• Jewelry brand Fred, which is "LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton-owned," has acquired another luxury name as its new face: Kate Moss. She'll be snapped by eyebrowed superstar Patrick Demarchelier with French actor Melvil Poupaud. [WWD]

• Doorbusters failed to save the Christmas retail season. Boo! [WSJ]
• "Many retailers opened before 6 a.m., offering 50 percent to 75 percent off" but to no avail! [Yahoo]
• That's a 24% drop from last year. [Bloomberg]
• The reign of Accessories is over, thanks to the Recession. [WWD]
• The New York Times deems 08 fashion a bore. [New York Times]
• However! "To VOGUE.COM, it meant one of the most exciting and unpredictable years in fashion memory." [VogueUK]
• Ugh. More layoffs at Liz Claiborne. [WWD]
• The latest beauty trend is...vegetables. We know we're in a recession, but jeez! [NY Times]
• Beyonce's new video is apparently a total Gareth Pugh homage. Fashion-y, yes, but a little weird. [Fashionista]
• Men's retailer The Officers Club, which sounds vaguely ludicrous, has a new owner. [FT]
• Hermes, meanwhile, launches its first San Diego store. Doesn't it seem like they'd already have one there? [WWD]
• Norma Kamali institutes awesome "try before you buy" feature to her website: you get the stuff before you pay! Are there late fees? [Fashionista]

• Clothing line Anchor Blue has signed Heidi Montag to be its new face. Because execs want to appeal to a "slightly older" demographic. No, really. [WWD, sub req'd]
  
• Would you like to be Erin O'Connor's escort to a show during London Fashion Week? Well lucky for you she's holding a contest with Vogue UK. To win her hand (or, you know, the seat next to her) all you have to do is compose her a poem. Start work-shopping those dirty limericks here! [Vogue UK]
  
• Thrilling/disturbing news: Steve & Barry's has inked a licensing deal allowing them to create and sell t-shirts bearing images and logos from The Little Rascals, The Andy Griffith Show, The Beverly Hillbillies, The Brady Bunch, The Love Boat, The Twilight Zone, Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley, Cheers and Beverly Hills 90210. And if you feel a twinge of sadness that the average Steve & Barry's customer has probably never known the joy of watching an episode of Laverne & Shirley, just think of the poor children in China who will be sewing them. [WWD, sub req'd]

• So the family of the actual Ossie Clark, whose namesake label was just revived during the opening of London Fashion Week, says they never gave anyone permission to use the house's name. And are now taking legal action. Awkward. [WWD, 4th item]
• Talk about expensive shit! Remember those Van Cleef & Arpels-Earnest Sewn jeans we told you about? They retail for between $9,700 and $11,300. Also, they are fug. [Fashion Week Daily]
• "I couldn't fit into my [Bill] Blass sample. I guess it's because I'm not an 18-year-old Russian." Socialite Plum Sykes: just like us! [Fashion Week Daily]
• Ooh la la: Heidi Klum and Seal on the cover of French ELLE! [Sassybella]
• Alessandra Gucci (daughter of dead Maurizio) is launching her own accessories line under the label AG, since the Gucci clan won't let any of its usurping-relatives use the family name to promote their own half-wit businesses. But Alessandra's business sounds less half-wit than most: It's all alligator handbags in pretty colors. And the girl does have a degree in economics, so good for her? [WWD, 2nd item]
• Perry Ellis revenues are down. Insert instinctual defensive remark about the halycon days of Marc Jacobs and his grunge collection. [WWD, sub req'd]
• Jones Apparel also doing not so good. That's a recession for you, folks! [Reuters]
• Liz Claiborne is thisclose to selling off Ellen Tracy to (who else) a private equity firm. The sale will fetch $50 million, which...seems kind of low, albeit to someone who will never see that kind of cash ever. [NY Post]

While it's true that women can be obsessed and concerned with their weight as compared to other women (my shameful secret is that I am a dutiful reader of theskinnywebsite.com — where an insane woman tracks the weight gain and loss of every starlet down to the ounce), isn't the implication that all women want to be thin as a bid for alpha female control a vast overstatement? Isn't our collective weight obsession a fraught and complex issue, with so many societal factors that oversimplifying it into mere catfighting is downright insulting? All the same, Bilmes isn't completely off the mark. Who among us has not mentally denigrated another, more successful woman by thinking, "Well at least I'm thinner"? (I'm not at all proud of it, but it's happened. But it's not just about weight — I've mentally denigrated other people in all manners of pettiness! i.e., at least I'm cuter/younger/etc.) Are you dismissive of those pleasure-seeking, beta-females? Or do you think Bilmes deserves an arse-kicking via one of those women with the "unappealing" musculature?

Vogue UK

• Rachel Zoe: prepare to die. The celebrity stylist has announced herself mightier than Anna Wintour! Uh, didn't Zoe ever study Greek mythology in school? Don't taunt the gods. [WWD, 1st item]
  
• Former Dior Homme designer Hedi Slimane is BFFs with French president Nicolas Sarkozy?! (Might they be interested in a threesome?) [WWD, final item]
  
• Benetton profits up by 6.5%. Which we think is pretty impressive considering the last time we remember buying or knowing anyone who bought anything from the brand was the late 90's. [Uh, try eighties. Oh right, you were wearing diapers. -Moe] [WWD, sub req'd]
  
• Doing even better than Benetton is Tod's, whose profits are up by 18.5% thanks to those pebble-soled shoes that are less ubiquitous but just as profitable as Tory Burch flats. [WWD, sub req'd]
  
• Dita von Teese: The new face of Cointreau. It's about time someone thought to make the direct connection between taking your clothes off and drinking. [Sassybella]

• Victoria Beckham had a spot of tea with ELLE's creative director Joe Zee and editor-in-chief Roberta Myers, eh? Do they want to help us get tickets for the Spice Girls reunion tour? Please? [Fashion Week Daily]
• Vogue UK calls the New York S/S 2008 collections "quietly competent." Which we think is the critical equivalent of saying that a potential suitor "has a real nice personality." [Vogue UK]
• Ralph Lauren is selling new polo shirts to fund breast cancer research. [Vogue UK]
• More fashion-oncology collabo! Marc Jacobs is the NYC Cancer Institute's honoree this year for having raised $400,000 for melanoma research. Oh and some oncologist is also being honored. [Fashion Week Daily]
• So People magazine thinks that Beyonce is one of the best-dressed celebs of 2007? Please god no one tell Tina Knowles. We just know this is going to make her even more unbearable. [People via FabSugar]

• Indie pop band Tilly and the Wall announces Nebraskan style-revolution from the stage of the Coachella Music Festival, saying of their home state: "...you don't really have anywhere to buy clothes except for thrift stores so you just create it yourself, which has led to a ton of crazy style in Omaha." [WWD]
• Glamour editor-in-chief Cindi Leive re-elected president of American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME); Elle editor-in-chief Robbie Myers transitions from secretary to vice president of the organization. [WWD, 1st item]
• Liz Claiborne has gifted a $350,000 scholarship in honor of their new Chief Creative Officer Tim Gunn to his former employer, Parsons, to help budding designers in their journey to "make it work." [WWD]

• Silvia Venturi Fendi, brand accessories director of the family business, sings "We Are the World," and insists that open office and eschewing of traditional, regimented design process yields more creativity and better products. [WWD]
• TopShop head honcho Sir Philip Green tended to customers and fetched different sizes during Kate Mosspalooza at the TopShop on Oxford Street yesterday. [Vogue UK]
• Furniture makers Kartel teamed up with the best of the best in the world of fashion design to create chairs that are supposed to embody femininity. Or something. The girly chairs will be on view in the windows of Barney's flagship store on Madison Avenue sometime in May. [Fashion Week Daily]

• Having convinced men that they smell Unforgivable, Sean "P.Diddy" Combs takes on the women's fragrance market. His new scent, which smells like a pina colada, will be supported by an ad campaign depicting Diddy forcibly taking a woman from behind. Ah, we love the smell of debatably consensual sex in the morning! [WWD]
• Brooks Brothers makes a move towards the obvious, opening smaller, edited editions of their normal retail stores in resort locations and calling the wares there "The Country Club Collection." And everywhere, WASPS breathe a sigh of relief. [WWD]
• Fashion's favorite enfant terrible John Galliano will not photographer William Klein's plagiarism allegations lying down. He was "inspired", not "stealing," ok??? [Vogue UK]