our leading work in elevating the art of fashion and presentation in Paris. "The Onion" follows the ground-breaking presentations of works by Samuel Beckett ("Come and Go") and William Shakespeare ("Get Ready"), and marks our third live-theater defile presentation in Paris in less than 2 years...











DOSTOEVSKY is an all-time giant not only in literature, but also in philosophy and psychology, influencing everyone from Einstein to Freud, Kafka, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Camus, Sartre, Joyce, Huxley, Maugham, Chekhov, Solzhenitsyn, Hesse, Woolf and Hemingway. And while he wrote 11 novels in his lifetime including Crime and Punishment and The Idiot, The Brothers Karamazov is his ultimate masterpiece. At nearly 800 pages, it is Dostoevsky's largest work, it received both critical and popular acclaim and is often cited as his magnum opus. First published as a serial from January 1879 to November 1880, Dostoevsky spent nearly two years writing the book, and died less than four months after its publication. Since then, it has been acclaimed as one of the supreme achievements in world literature and translated into 170 languages.









"THE Onion" explores a small piece of the story when a colleague in the monastery of the novice priest Alyosha Karamazov named Rakitin, uses Alyosha's vulnerability to set up a meeting between him and Grushenka, who is about to leave in haste to meet a long-lost lover. However, instead of Alyosha becoming corrupted, he is able to earn fresh faith and hope from Grushenka, while Grushenka's troubled mind begins the path of spiritual redemption through his influence. In the meeting, she recalls and recites the story of a woman in hell who is given a chance to escape and be pulled up to heaven by reaching for and grabbing an onion that God has offered to her on a cord that he is holding above her in paradise. As she grabs the onion and slowly is raised up from the infernal fires of hell, other souls in hell begin to grab and hold onto to her body, legs and feet in an attempt to also rise out of the fire with her. As more clamor to hold onto her, she loses her composure and her faith, and driven by fear begins to kick and push off the other sinner souls who one by one as a result of her blows, fall back into the fires of hell. Upon seeing the woman's selfish behavior, God becomes angered and quickly throws the cord, the onion and the woman right back down into hell with all the souls she had just pushed down into hell to save herself.

We believe the story of the onion is pertinent in our own time, as a global ruling corporate and political class (including fashion), continues to operate in making an increasingly unstable and unsustainable world as if they alone will be able to get away with and survive from the catastrophe that their decisions, actions and interests are creating, and that all they need to do is grab the onion on the cord from above and they will be saved by kicking the rest of humanity off their legs and down into the depths of hell, misery and apocalypse. Dostoevsky wisely suggests that there may be another plan for those who intend to grab the onion of salvation just for themselves.

Like all our collections, "the onion" is dedicated to all humanity in the world today, to the value of the human being, and the belief that if we work together and build real community in this world, we can not only survive the mess that we all face, but grow into a new dimension of prosperity and balance.

We will also dedicate this collection and its presentation to the great textile master Giuseppe "Pino" Colombo who passed away on January 3rd, 2019 and to his family, whose magnificent hand woven fabrics and genius have graced our collections over the years, including the one we are presenting this evening. Further testament that great art is the product of great human beings working together. grazie Pino.





For last minute passes & press inquiries contact Mr. Lionel Cisinski: fashiontherapy@free.fr

Best wishes,

Geoffrey & the team



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[carlocolombo]

Thank you Geoffrey for dedicating your collection to our father Pino, he would be proud of that. He ever said...."Geoffrey is a genius and his collections are allways so innovatives!". He has been a good teacher for us and signed us the right way.

We'll bring to Paris his energy in march.

Carlo Colombo
Tessitura la Colombina

[Mojo1990]

Amazing. I've just taken a look at some of the backstage pieces after the presentation. I'm loving everything, especially the variety and fabrics for the outwear pieces.

[Geoffrey B. Small]

Dear Mojo1990 and Carlo Colombo,

Thank you so much for your comments and again our deepest condolences to you and your family Carlo.

We are now able to post here on SZ Kris Dionisio's beautiful video of "The Onion" our historical and ground-breaking presentation last week in Paris.

With many thanks to everyone who helped to make this incredible performance and collection a reality,

Geoffrey

[Ahimsa]

GEOFFREY B. SMALL F/W19 – “THE ONION”
Photography by Matthew Reeves













View more on SZ-Mag

[Geoffrey B. Small]

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WE are pleased to present our Autumn/winter 2018 lookbook and ad campaign shot by Guido Barbagelata in Paris which has been running in Many of Them Magazine in Spain, Please Magazine in Japan. and Stylezeitgeist magazine online with many thanks to everyone.


I planned to post this a while ago, but it has simply been too busy--we believe in using this type of imagery for editorial placements and sometimes very tiny ad runs in important independent publications like Many of Them, or Please, and of course SZ which has remained the preeminent media point for serious independent design for over a decade now… even if the size of our company at the moment and the reach and budget of the ad campaigns if any are very small. We also think the work is good and it is really important for independent brands to begin to establish new advertising business models to support not only their brands but also retailers that carry them, and independent media and serious up and coming models, photographers and agencies as well, and it behooves the right models and photographers to appear in our images for their own promotional and artistic interests. But up until now for decades nobody at our size in our market has been doing anything with advertising, not CCP, not Harnden, Carpe Diem and their spinoffs, MA+, Guidi, A1923, and certainly none of the Belgians- and even the 100 million a year annual sales Owenscorp (Rick Owens)- run any serious or major ad campaigns. Most of them can afford it, believe me. Instead, they have chosen to simply continue to just freeload on the editorial and let the multinational corporates pay the bill for them. Not us...












































WE disagree with this 'take all the press and not give back' policy by independent designers and brands who then complain that there is no independent avant-garde media left (when they all have to close-up, sell, or become Raf-style corporate catalog mouthpieces) because nobody advertised with these media when they were trying to stay alive except the LVMH, Kering, H&M, Zara, Nike, Adidas, Prada, DG and Armani gang of companies.. Like Milan in the 1970's the independent part of this industry needs to work together and be intelligent about things today. We need to first to be able to put out beautiful image work and get it out there into leading independent print/online platforms-- even if to a tiny, exclusive- but leader audience. And believe me, there are some very good creative people and media outlets coming up now that have nothing to do with mainstream fashion media. But they need funding, they need work, they need material, and they need to build staff and resources. And if the independent designer brand industry gives them nothing, then they have no other place to go than the corporates. This is what happened to BoF, which has now replaced Fairchild as the industry daily bible but is running on LVMH early investment funding and clearly is a mouthpiece for such in so many ways, and it's a shame. Now is the time for all independent brands and designers to support independent media that reaches even a relatively small exclusive- leadership audience (like SZ does) which is now greatly influencing the entire industry more and more--then allow innovation and excellence in design and imagery to build new visionary brands to a new level of economic size that can eventually do bigger and bigger budgets and cultivate a whole new side of design and fashion media that over time will rival and replace the existing corrupt, dinosaurs that have led us all to the state of mass-media fashion and cultural and productive degradation that we are witnessing and dealing with today...




2018 . 2017 . 2016


GBS banner ads that link to our lookbook campaigns since 2016 have helped to support SZ-mag and t
he important stories and coverage it produces for the independent designer industry. While retailers
have supported the SZ forum for over a decade, we believe it is time for other designers and brands to
step in and step up in regards to advertising and supporting key independent media in the face of global
corporate fashion's monopoly and mainstream fashion media outlets.





AS the world contemplates "regime-change" for Venezuela this week, perhaps it is time to consider the same for corporate fashion and the lazy, corrupted media that has blindly supported them, completely bought and paid-for by LVMH, Gucci, Kering, Prada, Dolce & Gabbana, Giorgia Armani, H&M, Zara, Adidas, Nike, Chanel, Hermes, Balenciaga, Saint Laurent ad votimum...


For those that know what is going down inside Conde Nast worldwide and others like them, this is already happening.


Now is the time for all independent designers and brands to step up and put some of the money they have made benefitting from small independent media coverage back into the people who have been working so hard to support them, and back into the retailers that have carried them and bought their works, by advertising their collections and their points of distribution... and for independent media in turn to continue to cover and support independent designers and brands more than ever. Sitting back and expecting media to cover you for free is simply playing into the enemy's hands and the continuing spiral of media banality and neglect of real design and real designers out there working at making a difference. If you are a designer or a brand sick of stupid streetwear and dj celebrity corporate fashion taking over, join us and put your money where your mouth is and start fighting back.


Thank you for reading.


Best wishes,


Geoffrey


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[Geoffrey B. Small]

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ONE of the greats has passed. In tribute to Karl Lagerfeld whose contributions to the metier are too vast to begin to mention, we post the photographs of our 2006 “Toussaint Louverture” collection for Numero Magazine in Paris, which we were honored to have had the opportunity be chosen for and shot by him.

I never worked with Karl Lagerfeld personally. I found out he was watching us like many others when we were pioneering our Napoleonic-style collection work. We did our usual small, private little defile show in Paris one season with a great collection that was dedicated to the founder of Haiti, Toussaint Louverture. We were on our 5th Napoleonic theme collection and hitting the apex of our 18th and early 19th century period work technically. By that time, our Napoleon-influenced style was all over the industry and Dolce & Gabbana were coming out with a massive commercial rip of it in Milan, so our focus was to make and show real pieces of that period cut from original and authentic patterns that we had found in our intense research, to contrast against the Italian industrial fake garbage that the competition was coming out with.

But in the real world, there were huge race riots and fires all over Paris after Sarkozy's comments about the deaths of 2 immigrant kids being chased by police enraged the immigrant communities where it happened, and here I was coming into Paris from Italy as the leader of a new Napoleonic-style in fashion. I did not want to risk any association with what was going on around Paris as being supportive of Napoleon's later empiric ideals or dictatorial views. So, I chose to dedicate the collection to Toussaint Louverture, a black man, who led the rebellion against Napoleon's forces in Haiti, drove them out, and later died in prison in Paris.

Our small, controversial show was covered by a few good magazines including Uomo Collezioni. The Collezioni issue came out a few months after the show, and within a few days I got a phone call from a guy named Serge, who said he was the Chief Editor at a magazine called Numero Homme in Paris. He asked if I had a press agent in Paris, and I told him no I didn't, and that normally, I did not pursue very much fashion press coverage and could not make my prototype pieces available to magazine stylists for photographing. Unlike most other designers I cannot make duplicate samples of my prototypes due to the intense level of handwork and real research required to create just the one prototype. My prototypes to me are gold. Serge was very attentive on the phone (rare for most fashion media people), and then informed me that they wanted to ask me on behalf of Karl Lagerfeld if I would let them use some pieces from the collection they had seen in Uomo Collezioni for a special photo story to be shot personally by Mr. Lagerfeld for the magazine. I asked for some guarantees, and they granted them to me. I sent my pieces, got a note from Serge a few days later, indicating that they were perfect for the project and that Mr. Lagerfeld was very happy with them and the shoot results, and in September 2006, the photos and the story came out in the magazine.


Ironically, while Lagerfeld shot the collection for Numero with only white models, our Paris show was actually dominated by black models. Again, inspired by the heroic founder of the nation of Haiti, the entire production of "Toussaint Louverture" was sold out worldwide, and demonstrated just after the race riots in Paris, that our napoleonic style was applicable to people of all colors and beliefs.


As a side note, I have a lot of respect for Karl Lagerfeld. He was not a fundamentalist designer like Armani or Rei Kawakubo or this writer. That is to say he did not own the company that made and distributed his designs. But he was the pioneer of the non-fundamentalist designer approach and his work with Chloe' and then Chanel in 1982 paved the way for all those big old-name relaunches with a new "designer" at the wheel...Galliano, McQueen, Ford, Slimane, Bailey, Philo, Tisci, Jones, Van Asche, Michele and Abloh et al. that today dominate the industry. In fact, without the Lagerfeld-Chanel business model, Bernard Arnault's LVMH, and Francois Pinault's PPL and Kering, as we know them today would not exist.


For me, Lagerfeld was the best at it though, in a class of his own.


A non-fundamentalist designer must provide a creative image direction for the house that meshes with the inner workings of the company business at all levels, (not at all an easy thing to do if you don't own the business ) and most importantly, generate a ton of press as well. And Lagerfeld did that consistently for over 3 and half decades. He was also a serious student of the game, able to recite chapter and verse in regards to just about any aspect of Paris couture history--by far and away one of the best living historians of the metier during his time. He researched incessantly, and he used that research to stay current for ages in a game that uses up and spits out players by the thousands every season.


For example, when we launched "Brumaire revisited" in 2004, a key story in Sport & Street Magazine covered the collection and our radical new Napoleonic direction and made it visible to the entire inside of the industry. Within just one season, 2 designers were suddenly coming out with 18th century and Napoleonic inspired collections: Lagerfeld for Chanel and John Galliano for Dior and his own line produced with Gibo at the time. But Lagerfeld did an 18th century collection for women at Chanel that never mentioned Napoleon at all, was based upon his own long standing knowledge of the period, and indeed was very good, while Galliano had little to offer in terms of the collection but came running out wearing a Napoleonic hat and outfit to take his bow on the runway. One was subtle, timely and done in its own way by a pro, the other was a blatant copy and grab for press coverage that eventually cost the designer's name quite a good piece of credibility in the industry (before his love for Hitlerism took him down completely). Lagerfeld interpreted. Galliano grabbed and copied.





above: scans of the historic article in Sport & Street on "Brumaire revisited" that first covered our Napoleonic design research movement that singularly led the industry to completely change its look and styling for 3-4 years afterwards and is still influencing many today.





WITH Lagerfeld, there was never any of the costly and wasteful business dealings hung out in public as we have seen with Tom Ford and Hedi Slimane, who both walked out of their jobs in disputes over money and control--and who both lost the best jobs of their design careers on multiple times.


And, as we were all still trying to emerge from the shadows of the tragic loss and suicide of Alexander McQueen year ago, I recalled one clear memory of the day I met Karl Lagerfeld in person...

[Geoffrey B. Small]

IT was in October 1992 in the tents of the Cour Carre' in the Louvre where the Chambre Syndicale used to host the Paris fashion week, and Karl Lagerfeld was the man of the season. He had just finished the fashion world's first Grand Slam by successfully designing and showing no less than 3 major collections at the same time in Paris. He had been asked that season to come back to design Chloe' after a decade, as well as Chanel and his own KL/Karl Lagerfeld collection produced in Germany, and he did all three. I was going to shows that season, and was able to see the historic Chloe' show.

Backstage, there was about thousand people after the show and Lagerfeld had a line of about 25 camera crews and reporters waiting to each get a short interview clip with him. Champagne was everywhere and there was a full bar operation in the backstage area. He took care of each one of them, doing the interviews in 3-4 different languages in rapid fire succession while holding a dark colored drink in his hand. Quite a few times, he would interrupt an interview and greet a person from Paris of lesser importance for a brief moment to acknowledge and thank them for their presence, before getting back to the interview, something which I found very impressive at the human relations level.

And he worked hard at those interviews, almost a full 2 hours, long after the exhausting work of running the show was over. It was way before his dramatic makeover and weight loss, so back then he was bigger and rounder, but I was impressed with his energy and stamina-- also remembering that this was one of only three shows he had done in the same week. When all the TV work was over, I waited my turn as a young student of the Paris game and asked for an autograph and got it with courtesy.

The designer, his press team and assistants packed up and left for the night. On the table in front of me I saw about forty empty champagne glasses and plastic cups all over it. And then I suddenly saw the glass with the dark drink that Lagerfeld had been holding for the past 2 hours in his hand. It was still half full. Out of curiosity, I decided to pick it up and decipher what kind of drink was in it that could drive this legendary iconic figure. I figured some sort of wine, liqueur, cognac or scotch. I sniffed. Earlier in the day, I had witnessed the great Claude Montana backstage in the same tents doing the same interviews totally wasted on cocaine, and yet here was quite a contrast: no booze at all whatsoever in that glass of Lagerfeld's, just Coca-Cola. Lagerfeld was sober and straight as an arrow all that time. Like Armani, who didn't smoke or drink, Lagerfeld was a serious professional and those interviews were all business for him.

No wonder he amazed a ton of people that day. Like I said, he is in a class of his own, and to have our work recognized and shot by him some 14 years later for Numero Homme was a great kick for me...






KARL Lagerfeld was a real pro. A totally professional designer from another age, working right up to the end at 85 in a field today filled by incompetents, fakers, sycophants and corporate hacks.


With much respect, admiration and thanks, our condolescences to all who worked with, and knew him, and our very best wishes for everyone at Chanel and Fendi who must carry on the legacy of their houses now without him. A truly daunting task.


Thank you for reading.


Best wishes,


Geoffrey & the team



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[unwashed]

Thanks Geoffrey, it's was a pleasant read from a professionals' point of view. This gave me more respect for the man.

[treves]

Dear Geoffrey and the team! Thank you so much for sharing your personal stories, observations and insights on such sorrowful occasion. It is deeply touching to read words personal and honest while all you can see around is mostly generic condolences.

Sending you all the best energies and wishes!