Roger Vivier Miss Viv | Source: Holt Renfrew

What The Rich Are Buying Now (Forbes)
“While most consumers aren’t returning to their pre-recession shopping patterns, there has been a rebound in luxury spending lately. Ultra affluent shoppers … have started to come out of hiding”

Miuccia and Me (WSJ)
“Bertelli, is the mastermind behind a label most people associate with his wife, Miuccia Prada, the avant-garde designer who has created global sensations out of industrial nylon black backpacks, wallpaper-motif pleated skirts, tiedyed dresses and thick high-heeled wedge shoes, to name just a few.”

Italy’s Della Valle ups stake in Saks to 7.1 pct (CNN Money)
“Italian businessman Diego Della Valle increased his stake in Saks Inc with a series of stock purchases this week, strengthening his position as the second-largest investor in the U.S. upscale department store operator.”

Fashion to hit Tokyo’s runways (Independent)
“Japan has produced some of the world’s most famous designers – from Issey Miyake to Rei Kawakubo, Yohji Yamamoto and Hanae Mori – and the Japan Fashion Week Organization is aiming to build on their reputations for a new generation of fashion geniuses at the same time as enhancing Tokyo’s reputation as the center of the fashion business in Asia.”

It bags are back as luxury brand sales soar by 60% (Daily Mail)
“Fashion insiders have long been predicting its death. But it seems there is still life in the old ‘It bag’ yet. Selfridges says that it has seen a 60 per cent increase in the past year in sales of ‘must-have’ luxury handbags.”

Apriori S/S 09 ad campaign, courtesy of Apriori

Escada sells off Apriori, Cavita and Laurèl (Drapers)
“Escada has sold off its Apriori, Cavita and Laurèl womenswear brands which operate under its Primera subsidiary, to German investment firm Mutares.”

Ferre and Damiani announce cooperation (Forbes)
“The Gianfranco Ferre fashion house, which suffered the death of its founder and the bankruptcy of its holding company in the span of two years, said Tuesday it was starting a jewelry line to be produced by Damiani as part of its relaunching efforts.”

Fashion Legend Miuccia Prada On CNN’s Talk Asia (CNN)
“She’s one of fashion’s greatest icons, pioneering her own style at the top of the industry for decades. This week, TALK ASIA sits down for a rare interview with Miuccia Prada at an exhibition of her work in Seoul.” Miuccia Prada’s interview will be available online here after the first airing on May 27 at 8.30pm.

Evisu hires chief executive (Drapers)
“Denim brand Evisu has hired denim aficionado Scott Morrison as global chief executive. Scott Morrison, the co-founder of denim brands Paper Denim & Cloth and Earnest Sewn, has been charged with reinvigorating the brand. He left Earnest Sewn just two months ago.”

People talk about Miuccia Prada as an intellectual designer. Up there with Martin Margiela, Dries van Noten and Rei Kawakubo, Ms. Prada is a heavyweight in the world of conceptual fashion. Season after season she manages to surprise and inspire the notoriously critical and fickle fashion crowd.

What’s less cool to talk about is Miuccia Prada’s knack for marrying the creative with the commercial. No other designer seems to be as able to take the most high-falutin’ catwalk looks and translate them into a commercial product in the showroom. For Prada and her infamous husband Patrizio Bertelli, "commercial" is not a dirty word. Buyers rave about Prada’s ability to provide the right balance between the consistent core items that form the foundation for her collection as well as the on-trend items that push the brand’s creative ideas forward. In more ways than one, she is a leader not a follower.

How cool it was then for me to see this stunning lookbook for Prada’s S/S 2007 collection, which once again strikes this inimitable creative-commercial balance. So many lookbooks are just boring shots of androids- cum-models with a white backdrop. Often, the logic behind this is that its best to let the clothes speak for themselves and allow buyers to focus on editing. Instead, Prada has seamlessly combined this season’s vibrant rich colour palette, key pieces and trends  (fringe bags, turbans, ruffled leather and pared-down chic), landscape and cityscape images reflecting the global footprint of her brand, and seamlessly integrated these with runway looks to deliver a strong message about what she might have been thinking as she conceived of her collection.  The technique she used reminded me of the recent Gilbert and George exhibition put on at the Tate Modern, where everyday photos were infused with saturated colours and political messages.

For someone who honestly was a big fan of neither the turban nor the fringe, she somehow makes it work for me. The products look completely different now because Ms. Prada has let us into her amazing little head.

Photos courtesy of the Prada website.

© 2007 Copyright Imran Amed – The Business of Fashion.

For all of you budding young designers based in America, the CFDA has officially begun its annual search for America’s most promising young designers. Each year, the CFDA awards a $200,000 grant to the winner, along with mentoring from a recognised fashion business guru as part of the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund.  Past winners include the intelligent and talented Doo-Ri Chung (looking super glam in this ad) who is mentored by J.Crew’s legendary Mickey Drexler and the refined-beyond-their-years Proenza Schouler design duo, Jack McCullough and Lazaro Hernandez, who were mentored by Burberry’s impressive former CEO, Rose Marie Bravo.

This is a really great initiative from the CFDA and other venerable fashion names like Barneys New York and Vogue. That said, I have one suggestion to make it even more powerful. I believe the CFDA should supplement the business mentoring and cash with a requirement and access to funding for the winning designers to find a suitable day-to-day business partner/advisor. While mentoring from an experienced fashion business executive is priceless, it does not make up for daily support and partnership.

I have made this point before, but so many young designers try to do everything on their own, and this means they deal with areas where they might not have any formal training or expertise. One look at the long list of established designers who have relied on business parters to act as thought partners on day-to-day decisions and to share the workload, shows that this is a real pattern of success in the industry.  Marc Jacobs (who has Robert Duffy), Miuccia Prada (has always worked with her husband Patrizio Bertelli), Tom Ford (who with Domenico De Sole turned Gucci around from a fuddy duddy backwater brand), Giorgio Armani (Sergio Galeotti worked with Armani for years before he passed away), Valentino (Giancarlo Gianetti is still his business partner, even if he is no longer his life partner), and Derek Lam  (Jan-Hendrik Schlottmann) have all shown that this tandem approach can help to get the business off the ground properly, allowing the designer to focus more on the creative aspects of the business.

This ad above, from today’s WWD, lays out all of the requirements and the application procedure. Good luck!