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By Vanessa Friedman
This year will be a seismic year in fashion. It’s obvious.
In fact, it is clear that this year will be a year of seismic adjustments in the fashion workforce. Starting this month, new designers from 8 global brands, plus Calvin Klein and Chanel, will make their runway debut. As will be the case at Bottega Veneta, Lanvin, Givenchy, Tom Ford, Alberta Ferretti and Dries Van Noten, with the option of more positions being filled at Fendi, Maison Margiela, Helmut Lang and Carven in the coming months.
Sheesh! Whether that power shift will translate into seismic change in what we wear is a different question.
There has been much speculation as to the source of the turmoil. Much blame has focused on a slowdown in luxury spending (especially in China), as well as global political and economic uncertainty, which has led to a game of Blame the Designer (when in doubt, blame the designer), which led to Change the Designer.
In such an environment, there is a tendency to play it safe. Falling back into the comfort of a camel coat and assuming that what sold well in the future will sell well in the future. Focus on advertising rather than creativity.
That would be a mistake.
It’s time for a fashion revolution. The kind of revolution that Coco Chanel created in the 1920s, when she transformed the little black dress, the uniform of the servant class, into a prestigious symbol of liberation, causing Paul Poiret to clutch his chest in horror and declare : “What did he do? Chanel? invented? Luxury poverty. His consumers looked like “malnourished little telegraph clerks,” he sneered.
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