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You will instantly realise why Jesca Hoop, LA enfant terrible, has made the cut – as travelling in credit crunch central has made Money a very hot topic.
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Here is a clever way that Consuelo Castiglioni, the super clever Marni designer, is dealing with the credit crunch -she is releasing the new Marni Summer Edition 2009 line. The idea is to recycle some of her favourite archive pieces to revive the label’s spirit ( and bottom line.)
“My initial aim was to create a collection made out of clothes and accessories that give you the feeling that they have always belonged to you. It is a construction of memories and of style which, in time, have become distinctive Marni features.” Castiglioni told Vogue.
So she is taking the very au -courrant idea of shopping your own wardrobe and adapting it by shopping her own collections. Brilliant.
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“Recession is in the air – and on the runways, where it seems that men can dress for the winter 2009/10 season in any colors, as long as they are shades of gray, black and white” proclaimed Ms Suzy Menkes about the mood on the menswear catwalk in Milan this weekend. All I want is work and a steady salary was the witty riff in American Designer Thom Browne’s show ( pictured). Herecreated a 50′s work space populated by identikit men with a yen for Weberian order and a paycheck. Here’s a link to the IHT slideshow
What can I say “credit crunch is not a breakfast cereal” – to quote a merchant banker friend of mine
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PS. I have also included another round up of the shows in the same vein after the break Read More…
I was reading the Elle News Blog - one of the gals had just been to Tiffany party at the skating rink at Somerset House. I love that ice-skating parties are all the rage – the soundtrack was pre lunacy Michael Jackson and the snacks included these delightful cupcakes served with lashings of hot chocolate.
Comforting, given that they have just released their results and it seems that the credit crunch has taken a greedy bite out of the Tiffany cupcake to the tune of 20%.
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( Thanks to Elle for the pic)
The dawning of each new year brings with it an abundance of futurists, necromancers and fortune tellers reading the entrails and casting the bones so that we less prescient mortals will have an inkling of impending developments.
Web based Trendhunter.com have produced this little vid – their top trend for 2009 ” no 1. CREDIT CRUNCH COUTURE (Economy / Fashion) – From DIY jewelry to home-made shoes, the rediscovery of individual clothing is being fuelled by our troubled economy. Interest in DIY is even sparking top designers like Hermes, with their DIY status bags and Vivienne Westwood who showcased a collection of clothing made from towels, curtains and scrap material ”
Our very own trend analyst Dion Chang ( Flux ) has put out a handy summary of things about to strike the collective conscience. (Read the full transcript after the break) And just because – here’s a little link to the mystic doyen of futurecasting Li Edelkoort’s site.
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Read More…
We will all have to be just like scouts this Christmas as ye old credit crunch takes a short sharp bite out of our christmas cheer. We will all be forced be thrifty, frugal and prepared.
In that light I thought this was a very amusing and useful list of Christmas gifts from the New York Post which puts a rather positive spin on the newly fashionable state of scoutdom. Due to expensive packaging these little gifts will send all the right signals under the Xmas tree without destroying the budget ( well maybe just a wee bit.)
(This Marc Jacobs ring comes in at a whopping 17 dollars – so you might still have some spare change for the flight to New York- there are quite a number though that you can get here at home without the need for transcontinental travel)
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The credit crunch has done nothing to put a damper on the shopping mayhem as confirmed by the insane queues outside H&M for the launch of the Comme des Garcons line yesterday. It’s a high low conquest and apparently if you could not get your mittens on the goods then dozens of clever punters have stocked e-bay for your convenience – perhaps we can all take out a loan together to cover the courier fee.
In the interim Simon Shear sent me this little article to read about it …
I want a pair of these to go with my new found adoration of the game of tennis …
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I was lured to this Times article thinking it would give me some insight into how to make my measly salary magically reproduce itself so that I could do more of the thing I am being deprived of – namely shopping.
Instead it is a rather amusing take on what retailers should be doing to improve the shopping experience – oh well I suppose I will have to win the lotto or something.
Anyway this is the paragraph that caught my attention
According to this week’s let’s-all- slash-our-wrists survey, this time by PricewaterhouseCoopers, one in five shops could be “void” by the time that the economy picks up again, partly because of the downturn, partly because new shopping centres, equivalent in size to eight Bluewaters, are opening in the next 18 months, including the 43-acre Westfield in Shepherds Bush, West London, which opened last month. Although this report sounds as though it was written by 13-year-old girls with a Doctor Who obsession (wouldn’t closed have done the job just as well as void?) and serious GCSE anxiety, this is not completely bad news. First, it will clear out some dross. Secondly, it should remind all of our beloved retailers that, rather than spending the next few years concreting, glassing and champagnebarring over every last blade of grass, they might prefer to concentrate on improving service in their existing empires.
Link through to read her advice to retailers who plan to survive the voiding….
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