Rising Office Towers in Madrid's Financial District | Source: urbemadrid.es

MADRID, Spain — Stately and full of world-class art at any time of the year, Madrid is particularly appealing in the fall, when the city welcomes buyers, journalists and other industry observers from around the world for the year’s second Pasarela Cibeles, in which Spanish designers and brands present their new collections during a week of runway shows. Having recently wrapped up its 52nd edition, Cibeles has grown into a reliable, professional trend and design showcase without losing the independent, even zany spirit that is an advantage of its outsider status.

While it would be easy to dismiss Madrid as a provincial side note on the ever more packed global fashion week schedule, attending the city’s latest round of collections, BoF found that valuable intelligence can be gleaned from the over forty shows, and that the event’s importance beyond Spain can only be expected to increase in future years.

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Self-Portrait, Nashville, 2005 | Photo: Mary McCartney

LONDON, United Kingdom — This evening at the Michael Hoppen Gallery is the private view of images from Mary McCartney’s first book, From Where I Stand, documenting her more than fifteen years of work as a photographer. Mary seems to have always had the natural instinct to observe and document the people around her, shying away from the spotlight that has shone on her family ever since her father, Sir Paul McCartney, became one of the most popular musicians of all time.

Over time, Mary also began to photograph advertising campaigns for her younger sister, Stella McCartney, which brought Mary closer to the fashion industry and inevitably led to some enviable behind-the-scenes moments, where Mary of course always had her camera at the ready, capturing many living fashion icons on film, including Kate Moss, Daphne Guinness and Bjork.

“I wanted to pick shots that stand alone,” says McCartney of the images she selected for the book. “I like the photographs of other people that inspired me to be a photographer that make me think: Who was that person? Where was this picture taken? What was the feel behind it? What the emotion behind it? Those are the things that intrigue me and drive me as a photographer.”

In advance of tonight’s event, I met with Mary over breakfast to get learn more about the images from her book linked to the fashion industry, each of which seems to have it’s own special story, which we can share exclusively with BoF readers today.

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The crowd at Fashion Pioneers with Natalie Massenet | Photo: Lawrence Randall

Dear BoF Community,

We are approaching our 4th birthday here at The Business of Fashion and have some big plans in store for 2011 — but before we go any further, we want to get your input on how to grow and develop The Business of Fashion in the year to come.

2010 has been an exceptional year for us. We launched our Fashion Pioneers series of exclusive live-streamed interviews with Natalie Massenet and Jefferson Hack, grew our website traffic by 250 percent, and now have more than 10,000 subscribers to our daily newsletter, which has become a tool that savvy industry insiders around the world have incorporated into their daily professional routine. BoF has also been honoured with media attention from all over the world this year — calling us “The Economist of Fashion“, “A Legitimate Authority“ and “Frankly Genius.”

The time has come for us to take all of this momentum and make BoF even better. As we embark on a new phase of design and development, we’d be grateful for your thoughts and ideas.

You can fill out the short anonymous BoF community survey by clicking here. It will take 2 minutes and will be hugely valuable to us.

Thank you very much for your time,

Imran Amed, Founder and Editor-in-Chief

Viktor and Rolf | Photo: Philip Riches

NEW YORK, United States — “We had big ambitions,” says Viktor Horsting on creating fashion house Viktor & Rolf with Rolf Snoeren. “From the very beginning we wanted to start very high,” he says, indicating the absolute apogee of couture elegance: “Start at the top, and everything else would fall into place after that. It was a very emotional ambition, not just in terms of the size of the business or wanting to be like a certain designer. It was more about fulfilling creative ambitions and working at the highest level possible.”

In 1993, the duo, known for their immaculate constructions and the pop-sensationalism of their shows, gave the world a glimpse of their aims with an underground presentation of their first collection in Paris, which won them the venerated Grand Prix de la Ville de Hyères. Seventeen years and nearly 50 collections later, Viktor & Rolf’s dramatic vision has itself become a sensation — the awards continue to roll in and in 2008, around the time both of the designers were celebrating their fortieth birthdays, their work was the subject of a retrospective at London’s esteemed Barbican Gallery.

Today, as they celebrate the five year anniversary of their wildly successful fragrance Flowerbomb with a rare trip to New York at the start of fashion week, the elegant gentlemen from the Netherlands say they finally have all the pieces in place to realize their vaulting ambition.

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Ana Locking Autumn/Winter 2010/2011 | Source: thefashionisto.com

MADRID, Spain — This month, the BoF Spotlight turns to Spain. Despite a contracting economy, an increase in sales tax and nationwide austerity measures, it turns out that, between LVMH-owned luxury brand Loewe and fast fashion powerhouse Inditex — owners of global brands Zara, Bershka and Massimo Dutti — there’s still room in the market for a young and creative Spanish brand like Ana Locking.

Founded in 2008 by Ana Gonzalez, the label’s Autumn/Winter 2010 collection, ‘Spinning Destiny,’ incorporates bold colours arranged in a calculated progression that culminates in a unique pattern that resembles spinning paint, or spin art. Experimental jewellery made of brightly coloured paraffin wax set in brass emphasizes the perishable life of consumer goods.

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