• Gwyneth Paltrow's clothing line with Zoetees is hitting stores this month. The collection includes tee shirts, studded tank tops, and a grey oversized blazer — fine basics, but there's no indication why the line should start at £100. [Elle UK]

• Earlier this year, Katy Perry, desirous of a fashion line, pre-emptively sued the Australian fashion designer Katie Perry for trademark infringement. Although the suit was later dropped, now that the pop star is in Australia, all mention of Katie Perry and the trademark issue is verboten during media interviews. Which is why when a television presenter asked the singer if there were any Australian artists she admired, Perry's manager actually killed the studio lights. [News.com.au]
• The tender melancholy of Being Donatella: "I would definitely prefer not to be obliged to attend certain events and parties, but I must." [ToL]
• Being longtime fans of documentarian Loïc Prigent — the man who made both the excellent Signé Chanel and Marc Jacobs & Louis Vuitton — we cannot wait to watch his new series, which follows four designers during the last 36 hours before their respective shows. Sonia Rykiel, Proenza Schouler, Jean Paul Gaultier Couture, and Fendi are featured; Prigent says "They only have 36 hours left; they don't have time to be polite." [W]
• Gaultier was among the guests evacuated from a hotel in Nice recently following a bomb threat. Nobody was injured and no explosives were found. [Yahoo!]
• Rachel Zoe's line for QVC will be shown in the biggest tent at New York Fashion Week. [The Cut]
• Between The Rachel Zoe Project, America's Next Top Model, Project Runway, Models Of The Runway, Project Runway All-Stars, The Fashion Show, and the upcoming Launch My Line, there's more fashion-themed reality television than any human being could ever watch. Is the genre reaching saturation? No, because women think about fashion the way men think about sports, and it would be silly to ask if there is too many sports shows! No, really: "The same way that sports is a passionate category for men, women look at style in the same way," said Style Network president Salaam Coleman Smith. "Women are passionate about transformation, and about ideas for living a fun, fabulous life, to improve themselves, find a new lipstick and figure out a new haircut." [WWD]
• Zoe, for her part, admits she has "a hard time" watching her show. That makes two of us. [WWD]
• Victoria Beckham found a lookbook model for her dress line who looks very much like Victoria Beckham. [Daily Mail]
• Hussein Chalayan's line for Puma looks exciting, intimidating, and totally technophiliac. [WWD]
• Pint-sized and cooler than we'll ever be, child style blogger Tavi WIlliams may have made the first cover of Pop magazine to be produced under new editor Dasha Zhukova. Interestingly, Tavi was just in the second issue of Love, which was founded by ex-Pop editor-in-chief Katie Grand. These are Tavi's first major magazine appearances. [Fashionologie]
• Meanwhile, Tavi was asked by Laura and Kate Mulleavy of Rodarte to film the presentation of the label's upcoming Target collaboration. None of the items in that collection will be priced above $80. [Lucky]
  
• Add Antonio Berardi and Stella McCartney for Adidas to the long list of English designers beating a return to London Fashion Week this season. [Telegraph]
• Cintra Wilson — the ordinarily funny writer who penned that amazingly tone-deaf, sizist JC Penney's store review for the New York Times — would like you to know that the controversy over her comments is officially over. At least to her. So don't write her about it! Don't read the comments under her post if you don't want to hear Wilson and an acolyte braying about the "whalesong" of complaint. [CintraWilson]
• House of Dereon now has a day dress collection. Weirdly, it includes an awful looking silk drawstring-waist jumpsuit. [WWD]
• You can watch an online short with Chloé Sevigny all about hip boutique Opening Ceremony's new store in Shibuya, Tokyo. [Dazed&Confused]
• Levi's Ryan McGinley-shot "Go Forth" ad campaign for its 501 jeans also has an online mockumentary component. You can watch these "Stories Of A New America" about good-looking young people doing cool things, you know, totally spontaneously, at Break.com. [MW]
• Kenny Chesney's apparel line will launch at MAGIC, the Las Vegas apparel industry event. [WWD]

If you're interested, you can watch the episode — titled "Shape Shifters," here. This is the lowdown:

Upon learning that the challenge would involve "real" women and not models — and then seeing the tall blonde he had to make a dress for, designer James-Paul said: "I am going to die. It's like asking Jesus Christ to like, work with Satan."


Here they are; James-Paul is on the right, "Satan" is on the left in blue. Does she look like a normal person with a normal body to you? Maybe even a great body? Yeah. Me too. But James-Paul was was right about one thing: He doesn't know how to design for real people. This is what he came up with:


Downgrade.


Over on Tom & Lorenzo (formerly Project Rungay), the guys wrote:

Now, normally we dread when shows like this do a so-called "real world" challenge because our comments section tends to explode with outrage from, well, "real" women. We don't blame them for that, but we recognize how much and how well certain buttons are being pushed in certain segments of the audience.

Having said that...

THESE WOMEN ALL HAD PERFECTLY FINE BODIES, YOU ASSHOLES.

They continue: "Honestly (and we realize some of you may disagree), if they were actually dealing with obese clients we could at least understand some of their dismay (because that does require an entirely separate skillset), but we're talking about average women with, frankly, above average bodies."

And the way the designers talked about these poor women! Merlin had a woman named Amber, who was gorgeous (she's the one on the far right with the long dark hair, in the lead photo above), but he started out with, "Tell me: What is the thing that bothers you most about your body." Not, hey what kind of dress do you want? What's your style? Merlin went on to say, "It's the hardest challenge. Because… all these girls, they have problems with their bodies." It seems to me that the only "problem" could be if they were DYING OF CONSUMPTION. If their bodies work, there are no problems.

But the designers bitched and whined about having to add padding to their dress forms — due to one woman having a 43-inch ass; and another having 45 inch hips.

Daniella, who just got out of school, cried. She said she'd never felt more uninspired, because her woman was "big all over." Here's what that looked like:


Keep in mind that the camera adds ten pounds.

Isaac Mizrahi, to his credit, said to Daniella, "When you work in the real world, she's the average size. I find it slightly size-ist of you."

Some how the black man — Reco — who says he often designs for his sister, a size 12 and aunt, a size 16 — didn't win, even though his design was pretty cute:

This is the crap that won:

Guess what? Daniella, the one who shed tears, is the one who made it. Anyway, as one reader wrote in her email, the way the designers behaved when faced with women who were not size zero models "was revolting and highlighted exactly what is wrong with the fashion industry." Another reader noted that the "real" women actually "had better than average bodies," but of course, the Bravo camera still felt the need to pan over their "flaws."

Looks like we made the right choice in abandoning this show early on.

The Fashion Show [Bravo]
The Fashion Show Episode Player [Bravo]
TFS: Congrats and Bye-bye [Tom & Lorenzo]

The concept of the program — fifteen designers competing to win a cash prize — will seem familiar to you, since five seasons of a show called Project Runway have aired. But The Fashion Show is no Project Runway; it lacks the soul, heart and guidance of Tim Gunn; the kooky honesty of Heidi Klum and the bish plz of Nina Garcia. What TFS does have are insane deadlines, a "fashion show" held in front of an audience and tons and tons of headdesk-inducing soundbites. Here are some of the bon mots thrown about during the first episode:

• "My design is edgy"
• "Avant-garde"
• "Experimental"
• "They call me the panty Christ"
• "I use heat-sensitive ink"
• "I used to design for strippers"
• "Creativity, construction, wearability, saleability"
• "Your man berries are hanging out"
• "I need some butter and a miracle to put that on"*
• "Our must-have item is going to be harem pants"

The Fashion Show [Bravo]

*Uttered, straight-faced, by Miss Kelly Rowland

• Says totally important designer Alaïa, whose designs Nuclear Wintour snubbed in the Met exhibit, "she behaves like a dictator and everyone is terrified of her...but I'm not scared of her or anyone." BURN! [WWD]

• The Costume Institute curator, Harold Koda, says it's just a misunderstanding: "We would have loved to have had his pieces in the show, but there was a lot of miscommunication...Maybe it was oversensitivity on my part in broaching it informally rather than with a formal letter. Nobody is to blame. My understanding was that he didn't want his work in the show, so I honored it." [WWD]
• Speaking of Alaïa: Michelle Obama was not wearing him at Tuesday's Time 100 Gala. Contrary to what the White House reported, it was Michael Kors. Quoth the perma-bronzed Mikey's spoeksguy, "I've been digging out of the Alaïa hole all day." [WWD]
• And if you covet the square-necked stunner, it can be yours - for a price. [Fashion Week Daily]
• Speaking of the First Lady, Jason Wu still hasn't met her. But he'd like to! []
• Anna Wintour is also angry with Jack Bauer. For that whole head-butting unpleasantness. "Anna is furious that the Met Gala got upstaged by Kiefer doing something stupid at an after-party that wasn't even part of her event. Now that's all anyone is talking about, not her party. And she is so genuinely fond of Jack, she has supported him and Lazaro for years, she really feels they are part of the future of American fashion. So she's doubly annoyed." [StyleList via New York]
• Marc Jacobs is introducing another scent, Lola. And we're really hoping "Whatever Lola Wants" is integrated into the campaign. [WWD]
• Rival agencies Ford Models and Next Management are fighting over model Kendra Spears. In the meantime, Spears is walkin' for Next. Poached model on toast! [NY Post]
• Quoth the cuckolded Ford, "Kendra Spears is one of the shining stars of the Ford development system. Signed as a prospect while still a teenager in braces, for more than a year, Ford has painstakingly cultivated Spears - literally, taught her how to be an international fashion model." Literally, people! [New York Daily News]
• Oh, in case you were feeling good about yourself? Yeah, when moddles have babies, it makes them really, really skinny. Says Natalia Vodianova, "My agency thought that I might never do shows, because I was a bit shorter and not skinny enough, but what happened was; when I gave birth to my first son I was 19, so I lost a lot of weight. I guess the stress on the body was extreme and I suddenly just turned into this stick - just the way designers love models - and after Lucas was born that's when my career took off. I opened a lot of shows on the runway and that's where stars are made in my industry." [VogueUK]
• Thank God. Karl Lagerfeld has addressed the severe shortage of tweed motorcycle helmets with embedded iPod. [FashionWeekDaily]
• Says C.H.I.P.S. honoree Alberta Ferretti, in L.A., "It's wonderful to see both actresses and real women in my clothes." Real women, fake women - that's democracy in action, people. [WWD]
• The ugly family battle over the L'Oreal fortune escalates, as 86-year-old Liliane Bettencourt's children demand their mother get a psychiatric evaluation; they claim she's senile and in the clutches of a shameless gigolo. As one does. [Guardian]
• Stella McCartney's controversial Met Ball lace onesie was an improvisation. Quoth fellow rock-scion Liv Tyler, "Stella and Kate [Hudson] and I all got ready in Stella's suite at the Carlyle, which was like a four-hour process, and when I arrived at two o'clock they were literally cutting a piece of lace fabric with scissors, which later became Stella's outfit. They made it in two or three hours...It was coming apart at the seams at times and they were literally making it till the last second we left, but we had a ball." Her ladies-in-waiting also had to help her use the bathroom. Il faut souffrir, etc. [New York]
• The Crocs bubble has officially burst. [The Street]
• Dolce and Gabbana take the responsibility of designing a Tour de France jersey seriously! Quoth the pair,"An institutional symbol such as the Pink Jersey shall be respected. It cannot and shall not be distorted. And this is the reason why we customized it with certain historical details of the Dolce & Gabbana style, such as the tricolor bands and the effect of the superimposed jerseys, leaving untouched the base which is well-known all around the world." [Fashion Week Daily]
• Green is still the new black: YSL, Sergio Rossi and Banana Republic are all rolling out eco-chic. Only select pieces, of course. [ElleUK]
• More good news: Armani's up. [WWD]
• Talking about their Really!-It's-nothing-like-Project-Runway-we-swear! Bravo offeringThe Fashion Show, co-host Kelly Rowland says, "I think what makes The Fashion Show so unique is that it's the people's decision, and not only that but it's a real show for real people. This is coming from the consumer's point of view - what they like, how it fits, how creative it is." [TV Watch]
• Cupcake Alert! Rebecca Taylor is teaming up with New York's Billy's Bakery to do a line of Mother's Day sweets. "The Vanilla Twinkle cupcake - made of yellow cake with blue vanilla butter cream and a sprinkle of white crystal sugar and silver candy dots - is inspired by a blue dot chiffon dress from the designer's spring 2009 runway. The Mocha Meow cupcake - a chocolate cupcake with mocha-flavored butter cream topped with chocolate sprinkles - resembles the leopard-print pieces in the collection." [WWD]
• Here's some video of Victoria Beckham filming her nearly-nude Armani ad. Quoth Posh, "Creatively I have a lot of input into the shoot. I like the hair. it's really different for me, but I like to change it up, try different looks, a radical new image." [Grazia Daily]
• Ailing designer Pierre Cardin is on the mend, and heading home to the chateau after a stint in hospital. [WWD]
• Model Liya Kebede has a timely essay on global maternal health in the HuffPo. Sing it! [Huffington Post]
• FYI: a Jason Evans Associates hooded jacket has been recalled due to a strangulation hazard. But...aren't all drawstring hoods kind of strangulation hazards? [UPI]

Project Runway's move from Bravo to Lifetime prompted a year of lawsuits, which finally ended with a settlement last month. (Project Runway's sixth season will begin on Lifetime on August 20, and Bravo's ripoff of its own flagship series debuts tonight at 10 p.m.) The show follows the same basic concept as Project Runway, with 16 designers competing in a weekly challenge, fashion show, and elimination, but there are a few tweaks to the formula. The show is judged by designer Isaac Mizrahi, Kelly Rowland of Destiny's Child, and Fern Mallis, a senior vice president of IMG Fashion who appeared as a guest judge on Project Runway. There will be one main challenge every week, in addition to a Harper's Bazaar Mini Challenge, judged by the magazine's Special Projects Director Laura Brown. Mizrahi and Rowland perform Tim Gunn's role in addition to hosting and judging, taking a tour of the work room during the challenges and offering their thoughts. The designers are competing for a chance to see their designs sold in a not-yet-named major retail store, and to win $125,000. A team of fashion insiders will vote on the runway show at the end of each episode, then the judges will decide who is eliminated. Viewers will vote on the final winner.

Critics say the judges don't have the chemistry of Heidi Klum, Nina Garcia, and Michael Kors. Unlike Tim Gunn, Isaac Mizrahi's comments are more mean than constructive and Kelly Rowland's fashion credentials are dubious. As for the contestants, it seems they were chosen because they fill certain Project Runway stereotypes, not because they are great designers. At the end of the first episode, one group of designers presents Hammer pants as a wardrobe staple, and Mizrahi tells the contestants, "you all let me down." Still, three months is a long time to wait for more Project Runway and The Fashion Show may help tide fans over. Below, the critics judge The Fashion Show.

Variety

Talk about a cheap knockoff. Bravo's look-alike replacement for Project Runway is what Christian Siriano would call a hot mess. By raiding the production closets of shows like The Biggest Loser, The Fashion Show attempts to jazz up the old business model with the idea of real life, real people, real fashion. Problem is, making the fashion more accessible also makes it a lot less, well, fashionable and, inevitably, much less fierce. There's just not that same level of drama when designing a standard blue blazer.

Even delightfully entertaining host Isaac Mizrahi seems slightly aghast at the designs, often unable to mask his horror. If Tim Gunn was diplomatic, Mizrahi is just melodramatic. His signature sign-off of "Bah-bye darling" seems rather harsh even by Heidi Klum's gruff, auf Wiedersehen standards. Still, he totally eclipses bland co-host Kelly Rowland, whose credentials in fashion seem rather nebulous. The two, along with Fern Mallis and a weekly guest judge, weigh fashion show votes to pick a winner and loser. Mallis, a popular judge from Runway, adds practical, relatable advice and some much-needed clout.

The L.A. Times

Hosts designer Isaac Mizrahi and singer Kelly Rowland (ex-Destiny's Child) are not exactly your new Tim Gunn and Heidi Klum. (Rowland's fashion credentials come from having looked at and worn a lot of it — and fair enough.) They are peppy where the Runway hosts were contained and tend to steal focus from the contestants. And unlike Gunn, whose role as disinterested mentor allowed him to love all players equally, Mizrahi is both an involved commentator and a judge, a mixing of duties of which I'm not sure I approve. (When Gunn was brought in as a substitute judge for last year's Runway finale, it seemed very wrong.)

The New York Times

Isaac Mizrahi is the host and lead judge instead of Heidi Klum, which is a little like giving the Grace Kelly role in To Catch a Thief to Rosie O'Donnell. There is no avuncular Tim Gunn acting as mentor to the 15 designers; instead Mr. Mizrahi and his co-host, Kelly Rowland, formerly of Destiny's Child, inspect the workroom where the designers are frantically cutting and basting. They don't hand out helpful tips or encouraging words; mainly they exchange eye rolls and dismissive comments. (Mr. Gunn's exhortation, "Make it work," became famous; Mr. Mizrahi leaves the room with a less inspiring motto, "Keep pluggin'.")

Mr. Mizrahi, who can be very funny as well as flamboyant, is mostly a scold here. Ms. Rowland is not exactly nurturing, either. "Is that supposed to be like that?" she asks Haven, 29, a contestant who is struggling with a misshapen fold on her blouse. "No, it's not supposed to be like that, Kelly," Haven replies, barely concealing a bristle.

Instead of acting as the mercurial designer's more tolerant foil, Ms. Rowland tries to keep up with Mr. Mizrahi's venom - without his verve.

The Hollywood Reporter

The show, the contestants and even the judges (who have almost no chemistry) are almost entirely without flair. Fashion plods through the paces but never seems to gather a real momentum, and there's little spontaneity or a true clash of creative wills: the contestants just seem to get on one another's nerves.

On the other hand, examining fashion with a more serious attitude leads to informative, interesting discussions. The runway segment of Fashion puts outfitted models on display before a room full of industry leaders, and producers seek out feedback from top names. During the runway examination, contestants provide a play-by-play on their fashions; later, when called on the carpet, they're articulate and insightful as to their design motivations and theories. In those moments, Fashion raises the bar for fashion reality.

The Washington Post

The show would be so much more hahaha, and so much more interesting, if we hadn't seen these contestants before. Merlin's costumes and smack-worthy comments seem far less outlandish when you realize he's pretty much just a Christian Siriano/Jay McCarroll hybrid. And Fashion's Kristin, with her flaky eco-inspired designs and what looks like a dreamcatcher in her hair — didn't Elisa and Sweet P (Runway Season 4) have that shtick covered? The contestants of Fashion sometimes act as though they auditioned not to be fashion designers on a reality show, but rather to fill the specific shoes left behind by Runway contestants. You can almost picture them backstage, doing rock-paper-scissors to determine which one of them will be "the offensive contestant," which one will be "the contestant who wears a headpiece bigger than Milwaukee."

The Chicago Sun-Times

Project Runway is ingenious at casting. Will we ever forget Santino? Christian Siriano? Or Kenley Collins, last season's finalist who was so combative that she has since been charged with throwing her cat at her ex?
Tough to top. But The Fashion Show just may do it. So far we have a men's underwear designer who calls himself "the pantychrist"; a Siriano look-alike who mumbles something about how he only works with squares and rectangles, and Merlin, who has an impenetrable accent, at least one red cat suit and a collection of astonishing hats. "The world is controlled by bitches, that's what I believe," says Merlin. I think.

The Daily News

Mizrahi also doesn't seem to be from the pep-talk school of hosting. At one point in tonight's show he informs the assembled group that "you all let me down." ... In Mizrahi's defense, tonight doesn't suggest these contestants are quite ready to revolutionize fashion. It doesn't take a professional to know that if a dress is so painfully tight even a wispy model can't comfortably wear it, it's probably not going to score in the shops. But as viewers, we're less interested in the destination than the ride, and this one starts out feeling like fun.

• Kohl's seems to think a Lauren Conrad fashion line will be a winner. And we had been so joyful when it seemed the Lauren Conrad Collection was taking a permanent vacation! [NY Times]

• Marc Jacobs: "If Naomi [Campbell] were very well behaved and always on time, and didn't have her little tantrums, I don't know that she'd still be around and traveling like Elizabeth Taylor with an entourage." I suppose you just have to find what works for you, and do it. [Style.com]
• Interesting tidbit from the set of the Prada fall campaign shoot: Steven Meisel worked for four days at Pier 59 studios in New York City — last season, the campaign was shot by Meisel in Los Angeles, but then a studio's a studio, more or less. And this season's undertaking involved an actual live horse. Can't wait to see how that turns out. [FWD]
• The New York Times finally got its Critical Shopper, Cintra Wilson, into Topshop (which, weeks after opening, still has a line outside and "bouncers" at the door — whether or not the shop is close to capacity). Wilson's take? "Everything looks so sarcastic and right-this-second trendy as to be planning for a near-immediate obsolescence." [NY Times]
• As had long been expected, Peter Copping was officially named Olivier Theyskens' successor at Nina Ricci in Paris. [WWD]
• New York asked Liya "Kibede" — May American Vogue cover girl, and the third black woman on the cover in as many months — to talk about fashion's cautiously increasing diversity, which the Ethiopian supermodel attributes in main to Barack and Michelle Obama. "I think there's a lot more black models working and I think that's because of having Michelle and Barack out there," says Kebede. "I mean there's been this issue, raised last year — how there wasn't enough black models on the runways — but I think Barack and Michelle have really helped us, hopefully forever, to get over this hurdle for black models." Three covers with black women in a row for Vogue is better than the one cover every 2-3 years that had been the norm for the twenty years of Anna Wintour's tenure at the magazine — but Vogue's 117-year history still counts only a mere 16 covers with black women featured solo, and 5 covers where a black woman was pictured as part of a group. We hate to say it, but Kebede's optimism may be premature. [The Cut]
• Tyra Banks announced that this season she was taking contestants on her watch-pretty-girls-cry TV show to Brazil by having a male model come on the set and offer her Brazil nuts in Portuguese. Unfortunately, that model's name was Hugo Vieira. Vieira is from Portugal. Not Brazil. [MadeInBrazil]
• Meanwhile, in the upcoming season of Australia's Next Top Model, a 16-year-old contestant, who took the preparatory step of dropping out of high school to jump-start her modeling career, is ordered into anger management counseling after threatening to assault another contestant. Seriously, where do they find these people? [News.com.au]
• Polymath (ADD?) designer Isaac Mizrahi was happy to be a judge on Bravo's Project Runway replacement, The Fashion Show (which premieres May 7). But not because it would lift his personal brand: "I respect people for doing that," Mizrahi said, tactfully, "but I'm doing it because it's really fun." [Variety]
• Jason Wu, despite his quick rise to household name status after it became known that he designed Michelle Obama's inaugural ball dress, is nevertheless still doing his quirky bread-and-butter sideline project: designing dolls. His latest is inspired by Lana Turner. It's for sale at FAO Schwartz, for $180. [FWD]
• Model-slash Daisy Lowe: "When I think of 'It Girl,' I think of someone who is privileged, someone who has everything given to them. My parents don't have loads of money. I've been looking after myself, paying my own way since I was 17." [Daily Beast]
• Patrick Robinson's quest to make the Gap cool (again? for the first time? can anyone remember? or is the Gap's alleged hip is beyond a sartorial event horizon: no information about it can reach the wider world?) takes on the jeans. Robinson and his design team have spent two years rethinking the chain's denim offerings, and come August there'll be new offerings like boyfriend jeans, well-fitted drainpipes, and bell bottoms in a variety of lengths. All for $69. [Style.com]
• Penelope Cruz's Mango line's summer collection looks pretty damn cute. As does Ms. Cruz herself. [Fabsugar]
• Yesterday, If we were to have ranked designers by their relative likelihood to launch homewares lines, Martin Margiela's name would have been near the bottom. Shows how much we know! [WWD]
• Quoth the artistic director of Shu Uemura: "I have so many ideas that it can be overwhelming." [The Cut]
• Four images from Shipley & Halmos' Uniqlo line, launching May 7, have leaked. The clothes look a little...boring. [Nylon]
• Matthew Williamson for H&M launches tomorrow in select stores. [Times of London]
• Could a Missoni for H&M line be on the horizon? Angela Missoni, creative director of the venerable Italian knitwear house, says in a recent profile, "I would like to do something with H&M because I think it is a very powerful way to reach younger girls now." Missoni is also frustrated by the format of modern runway shows, which she finds "cold and distant" and a distraction from the clothes. And she hates that more established models can command high runway fees: "I prefer to show my collections on fresh, young girls to capture that spirit. Having Naomi or Gisele in your show is really just about saying that you were able to get her." But girls like Nimue Smit — who is in the spring Prada campaign — and Sara Blomqvist — who was launched to fame by a Prada exclusive in 2007 — both of whom walked in Missoni's last show, aren't exactly "unknowns". [Telegraph]
• M by Missoni, the company's diffusion line, experienced 25% annual growth last year — so it's launching new accessories and denim collections. [WWD]
• H&M says it's strongly positioned, despite the troubled economy and its recent lackluster sales figures. The company plans to open 225 more stores than it will have to close this year. [WSJ]
• Here is your fashion inanity of the day: "Designers always say, 'Gray is the new black,' and the next season say, 'I can't do one more gray piece.' Where does it go? How come the loyalty vanishes? Why don't you love gray every season?" Stephanie Seymour — never afraid to ask the tough questions. [Fashionista]

• Yes, it's fashion week, yes, there are better things to talk about, and yes, we'll get to them after the jump, but first: Toby Keith's clothing line debuted. It's worse than we thought. [TMZ]

• London's fashion week, small but mighty as always, starts today and only runs for four days. It's a strange paradox of British fashion that, while some of the top designers — McQueen, Galliano — are from the UK, and London's Central St. Martins is acknowledged as one of the best fashion schools in the world, London fashion week has never quite managed the automatic prestige of New York's, Milan's, or Paris's (which is, not incidentally, where Galliano and McQueen both show). [Reuters]
• André Leon Talley went nuts for Vera Wang's show in her new downtown store. [The Cut]
• Who invited Julia Allison to Philip Lim? He doesn't make pink clothes. [Observer]
• WWD gets its own loving spoof! Worldwide Womenswear Digest, or WWWD has stories like "THE PARENT TRAP: Bee Shaffer shocked to learn most parents don't have yearly hug limits" and "Diane von Furstenberg Debuts Controversial Spinach Wrap Dress." Awesome. [The Cut]
• Leanne Marshall, who won this show called Project Runway this one time, completed a cross-country move and finished her entire fall collection in a few weeks. She says the only thing that's hard about designing from her Brooklyn apartment is keeping her cat out of her sewing. [People]
• Bravo's replacement for their lost treasure, to be called The Fashion Show, will be hosted by Isaac Mizrahi, Fern Mallis...and Kelly Rowland. [Variety]
• In the front row at Calvin yesterday afternoon, Eva Mendes explains the concept of a fashion show to newbie Kate Beckinsale: "It's a little like going to a museum and seeing a beautiful exhibit, except it's emotion." Did she mean, "in motion"? [WWD]
• SIR — Thank you for your measured post considering the economic value of the fashion industry. I'll resist the temptation to call any of the economists who would argue that "creative innovation that matters is somebody in a lab at MIT coming up with a more efficient battery or solar cell. It is somebody at Stanford coming up with a way to make computers smarter or cancer more preventable. I just can't get excited about some frou-frou fashion designers and the magazines that feature their creations" pointy-headed misogynist assholes (who probably dress poorly and were made fun of for it in high school). [The Economist]
• There is justice! Crocs lost $33 million last quarter. [WWD]
• The three shareholders in De Beers — a mining company, the government of Botswana, and the family of company chairman Nicky Oppenheimer — have together loaned the diamond company $500 million as sales have softened because of the economy. The loan is interest-free for two years. De Beers had record sales in the first three quarters of 2008, but the last quarter was flat, and analysts expect 2009 to be even worse. [Reuters]
• Wholesale prices of US-made apparel rose in the month of January, despite concerns about deflation. [WWD]
• Brazilian designer Alexandre Herchcovitz is able to afford to show in New York partly because of his home country's lavish support of the arts. This season's show cost $170,000, around $70,000 of which came from the Brazilian government. I'm always mystified by the huge numbers some designers give as their budget costs for models — Herchcovitz claims he spent $90,000 on models a year ago — and I have to wonder, are they counting the "cost" of the trade they offer as payment to the girls who work the show? Because as far as I can recall, Herchcovitz is one of the many to "pay" in clothes. Not that giving away clothes isn't a cost to a designer, but I don't think it's unreasonable to recognize that providing some of your product for free is a different class of cost than actual out-of-pocket expenditures. [NY Times]
• Versace is dipping a nervous toe into the turbid waters of internet retail. [WWD]
• And Celine Dion wants you to smell Chic like her this April. [WWD]
• After Victoria Beckham agreed to sell her upscale line of dresses exclusively through Bergdorf's, Saks, which had been among the first to support her dVb by Victoria Beckham denim line, decided to drop the pants. Kitson and Henri Bendel stopped restocking dVb last year because of poor sales. [NY Post]

• Lauren Conrad is On The Move, Azlan-style. After a prolonged period of alleged laziness, Conrad is promoting her eponymous clothing line all over our fifty states. [Yahoo]
• According to this Sun columnist's "hunch," Kate Moss is pregnant. Take that for what it's worth. [The Sun]
• According to model Niki Taylor — and her husband, doctor and uterus' hunch — she's pregnant too! [People]
• Fashiongate FAQ. [Washington Post]

• More signs of economic apocalypse: the cancellation of Fashion Rocks, CondeNast's annual fashion-rock concert-magazine. [AdAge]
• Here's how to get those undecided swing voters! "On Thursday morning, (Zac) Posen filmed a 15-second video urging people to vote, to vote for Barack Obama, and to dress for the occasion." [WWD]
• L'Oreal keeps its head above water, but cuts forecasts. [WSJ]
• There's hedging your bets, and then there's...this. In case they don't get Runway back, Bravo's introducing Fashion House, Celebrity Sew-Off and The Fashion Show, which sounds suspiciously like a Project Runway where viewers choose the winner. [Yahoo]
• Kate Moss, friend, rumored to be dressing up as Tina Turner, Cher for Halloween, kicks. [Fashionologie]
• "Where would Moss be without her languidly rockish locks?" Um, I don't know. Anyway, her hairdresser is releasing a budget line of hair products. So that we can continue to look nothing like her, on the cheap! [Guardian]
• Ferragamo does all the beautiful, 40s-style shoes for the epic film Australia. [W]
• As an army of Bettys and Joans can tell you tonight, Mad Men has had a serious influence on fashion. [LA Times]
• Charlotte Ronson for J.C. Penney is predictably darling. [Nylon]
• Speaking of cute fast fashion: Old Navy's latest plus-sized line is really pretty. [Fabsugar]
• On the other side of economic divide, Balenciaga's Nicolas Ghesquière ditches his celeb moddles. [New York Magazine]
• And the head of Chanel: “Even in tough times, people want to see beautiful and inspirational things." [Economist]
• Rami Kashou lectures at the Phillips Collection. Quoth the master-draper: "I want to talk about what it takes to keep a dream alive...What it's like to be a 5-year-old and have a dream." [Washington Post]
• Bottega Veneta gets into cruisewear. Believe it or not, more frequent collections is actually a Recession-proofing measure. [WWD]