Oscar Pistorius Is Losing All of His Fashion Endorsement Deals

Nike and Mugler have each dropped Oscar Pistorius as a brand ambassador in the wake of the shooting death of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp. According to Nike, the accused murderer and double-amputee athlete’s lucrative endorsement contract with the sportswear giant has been “suspended” pending the outcome of his criminal trial. Pistorius had been the face of Mugler’s AMen fragrance since 2011 — the men’s version of its popular Angel scent — but the company announced it is withdrawing the ads out of “respect and compassion” for the Steenkamp family. Pistorius had starred in Nike ads that bore the tag-line “I am the bullet in the chamber.” [WWD, WWD]

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For Into The Gloss, Olivier Theyskens did a kind of DVD-extras-style designer’s commentary on his beautiful fall collection for Theyskens’ Theory, which was based on ideas of futurism (“but not in a utopic way,” Theyskens pointed out at the time). [Vimeo]

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Michelle Obama chose to wear a Reed Krakoff dress for the official portrait showcasing those mid-life crisis bangs. [WWD]

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Here’s Gisele in a new Chanel makeup ad. [YouTube]

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• Charlotte Free‘s comments about Terry Richardson have elicited criticism from model Sara Ziff of the Model Alliance. After calling the models who’ve accused Richardson of sexual harassment “stupid bitches” in a (since-deleted) Tumblr post, Free added:
• “I don’t even believe the accusations against terry…. And if they are true, I still stand by what I said. I shouldn’t have used such offensive language…I’m sick of people making stuff up about him, and even if it was true, I still have Terry’s back no matter what.”
• Refinery29 called the Maybelline model’s statements,
• A comment on the entire modeling profession, one that seems to suggest that if you don’t accept an uncomfortably sexualized working condition someone eventually will and, perhaps should, replace you. It’s the way these things work, both with Richardson and others, the logic goes. Deal with it or find another job. But, we can’t agree.
• And Ziff says:
• “There is a long history of people like Charlotte Free blaming the victim in situations where there is an abuse of power…Free’s logic that, ‘everyone is a free individual and so is responsible for the choices they make,’ is appealing in the abstract, but it’s also incredibly naive to think that, in reality, everyone has the same ability to resist mistreatment. This is why we protect children, it’s why we have workplace harassment laws, and it’s why we have a minimum wage. It’s not always economically or socially feasible to just leave, or just say ‘no’, because you don’t like how you’re being treated.”
• [Refinery29]
• A publicist for the fashion label Moncler has been arrested for stealing a Salvador Dalí painting worth $150,000 from a Manhattan art gallery last year. The painting was mailed back to the gallery from Greece within days of the theft, and police matched a fingerprint on the mailing tube to prints on file for the publicist Phivos Lampros Istavrioglou, who had previously been arrested for shoplifting a steak at Whole Foods. [NYPost]
• Vera Wang on her current business strategy: “Our really big push is into Asia.” The designer added, “I don’t mean to sound like Ghengis Khan here. I’m not on a horse with a sword.” [Fashionista]
• Stephen Burrows‘ early work will be the subject of an exhibition at the Museum of the City of New York this spring. It opens on March 22. [NYTimes]
• Luxury giant Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy has bought a stake in the label designed by Maxime Simoëns, the young French designer. Although the exact size and value of the deal were not revealed, Simoëns is understood to have retained a majority stake in his namesake brand. [WSJ]
• This entire however-many-thousand-words article in the New York Times today seems devoted to exploring the phenomenon of people who work in fashion sometimes caring about how they dress. Or even crafting a look for themselves. Imagine! [NYTimes]
• Marchesa co-founder Georgina Chapman is launching a line of formal wear at J.C. Penney. The brand is a mouthful, get ready: Pearl by Georgina Chapman of Marchesa. Phew! Prices will span $50-$250 and the first pieces from the line will hit stores March 1. [WWD]
• Apparently Google is working with Warby Parker, the online eyewear start-up, to make its Google glasses less fugly. Neither company would confirm the relationship. [NYTimes]
• Alessandra Facchinetti, who previously designed for Gucci and Valentino, has landed a gig as the creative director of women’s wear for Tod’s. [Vogue UK]
• Well-known blog the Business of Fashion just had a cool redesign, paid for with part of the $2 million in financing the site raised last year to fund its growth. [On The Runway]
• Fashionologie, the fashion blog founded in 2005 by Tommye Fitzpatrick and later acquired by the company that runs the Sugar network of blogs, no longer exists as an independent brand. All of the Sugar blogs have been folded into the network’s most successful property, PopSugar. Fashionologie is now PopSugar’s “Fashion News” vertical. [Fashionista]
• Iconix Brand Group bought Lee Cooper for $72 million in cold, hard cash. [WWD]
• And now, a moment in the media pit at fashion week. The photographers and videographers who pack themselves onto the riser at the end of the runway are different than other fashion show guests. They don’t need to request invitations to attend shows — their media passes entitle them to access to the pit — and they don’t have assigned seats. Consequently, the hierarchy of the pit is pretty intense. But one gets the sense that the photographers don’t feel beholden to the show’s organizers in the same way that seated guests can; often during or before a show, rumblings and shouted commands emerge from the pit. For instance, photographers are always yelling at the editors and celebrities in the front row to uncross their legs — crossed legs create shadows on narrow runways that can ruin shots — and it’s hard to imagine anyone else at a fashion show screaming at, say, Anna Wintour in that way. Once we were at a Jill Stuart show when the music cut out for a few seconds, and all the photographers started singing. When the music came back on, they laughed. Anyway, here’s a story about a guy born in 1934 who still shoots all four fashion weeks:
• Although those in the pit are often professional rivals, there’s a friendly atmosphere. Equipment and boxes are borrowed; favours are offered and accepted. If one has a disaster and fails to get the shot he needs, another might share his images. But there’s a firm hierarchy too. “It’s a little bit mafia,” says Moore. “The people who cover everything look after each other.”
• [The Cut]