Today, Phoebe Philo launched her first collection via her website phoebephilo.com where she showcased her debut collection for her new eponymous label. What are your thoughts on the new collection and will she reach the heights she did at Celine or Chloe?
After Phoebe left Celine in December 2017, the industry was taken by surprise when Hedi Slimane took on the brand’s creative leadership and retired her minimalist aesthetic. Slimane’s Celine is doing brisk business and is said to be approaching 3 billion euros in annual revenue, but it has left the tribe of so-called “Philophiles” without their beloved designer’s highly covetable bags, shoes and ready-to-wear.
Of course, Phoebe’s ‘old Celine’ designs are still in wide circulation on resale sites like Vestiaire Collective which says it has already facilitated the sale of 25,000 old Celine items this year. And several labels - from Jil Sander and Peter Do to The Row and Bottega Veneta - have attempted to fill the gap she left in the market. Then there are also the labels helmed by her former protégés, including Daniel Lee, Nadège Vanhee-Cybulsk and Peter Do.
Such is Phoebe’s enduring influence that even new Gucci creative director Sabato de Sarno took a page from her playbook when he teased his new vision for the Italian luxury megabrand over the summer with advertisements featuring Daria Werbowy, the quintessential Phoebe Philo model, in a natural no makeup look that could be right out of an old Celine campaign.
Phoebe’s digital approach is also a reflection of something deeper. Most star designers don’t get their own labels because it is very hard to make the economics of a start-up fashion brand work using the traditional luxury business model, rooted in expensive fashion shows and physical stores.
For Phoebe’s new venture to work, she is also going to have to embrace new ways of working. That she has moved to an all-digital launch (no fashion show invitation in sight!) and revealed the first visuals online demonstrates the most notable thing about Monday’s launch: Phoebe’s new operating model. The approach is (1) a necessity now that she is running a startup; (2) a reflection of the changing times given how and where the fashion conversation takes place; and possibly (3) a realisation that since she is starting her business from scratch, she can do things the way it make sense to her without having to operate by any industry rules or conventions - VIA BOF
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7 сен 2024
