Material Girl Builds Brand; Martin + Osa To Close
Latest- Madonna got a clothing line. Not with Ed Hardy, but with Iconix — and her juniors’ clothes will hit Macy’s under the label “Material Girl” as soon as August. Expect a variety of other collections to follow, including eyewear. [WWD]
- “People always ask if I think about a concept or the show or the front row or whatever first. No! Fuck off! The client comes first! The collection is driven by what clients want in different parts of the world, so I want them to be able to see it straight away and to judge it for themselves. Well I just think that which celebrities are wearing it, what reviews say – none of it matters if it’s all there for people to make their own minds up. I’m 40 now, but I want this to be a company that lives way beyond me, and I believe that customers are more important to making that happen than press. When I’m dead, hopefully this house will still be going. On a spaceship. Hopping up and down above the earth.” — Alexander McQueen, in an interview with LOVE before his death on February 11. [Fashionista]
- The Guardian, on McQueen‘s brief collection, presented posthumously yesterday: “There were chill moments, such as when the Paris sunlight caught the sculpted heel of an ankle boot revealing a carving of a broken skull. The skull had come to be something of a McQueen trademark, but here it appeared crushed. Elsewhere, McQueen’s interest in 15th century art seemed to dwell on the Netherlandish solemnity of Hugo van der Goes and the early surrealism of Heironymus Bosch.” [Guardian]
- The Times of London‘s take: “As someone who specialised in orchestrating haunting spectacles, McQueen would have appreciated this concentrated distillation of his world view – in particular, the visceral sense his diminutive audience had that he himself was still there. The soundtrack of sepulchral 17th-century choral music was what he had listened to while he worked on this collection. The outfits we saw were the ones for which he had cut the patterns and chosen the fabrics.” [ToL]
- Suzy Menkes wrote that the show “was a requiem for a great designer. His vision of Gothic glory, with a world bathed in religious symbolism, was translated not just with immense subtlety and beauty but also with the urgent futurism that was the essence of his spirit.” [IHT]
- The Wall Street Journal‘s Christina Binkley sees Sandro Botticelli‘s angels and Bosch’s demons in the collection, which was made from textiles that incorporated images from the art historical canon. Before his death, McQueen tweeted, “Hells angels [sic] and prolific demons,” which may have been a reference to the collection he was working on. [WSJ]
- Michelle Obama met Jason Wu for the first time at the unveiling ceremony for her inaugural ball dress at the Smithsonian. The designer said, “To say that she has changed my life is truly an understatement.” The First Lady, who wore Prabal Gurung, said of Wu’s dress, “It is simple, it’s elegant and it comes from this brilliant young mind, someone who is living the American dream. The countless hours that you can see that he spent sewing this piece made my night even more special and now I am proud that millions of visitors will be able to see just how talented this young man is.” [WWD]
- “Style is wearing an evening dress to McDonald’s, wearing heels to play football. It is personality, confidence and seduction.” — John Galliano [Vogue UK]
- Christie Brinkley is auctioning off the Armani suit she wore to marry Peter Cook to benefit the Red Cross. [NYDN]
- Jennifer Aniston, who was rumored to be shopping a fragrance deal last month, is reported to have entered into an agreement with the Falic Group. Falic is famous for two things in fashion: closing Christian Lacroix, firing the designer and over 100 workers, and pimping out the brand for licenses, and giving Eva Longoria Parker a perfume. Aniston could see as much as $10 million for the deal. [WWD]
- And Blondie’s Debbie Harry is lending her name to a line of sneakers for Nike brand Converse. [Contactmusic]
- Kourtney, Khloe, and Kim Kardashian will be the faces of PerfectSkin, some kind of skin care thing we’ll no doubt be hearing a lot about soon. [CocoPerez]
- Min-Ha T. Pham at Threadbared has written probably the best analysis of haul vlogging — the phenomenon of YouTube videos, invariably made by young women, who detail their recent acquisitions of clothing and beauty products, and which we cannot really watch because they always make us feel buyer’s remorse by proxy. Haul vloggers got a drive-by from The Cut recently — happens, it’s the Internet, not kindergarten — and one posted a response video that included the plea, “Shouldn’t the editor of New York magazine try to be inspiring to women rather than bashing other women? I mean, shouldn’t they try to report on factual information rather than accusations based on outward appearances?” which is funny because, well, there exists no feminist obligation to regard with glowing, sisterly positivity all activities that other women engage in, and to be “factual” about it, the Cut writer concerned, Amy Odell, is not “the editor of New York.” While tracing the extent to which the criticisms of haul vlogging echo the “‘dumb girl fashion/capitalist victim” talk that dismisses fashion consumerism as feminine stupidity,” Pham also wonders, “How are material entitlements to Forever21 jewelry and teeth whitening strips coextensive with a moral discourse about love and inspiration among women?” [Threadbared]
- Liberty of London for Target hits stores on Sunday, but if you live in New York, there’s an adorable-looking pop-up store near Bryant Park that opens today. [WWD]
- Dodai, that awesome bike you want is $199.99. [NYDN]
- “I think our magazine will really showcase the diversity of our people. Top photographers from all countries will shoot for the magazine in Turkey and abroad to bring a brand new vision of Vogue,” says Seda Domaniç, the editor of Vogue Turkey, the magazine that launched with a picture of the blonde Canadian model Jessica Stam on its cover. [FWD]
- “I’m really proud of this post in particular. This is literally the 30th version of this kaleidoscope image we created for the blog. Noah from Complex asked me if I created the Versus gif (the animated graphic image file) from a few days ago that included the quickly flashed naked woman, that let me know it was necessary to express how much time and thought goes into these posts. From choosing every frame, to photoshopping, to saturating and animating 35 cells to create a gif, then not being satisfied with the post, then bouncing ideas off of my team. MY FAVORITE QUESTION: HOW CAN WE MAKE THIS BETTER? The idea of adding a naked woman was thrown up. We proceeded to find a naked woman online, then photoshop the models head and Versus shoes onto the body, change the skin tone and remove the landing strip from above the coochie. Lets ad the naked woman in… still not good enough… she went by to quick so we preceded to place her throughout the animation 3 times instead of popping up just once… We have Magic!!! I look at the blog and make slight adjustments daily. We lock every page where most blogs re-categorize images when you search previous pages. Every page is like an outfit and cannot be compromised by a previous post. The Givenchy shirt was shot on my living room floor, photoshopped and saturated. It’s all worth it though. I hear people love it. That’s what matters the most to me.” Kanye West sure does take fashion blogging pretty seriously. [KanyeWest]
- Christian Siriano‘s really, really unusual curved heels have hit Payless. At least, certain Payless locations: the one in our neighbourhood seems to have gotten the toned-down versions. Boo. (Wherever you live, you can acquire these exemplars of Siriano’s undiluted vision online, if you want, for $79.99.) [Racked]
- Gisele Bündchen has a blog. (Ghostwritten, we imagine! Girl is busy.) This post about childbirth is tagged, “Destaque, Gisele’s Way, Meaning of Life.” [GiseleBündchen]
- Kelly Cutrone insisted that the segment of Kell On Earth where she went to Babeland for sex toys and condoms be included in the show, after producers told her they were going to make it an online extra. [P6]
- The Times sees references to science fiction aplenty in the collections. [NYTimes]
- Transit strikes in Paris have paralyzed the city, and American Vogue‘s Grace Coddington and Tonne Goodman arrived nearly an hour late to Valentino. As is fashion show S.O.P., they were booed by the photographers’ pit. But Hamish Bowles apparently felt the need to clap for the poor dears. [FWD]
- Giancarlo Giammetti, who shared less-than-glowing words about Valentino’s couture show on his Facebook, turned out to support the designers Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pier Paolo Piccioli yesterday. [WWD]
- Chiuri and Piccioli apparently asked Kenneth Anger to make a film to run in the background of the show. How fucking cool is that? [@Jeanne_Beker]
- Burberry is suing the parent company of Marshalls and T.J. Maxx over alleged copyright infringement. Burberry alleges it found counterfeit Burberry polo shirts for sale at a Marshalls store. [WWD]
- Amber Le Bon is the new face of Pantene Pro-V in England. [Daily Mail]
- Rumor has it that Elle MacPherson and Laetitia Casta will make a turn on the catwalk for Louis Vuitton today. [WWD]
- Givenchy allegedly screwed over some models with its casting. After offering five girls “exclusives” — in which the models agreed, for 1,500 Euros, not to walk for any other designers in Paris — the label cut them from the show the night before, according to one agency booker. Prada does that kind of thing all the time. [P6]
- The Northampton Museum and Art Gallery is mounting an exhibition to mark the 50th anniversary of Doc Martens. [Telegraph]
- After months of shilly-shallying, American Eagle has finally announced the closure of its money-losing Martin + Osa “concept store” chain. [WWD]
- Neiman Marcus eked out a profit of $4 million for the fourth quarter. Last year during the same period, the company lost $509.3 million. So that’s an improvement. [WSJ]
- J. Crew‘s same-store sales were up 17% in the fourth quarter, and it turned a profit of just over $40 million. [Forbes]
- Foot Locker wants to move away from running shoes: it sees the future, and better sales, in “athletically inspired shoes and apparel,” says CEO Ken Hicks. [WWD]
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