The In-Betweeners: Why fashion pre-collections matter

By Alexander Fury 6:00 AM Thursday May 29, 2014

Chanel Cruise 2015, shown in Dubai. Picture / Olivier Saillant, Supplied

Cruise, resort, holiday. The fashion world isn't enjoying a vacation: in fact, quite the opposite. These are some of the confusing, obfuscating monikers given to fashion's new obsession, interim or "pre" collections - entire seasons of clothing presented between fashion's traditional spring/summer, autumn/winter split.
International designers are currently knee-deep in "cruise". The power-player troika of Christian Dior, Chanel and Louis Vuitton have presented their respective collections across three separate continents and others in the industry are scrambling to showcase their own wares in showroom appointments and presentations over the next two months.
These clothes will make up roughly 35 per cent of the designers' income - another 35 per cent comes from "pre-autumn", showcased from November to January each year. The remaining 30 per cent, or less, is composed of sales based on traditional spring/summer and autumn/winter catwalk shows.
That's a lot of sales figures. And really, that's what pre-collections are all about. "Cruise is our most important collection," stated Michael Burke, Louis Vuitton's CEO. "It's everybody's biggest collection." The tricky titles - "cruise" and "resort" - allude to their commercial origins: satisfying the demands of wealthy clients for fresh garments to wear during summer vacations.

Louis Vuitton Cruise 2015, shown in Monaco, and Dior Cruise 2015, shown in Brooklyn. Pictures / Supplied

The implication is that cruise clothing and collections are flimsy nothings, better suited to stuffing a suitcase than filling a catwalk. Perhaps that was once the case, but no more. Witness the time and money lavished on Christian Dior's recent cruise show in New York, Chanel's excursion to Dubai or Nicolas Ghesquiere's Louis Vuitton collection presented in Monaco last week.
Nevertheless, perhaps it's all part of a move away from fashion as pure fantasia. Ghesquiere intoned the word "real" repeatedly when talking about his Vuitton clothes, and regardless of the intricacy of their embroidered and jewelled surfaces, nothing felt overdone. Similarly, despite the Thousand And One Nights backdrop to Karl Lagerfeld's Chanel cruise show - staged on a man-made island off the Dubai coast, in a Moorish palace specially erected for the occasion at a rumoured cost of £1.4 million - there was a resolute commercial reality to the clothes. "I made a modern look for women all over the world," Lagerfeld stated. "This is, for me, a look that can translate for everybody in the world, especially with the travelling - it's a cruise collection."
There's that word again - cruise - which does seem to have an impact on designers' thought processes. Sometimes, it's a clanging impact: far too many designers can't see the clothes for the "cruise" and wind up splodging nautical stripes and dropping comedy anchors across their clothes.
"It needs to have a commercial impact," said Raf Simons, of the cruise collection he showed in New York for Christian Dior. "I am trying to bring a lot of reality to Dior ... they're not going to be 3m tall," he continued, miming a towering pair of platform shoes. "It's a cruise collection."
During that Chanel cruise show, one fashion editor made an apt comment: that the ready-to-wear was replacing haute couture, in its use of expensive, labour-intensive techniques and in its unwearability. The pre-collections, by contrast, have elevated themselves over the past few years from suitcase-stuffing to wearable; practical, saleable, yet undoubtedly "designed" clothes. Chanel dubs its pre-autumn collections "Metiers d'Art", using them to showcase techniques of craft specialists, such as the embroidery houses Lesage and Montex or the Scottish cashmere company Barrie. That doesn't come cheap. Nevertheless, with high-profile clientele demanding more of their fashion, ironically in today's marketplace of hyper-luxury, they are commercial.
Our demands of designers' pre-collections are being pushed higher and higher. If these collections were virtually unheard of 20 years ago, the lavish spectacles of Dior, Chanel and Louis Vuitton are only the most visible examples of a seismic fashion shift from two seasons to four. Pre-seasons - previously for buyers' eyes only - are reported as avidly as the biannual catwalk shows on websites such as style.com - and in the pages of magazines. In a sense, they're also satisfying a demand, for physical product and fashion imagery; for fresh ideas and creativity.
So pre-collections are great for fashion buyers, for wealthy clients and for frock-watchers. They provide extra trends for high street retailers such as Topshop to latch on to (incidentally, said high street behemoth has no fewer than 52 drops of fresh product each year). But where does it leave the designers?
"Has a designer ever said they like pre-collections?" asks Lazaro Hernandez of Proenza Schouler. "I think that there's always been this fight between editorial and expressing creativity, and commercial clothes," he continues. "Somewhere along the line, they split up."
"More commercial, less expensive," interjects his Proenza partner, Jack McCollough. "Pre-collection is delivered earlier, but it goes on sale at the same time as the collection. It has a really long shelf life."
"It's weird, because we started with two seasons; we got to see the tail-end of that and the beginning of these four seasons," continues Hernandez, of the beginnings of the Proenza Schouler label in 2002. Then he sighs and exclaims: "It's a pain in the ass."
If we're honest, that's probably the reaction of many designers when confronted with the doubled workload the pre-collections represent. Despite the financial benefits, cruise is no vacation for the fashion industry.
- The Independent

By Alexander Fury

Can Better Fashion And Enhanced Savings Help Abercrombie & Fitch's Results?

Abercrombie & Fitch, which was once among the most sought after apparel brands in the U.S., has lost a number of its customers to other brands in the last two years. While the company’s comparable sales increased by 7% and 5% in 2010 and 2011, respectively, they declined by 1% in 2012 and slumped by 11% in 2013. Abercrombie’s premium prices, its slow response to changing trends and seasons, along with improper inventory management, were the main reasons responsible for its dismal sales. In an environment where teenage buyers are extremely cost and fashion conscious, Abercrombie hasn’t been the most viable shopping option.
However, the company is trying hard to win back customers by aggressively working on improving fashion and reducing product prices. Earlier this year, it hired a tech firm, First Insight Inc, to test its merchandise for customer response during the product development cycle. This move was expected to help Abercrombie reduce the risks involved in launching a new collection. We are eager to see if the retailer’s products received the desired response in Q1 fiscal 2014, which will become clear when the company comes out with its quarterly results on May 29. Apart from revamping its fashion content, Abercrombie is planning to bring its prices down to a more competitive level. To ensure that this move doesn’t put pressure on its margins, the retailer is taking certain steps to lower its SG&A expenses and source goods at cheaper prices.
While the aforementioned moves appear valid, we may not see a significant improvement in Abercrombie’s results in the near future. Yet, the slightest glimpse of recovery will indicate that the retailer is moving in the right direction.

Our price estimate for Abercrombie & Fitch stands at $39.72, which is about 10% ahead of the market price.

Better Fashion Can Have A Positive Impact On Customer Response
Taking cue from successful low-cost fast-fashion brands such as Gap Inc, Urban Outfitters, Forever 21, H&M etc., Abercrombie is looking to revamp its product portfolio. The company is working on improving its designs, shortening lead times and increasing style differentiation to offer a better variety of fashion assortments and remain responsive to changing trends. Abercrombie’s partnership with First Insight Inc will enable it to test its products much earlier in the product development cycle and plan their launch accordingly. First Insight Inc leverages online social engagement tools to study consumer preferences and provides predictive analysis to the company. It also incorporates customer feedback before giving a recommendation to Abercrombie. In its recent quarterly update, the retailer stated that it is now testing 100% of its assortments, that will help it better understand customer tastes, and reduce the risks related to its fashion launches.
Additionally, the company is employing a vertical organization structure for categories such as planning, merchandising and design for each individual brand. Along with brand differentiation, this should help Abercrombie effectively address the needs of its business. The retailer is utilizing new fabric platforming techniques to increase its speed to market and it will also start including vendor designed products in its merchandise mix Q1 fiscal 2014 onwards. Overall, we expect these efforts to translate into a more appealing product range that can help Abercrombie attract customers. However, given that Abercrombie’s brand image has taken severe damage over the past several quarters due to its missed fashion calls and controversial comments, a turnaround in the first quarter seems unlikely. Nevertheless, fresh fashion will be welcomed by the customers.

Efforts To Improve Cost Savings Can Help Margins

Since the U.S. retail industry has been relatively bleak over the last one year on account of weak economic environment, buyers have been placing greater value on the cost of products. Therefore, it’s necessary for Abercrombie to keep its prices affordable and somewhat inline with its competitors’ prices. Although the retailer is striving from competitive prices in order to improve its store traffic, enhanced pressure on margins is threatening for its profitability. As a result, the retailer is looking to enhance its cost savings to ensure that its efforts to attract customers do not end up eating its profits.

Abercrombie is planning to reduce the cost of its clothing, to help offer products at lower prices without much pressure on its margins. The closure of its intimate brand Gilly Hicks is also expected to have a certain positive impact on its cost savings. The retailer closed 16 Gilly Hicks stores during Q4 fiscal 2013 and is expected to shut the remaining ones in the first quarter of 2014. In its last earnings call, the company stated that it saved nearly $25 million during the fourth quarter as a part of its profit improvement initiative. For fiscal 2014, Abercrombie expects to save $175 million in areas such as store repairs and maintenance, store packaging, IT, supplies, and corporate overhead.

With better fashion content and lower product prices, the retailer should be able to drive greater store traffic and operate with fewer markdowns. Moreover, its enhanced savings can have a slight positive effect on its operating margins. That said, the impact of these factors might not be strong enough to pull Abercrombie out of its slump.

East Africa ups the fashion stakes

27 May 2014 15:39 Amy Fallon


Fashion Weeks in Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi provide a showcase for local designers and are spurring similar events in neighbouring countries.

The fashion industries of East Africa are still in the nascent stage, viewed less seriously than other sectors and under-resourced with no technical schools. But those with a love for fashion have embraced innovation when it comes to clothing, perhaps because designers face stiff competition from the region’s booming second-hand clothes trade.
Western imports with the ability to clothe the masses cheaply are pushing designers further than ever when it comes to breaking boundaries. And Kampala, Kigali and Bujumbura showed Lagos and Johannesburg that they are style forces to be reckoned with at the launch of a Great Lakes fashion initiative on Saturday.
Kampala Fashion Intro, held at the Ugandan capital city’s Serena Hotel, showcased the creations of 13 fashion designers on 33 models from Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi to “promote unity in the region, and fashion and the arts as a serious business”. It is the first in a series of events planned in these countries and will eventually include Kenya and Tanzania.
“We need to embrace our Ugandaness and love Made in Uganda products,” said Anna-Clare Lukoma (35), who teamed parachute hem dresses with kooky glasses, turbans and statement jewellery from local brand Balungi. Balungi’s creations were made from horn, banana fibre and paper sourced in Uganda.
Local inspiration
Lukoma drew inspiration for her Lulu label collection from local culture, using a palette of earthy oranges and browns, and black and blue. 
“Kampala is so chaotic that we need to create our own zen moments, and what better way to do that than drape ourselves in calm, luxurious fabrics that are comfortable and easy to wear,” she said. 

Models wearing Lulu with Balungi accessories, both Ugandan labels.

Lukoma launched Lulu in 2011, but now wants her involvement in the industry to “stretch into making a positive impact on development and social consciousness in Africa. “We have more than 80% of our able-bodied youths unemployed in Uganda,” said the designer, whose clothes were part of a United States Urban Outfitters African Bazaar pop-up shop last year.
“In our jaajas’ [grandmothers’] times, most people knew how to sew and took pride in creating replicas of high-quality foreign garments. These skills were not transferred to the next generation because academic skills became more revered.”
Behind the scenes
LDJ Productions assisted the inaugural Great Lakes Fashion Intro on the technical side. The production company has been behind the scenes at New York Fashion Week for the past 15 years and has also helped the Mumbai, Toronto and LA editions.
After working on the second Kigali Fashion Week in Rwanda in November, LDJ Productions ventured into neighbouring Uganda and is now looking at developing a business plan for its project there. President and chief executive Laurie DeJong said Burkina Faso and other West African nations had approached the company about working there.

Balungi Uganda designer Eva Mynsberghe and Julius Mugomba, a representative of Lulu.

“The whole idea is to bring our staff to underdeveloped countries to create pop-up workshops, then end in the production of an event,” DeJong told the Mail & Guardian.
“We don’t want to go on the ground and just produce a show, but want to share our skills, with the goal of the country being able to sustain it on their own after a few seasons.
“The vision is to assist with economic development and provide opportunities for woman via various arts fields.”
Business benefits
Cynthia Rupari (30), a Rwandan model-turned designer, said she’d benefited from being involved in the second Kigali Fashion Week. “I got some orders after it and that’s when I started to be known as a designer, not only as a model. I learnt how to make it.”
Using fabrics sourced from West Africa, her Kampala Fashion Intro range was a mix of evening dresses and sharp suits for the office in bold red and black, the result of Rupari having started work on the range around Valentine’s Day. 
The designer has a small showroom at her Kigali house and an online shop, but hopes to open her first Rwandan store this year. She continues to work in banking for the time being.
“Rwanda is a very good place to do business [and] such a peaceful country in the region, so many investors around the world are dreaming of doing business there,” she said.

Rwandan fashion designer Patrick Muhire (middle) and model turned designer Cynthia Rupari (right).

Next door in tiny Burundi, the organiser of the first Bujumbura Fashion Week, Cynthia Munwangari, hopes to put the country on the map not only as a fashion destination but also as one for tourism and investment. 
The theme of the debut event is “expressing our potential through fashion”, said Munwangari. “It’s to put Burundi in the sights and minds of the entire world as our fashion designers are exposed to the rest of the world.”
Bunjumbura Fashion Week takes place in the second week of July, Kigali Fashion Week takes place from November 3 to 7 and Kampala Fashion Week takes place on November 14 and 15.

Nuri Bilge Ceylan's 'Winter Sleep' is not what it seems

Director Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Palme d'Or winner for "Winter Sleep", Cannes, 24 May

Reuters/Regis Duvignau

By Rosslyn Hyams in Cannes

For its closing movie this year, Cannes changed its habits and showed a classic, A Fistful of Dollars – Un Pugno Pieno di Dollari of 1964, considered to be the first Spaghetti Western. It's a film which could hardly be in greater contrast to the winner of this year's Palme d'Or ...

Quentin Tarantino, a man of action movies, presented Sergio Leone’s.
The contrast with the Jury’s choice of film is probably a coincidence, nonetheless it’s an obvious one.

Dossier: Cannes Film Festival 2014

Jane Campion and her international team of eight directors and actors, decided that the Golden Palm award should go to a film with a concentration of words and only measured action.
In Winter Sleep, the land of Central Anatolia in Turkey is quickly covered with snow, but the heart of the earth beats still, ready to be awakened when it’s time. Director Nuri Bilge Ceylan allows more than three hours for audiences to think about it.
“This film needs more help than the others because it’s very long and I don’t have any intention to shorten it. I hope that this award will help other difficult art films to survive in the jungle,” he said.
If action there is, it’s sparse - a boy breaks a 4x4 window with a stone, his father cuts his hand by breaking the window of his own house with it.
The main character, Aydin, played pensively by Haluk Bilginer, remains aloof from it all. He’s a landowner, master of his hotel, his land, his tenants, his wife and sister, and he delegates.
He does everything, even his own writing, at a distance. His action is to free the once-wild horse he has had captured and broken-in, then, after emptying his body and his mind, to free himself. The two women, his young wife Nihal (Melisa Sözen), his divorced sister, Necla (Demet Akbag), provoke the retiree.
Far from Tarantino and Leone’s cinema world though it may be, Winter Sleep is a sort of action film after all.

Louise Wilson's Family's Statement

27 May 2014Scarlett Kilcooley-O'Halloran

 

Picture credit: Rex Features

THE family of Louise Wilson has released a statement expressing their "deep gratitude for the many condolences they have received in appreciation of her immense life's work".
While a private funeral will be held in Scotland, the statement says a memorial "to celebrate her life and many achievements" will happen in London later in the year. It also revealed that there are plans to establish a fund in Wilson's name to "honour [her] profound belief in access to fashion education".
The legendary and much-celebrated fashion professor died earlier this month.