Material World

FT column: Beckham’s next goal

Vanessa Friedman — Fri, 24 May 2013 22:37:09 +0000

It has been a week since David Beckham stepped off the field for Paris Saint-Germain in the final game of his celebrated football career; a week since the tears and hugs and accolades rained; a week since the whispers began.

The speculation is about what he will do next, of course. Though some interesting possibilities have been mooted (Beckham should learn to act and be the next James Bond! He should go into politics!), the majority opinion so far is leaning toward fashion. And by fashion I don’t mean another one-off collaboration for H&M; I mean something long-term that could land on the schedule of the London collections: men. Just imagine the promotional potential, not just for Beckham, but London menswear as a whole.

Making sense of ‘accessible’ luxury

Vanessa Friedman — Fri, 24 May 2013 12:04:12 +0000

The other day I was talking to Geraldo da Conceicao, Sonia Rykiel’s new creative director, about his plans for the brand, when he said something that surprised me. “I want us to be an accessible luxury brand,” he announced. Hmmm, I responded: “So you are dropping your price points?” He looked confused. “No, not at all. In fact, they are probably going up.” Now it was my turn to be puzzled.

Proenza Schouler: creative computing – the real tech revolution

Vanessa Friedman — Thu, 23 May 2013 13:36:49 +0000

When we (and I do not mean the royal We, but We the fashion collective) talk about fashion and technology, we almost always talk about Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and Tumblr and ecommerce, and so on – ways for brands to communicate with consumers – and then we talk about how fashion was so bad at it, and how important it is, an industry-changer, etc. But this week was Internet Week in New York, and I had a conversation with Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez of Proenza Schouler that made me think we’ve all been missing the real revolution. It’s not in comms (or not only); it’s behind-the-scenes, in creativity.

Is menswear the next big e-tail thing?

Vanessa Friedman — Wed, 22 May 2013 14:01:59 +0000

We all know menswear is seen as a Great Luxury Hope, what with the Chinese market being driven by male consumers with money. Hence the Kering acquisition of Brioni; LVMH focusing on Berluti and buying French made-to-measure tailor Arnys to make apparel; Hermes and Coach opening mensonly shops, and so on. Now, however, it seems the on-line folks are also thinking along these lines. Yesterday MenInvest, the slightly cringe-worthy-named Paris-based e-commerce group bought the even odder named upmarket UK site Oki-ni.com, which specialises in “cutting-edge” menswear, for an undisclosed sum.

Not-so-valuable Luxury brands

Vanessa Friedman — Tue, 21 May 2013 13:48:01 +0000

The WPP/BrandZ Top 100 Global Brands ranking is out today – OMG! OMG! – and, as usual (for me, anyway) what ISN’T on it, when it comes to fashion and luxury, is more interesting than what makes the grade.

Of course, that isn’t hard to parse, since only FOUR (yes, more capital letters, but this is big) traditional luxury brands do make the grade. And yes, you can argue that Apple (#1) and BMW (#24) are luxury brands, but let’s stick to the generally accepted silk/apparel/leathergoods/watch & jewellery categories, for clarity’s sake.

And in those categories, we have: Louis Vuitton, Hermes, Gucci and Prada. That’s it.

Yup: no Burberry. No Ralph Lauren. No Cartier. No Armani. No Fendi or Celine. No Bottega Veneta or Balenciaga. No Michael Kors. Uh oh. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

Rumble in Milan

Vanessa Friedman — Mon, 20 May 2013 13:39:33 +0000

Oooh, the trash talk out of Milan. Having finally woken up to the fact that London Fashion Week is getting buzzier, and that such a development could be a threat to Milan, its collections, and the related economic windfall that comes to a city during showtime, Milanese designers are joining forces to defend their territory – but the infighting has already begun. The gossip and name-calling is fun to watch, but behind it is a real issue currently afflicting every fashion week: the tension between national industry interest and a brand’s self-interest.

Richemont’s Johan Rupert redefines luxury as a year off

Vanessa Friedman — Thu, 16 May 2013 14:26:24 +0000

The announcement that came along with Richemont's 2012 annual results this morning that chairman Johan Rupert (left), is taking a year off from running the world's second biggest luxury company starting this September is by far, to me at least, the most interesting part of the statement. For a man who has built the largest watch and jewellery Group to take a year off at age 62 – which, let’s face is not so old -- at a time when the exponential growth trajectory of the luxury sector has started to slow is a little, well, surprising. And leads to all sorts of interesting speculation.

Rebuilding fashion for the internet: from Versus to Matches

Vanessa Friedman — Wed, 15 May 2013 12:31:30 +0000

Tonight Donatella Versace is unveiling her new Versus Versace JW Anderson line, a capsule collection with a too-wordy name made in collaboration with YBD J.W. Anderson. She is doing so at 9:30 pm, in the form of a concert/party, which feels old-fashioned: very 1980s big top, like when Jean-Paul Gaultier and Thierry Mugler had shows in stadiums, as opposed to recession-restrained. And yet this is, at least strategically, a very new-fangled brand. Essentially, it has been re-built for the on-line world.

How far does cultural and creative protectionism go?

Vanessa Friedman — Tue, 14 May 2013 12:17:27 +0000

I wonder what the luxury world makes of the new French initiative to protect its culture in the digital age by imposing a tax on sales of tablets, smart phones, etc? They, after all, (the luxury folks, that is) have been promoting themselves as a “cultural industry” for the last few years. I mean, the name of their pan-European lobbying group is the European Cultural and Creative Industries Alliance. In case you missed it somehow. Yet as far as I know they don’t benefit from any protectionist legislation, in France anyway.

Luxury profits from baby boomers: glasses are the new handbags

Vanessa Friedman — Mon, 13 May 2013 12:27:56 +0000

So the other day I was chatting with Safilo CEO Roberto Vedovotto, trying to get to the root of the explosion in optics – they’re fast catching up to handbags as the super-accessory of choice – when he threw out an interesting theory: it’s the baby boomers, stupid.