Chloe Spring/Summer 2012 show at Jardins des Tuileries, Paris | Photo: BoF

LONDON, United Kingdom — It’s hard to believe 2011 is coming to a close. It’s been an action packed year in the business of fashion. From the rise of digital to the fall of Galliano, and everything in between, BoF has found itself exploring the heart of an ever-changing fashion ecosystem, fuelled by creativity, digital innovation and globalisation.

We are grateful to all of the fashion visionaries, entrepreneurs and professionals who have shared their stories with us over the past year, offering us lessons from fashion’s front-lines. Their insights have sparked conversations here on BoF, across the social web, and in boardrooms, classrooms and studios all over the world. Thank you to everyone for your continued support and interest in BoF.

As the year comes to a close, it’s time for us to take a break. The BoF team will be off until 3 January, 2012. Until then, to whet your appetites for 2012, we look back the defining BoF stories in 2011.

Happy holidays to everyone!

1. The Business of Blogging

Scott Schuman | Photo: Garance Doré

Bloggers’ businesses have been garnering headlines in the mainstream media in recent months, but BoF has been exploring the business models emerging from the fashion blogosphere since 2007. This year, we launched a series of in-depth interviews with some of the world’s leading fashion bloggers, revealing that there is as much variety in their approaches to business as there is in the ways they express themselves online. The Business of Blogging series was by far the most shared and discussed content on BoF this year. Our interview with The Sartorialist Scott Schuman alone has been viewed more than 80,000 times.

The Business of Blogging | The Sartorialist

The Business of Blogging | Elin King

The Business of Blogging | Susie Bubble

The Business of Blogging | Tommy Ton

The Business of Blogging | Bag Snob

2. Trouble with iPad Magazines

Vanity Fair’s June 2011 iPad Issue | Source: Vanity Fair

Magazines have jumped into the iPad fray with gusto, but how are they succeeding in creating a digital magazine experience that is genuinely new? Our managing editor Vikram Kansara investigates.

3. Fashion PR in the Digital Age

YSL Tweet Denying Pilati Rumours | Source: Twitter

In the speedy new world of fashion communication, PR’s operate in an ‘always-on’ viral world where rumours can spread faster than ever before and new fashion communities are springing up everyday. BoF talks to the fashion industry’s leading PR agencies about their strategies for managing communication in the digital age.

4. Finding the Luxury in Mass Customisation 

Prada SS11 Lace-Up Project | Source: Prada

Could new technologies help to revive one of the original tenets of luxury? The rise of a new mode of production called “mass customisation” promises to restore individuality to the product design process, bringing a variety of new personalised product experiences to consumers.

5. Social Curation Start-ups Target Fashion Industry

Lyst Screenshot | Source: Lyst

Filtering content through recommendations from our friends and colleagues has become an important way of sorting through all the noise. Now, a gr0up of innovative social curation startups are providing a new way to discover and enjoy content, and are attracting investor attention. Since our report in April, Pinterest raised $37m in funding with a valuation greater than $200m, and The Fancy, received a $10m investment from PPR, valuing the business at $100m.

6. The French Contemporary Wave That’s Reshaping Ready-To-Wear

Couples from The Kooples ad campaigns | Source: The Kooples

Over the past couple of years, a slew of French contemporary brands including Sandro, Maje, The Kooples and Zadig & Voltaire have attempted to conquer London and New York, two of the most competitive retail landscapes on the planet. Is contemporary pricing the future of a failing ready-to-wear model that’s increasingly out of sync with consumer expectations and budgets?

7. How Commercial Content is Changing Editorial

Mr Porter Screenshot | Source: Mr Porter

It seems that there are almost weekly reports announcing that yet another magazine veteran has fled a traditional publishing company to take up a position at a brand or retailer. BoF guest contributor Ken Miller explores the implications of  the content-meets-commerce fashion fusion.

8. The Long View | How Realtime Data is Reshaping the Fashion Business

Julia Fowler and Geoff Watts | Source: Editd

EDITd is the London-based start-up whose real-time analytics of social data serve up predictions on trends, colours and silhouettes in the seasons to come. BoF sat down with founders Julia Fowler and Geoff Watts to learn more.

9. BoF Exclusive | Style.com to Launch Magazine and ‘Dip Toes’ in E-Commerce

Dirk Standen, Editor-in-Chief, Style.com | Photo: Style.com/Lexie Moreland

We’ve all seen print media go digital, but when digital goes print, you know something interesting is happening in fashion media. I spoke to Dirk Standen, editor-in-chief of Style.com, in a BoF Exclusive on the launch of Style.com Print magazine.

10. Introducing the Calgary bag and Crowdsourcing Experiment with Bill Amberg

The Calgary bag panorama | Photo: Bill Amberg

And last but not least, the Calgary bag, a collaboration and crowd-sourcing project with leather goods craftsman Bill Amberg, sparked a huge reaction amongst the BoF community, with people from all over the world weighing in on the merits (and demerits) of fashion crowdsourcing, and revealing some interesting results in the process. The Calgary bag has now sold out twice on BillAmberg.com and more are due in early next year.

Imran Amed is founder and editor-in-chief of The Business of Fashion

L-R Altuzarra, Prabul Gurung, Alexander Wang | Source: Style.com

You Can See Spring Coming (NY Times)
“Mr. Wang is a boy disguised as a designer — or maybe it’s the other way around — but whatever the case, he doesn’t want to grow up, and the clothes naturally follow that youthful spirit… Prabal Gurung’s show on Saturday had a pronounced erotic undercurrent that in its blunt use of violet, and the transparent hems of silk print dresses, owed something to the style last season of Riccardo Tisci of Givenchy.”

Fashion week: The ordinary people who stole the show (BBC News)
“Many people might not have heard of Tavi Gevinson, Scott Schuman, Susie Bubble and Bryanboy but they are household names to dedicated followers of fashion. All four are big players in the blogging revolution that has turned the fashion world on its head… But bloggers have been chipping away at the mainstream media as more and more people want to hear about fashion from people who apply it to everyday life.”

Where Fashion Gazes at Itself (NY Times)
“Tumblr, founded four years ago, has reached out to the fashion community in a way no other social networking site has. For the second time, it has brought users to New York Fashion Week as reporters, paying for their trips and giving them access to the shows. Their coverage is being posted on a dedicated channel, tumblr.com/NYFW, made up of posts from 20 bloggers picked by Tumblr’s staff, along with contributions from magazines that have their own Tumblrs.”

Versace sees revenue up in 2012 on H&M and Versus (Forbes)
“Italian top fashion house Versace is expecting higher revenues in 2012 after launching a collection for Swedish retailer Hennes & Mauritz this year and revamping its Versus second line…The company draws most of revenues from its top Versace line, but it launched a “Young Versace” line for kids and bought back its Versus licence this year to boost sales and profitability after starting a deep restructuring in 2009.”

Luxury: the next generation (FT)
“One of the more astonishing success stories of the past century has been the evolution of luxury retailing, from small-scale family firms to an international, multi-billion dollar industry… Yet, as the modern industry struggles to reconcile its artisanal heritage with today’s public offerings and quarterly reports, it is the personal, family connection that bridges the gap.”

“I feel like they’re adding a real dose of freshness and reality to the fashion world online.”

Rumi Neely of Fashion Toast, amongst several other bloggers, speaking to Net-a-Porter TV as part of Net-a-Porter’s special bloggers issue, which includes their first ever Blog Power List, ranking Tommy Ton at Number 1, Susie Bubble at Number 5, and The Business of Fashion at Number 7.

Dion Lee S/S 2012 at Sydney Opera House | Photo: BoF

SYDNEY, Australia — Australian fashion has an image problem. When I mentioned to friends that I was thinking of attending Rosemount Australian Fashion Week in Sydney, the reaction ranged from raised eyebrows to incredulous laughter. Others quipped that the sum total of Australia’s contribution to global fashion could be distilled down to Ugg boots and swimwear.

“Surely you’d only be going to take some time in the Australian sun?” they asked. But as my schedule only allowed for three days in the Australian fashion capital, there would be little time to sit on the beach and anyway, the summer sun in Sydney had already given way to crisp Autumn evenings and intermittent rain showers.

It was an email exchange with Tommy Ton and Susie Bubble that finally convinced me to get on the 24 hour flight from London to spend a few days immersed in Sydney’s fashion scene. Both Tommy and Susie were planning to go back for their second season, and highly recommended that I come along too.

In Susie’s words, there is “plenty to see that’s interesting…it’s good to see a developed fashion week outside of the big four and definitely worth going to just to see how Southern hemisphere fashion works!”

Indeed, that turned out to be the most interesting question of all, and it was well worth the time to get there.

In multiple ways, it seems the cards are stacked against the Australian fashion industry. Apart from the fact that Sydney is more than 20 hours away by plane from all of the major fashion capitals, the value of the Australian dollar has increased by over 100 percent in the last ten years, from 53 to 106 Australian cents to the US dollar. This has made products exported from Australia very expensive, though raw materials and services from abroad have also therefore become much cheaper, an important consideration in a country where local apparel manufacturing is scarce.

But, the complexities continue. Unlike other secondary fashion markets like Brazil, India and China which have huge local populations, Australia has only 23 million people. To build a sizeable fashion business therefore, international growth is imperative. However, the fact that Australia is seasonally opposite means that in order for designers to build global businesses, they have to find some way of catering to both their local market at home, as well as the large Northern hemisphere markets in Europe, North America, China and Japan.

THE POWER OF TRANSEASONAL PRODUCTS

With all of these challenges, I began to wonder if it was possible for any Australian fashion designer to build a global business. All it took was one conversation with Nicky Zimmermann to prove me wrong.

More than twenty years ago, Zimmermann and her sister began designing swimwear, and shortly thereafter began showing at fashion week in Australia. Unlike the straightforward swimsuits which are ubiquitous in a country where the lifestyle is built around beach culture, Ms. Zimmermann has specifically sought to associate her product with fashion, and has built a global following for a core product that is “transeasonal.”

“We sell swimwear pretty much the whole year round,” she said to me as we sat down for lunch in the chi chi food court of the brand new Westfield shopping mall, where the brand has opened its latest Australian store. “We knew from the very first season that we would have a seasonal issue, but we always linked it to fashion which has now enabled us to add our own ready-to-wear line,” she explained. Zimmermann and other Australian brands like LOVER also split their collections, targeting part to the local market and part to the markets in the Northern hemisphere.

The strategy has worked wonders. Zimermann now has more than A$25 million in annual sales, 14 stores across Australia, and plans to open its first international outpost on Los Angeles’ Robertson Boulevard later this year.

YOUNG CREATIVE GENIUSES

But lest you think that fashion down under is restricted to swimwear, make sure you have a look at the collections by Dion Lee.

Aged only 24, Lee is Sydney’s design wunderkind. Unlike many of his peers who seemed content to draw liberally and unashamedly from the collections shown in London, Paris and Milan only a couple of months ago, Lee showcased an aesthetic and approach all his own. Layers of tailored pleats and folds, with soft abstract prints and deconstructed, asymmetrical silhouettes made for inspired viewing, even in the landmark setting of the Sydney Opera House, which could have distracted from a collection by a lesser talent. The expectations placed on this young man were formidable, and by all accounts he more than lived up to them.

At the end of that sunny Sydney day, Mr. Lee breathed a sigh of relief as he collapsed in a heap at the Blue Bar and told me about the challenges faced by fashion designers in Australia — a virtually non-existent local manufacturing base, a small local fashion market, the soaring Australian dollar — in addition to those other difficulties that young designers face the world over. Operating an emerging fashion business in Australia is not for the faint of heart.

But this is one determined young man with eyes on taking his business global. Already, Net-a-Porter has snapped up his collection. And, with help from his mentor Nicky Zimmermann, he is plotting his next moves. Watch this space.

I was also struck by the aesthetic sensibilities of another young Australian, 28 year old Chris Kyvetos, creative director of the venerable Australian menswear store Harrolds, which opened a huge 1000 square metre emporium in Westfield Sydney in December 2010 to great fanfare and early commercial success.

Kyvetos has curated an enviable selection of globally recognised men’s fashion brands — Thom Browne, Comme des Garcons, and Kiton, and soon, Tom Ford and Rick Owens — in a setting that is truly world-class. But what was even more special was discovering niche brands from all over the world, including Naked & Famous denim from Montreal, Gold Bunny leather jackets from Milan, t-shirts by Deerdana from New York, and Song for the Mute, a local Australian label.

THE ARRIVAL OF INTERNATIONAL FAST FASHION

But many other local retailers are having a tough time of it. Earlier this year, the denim brand Sass & Bide, (another globally successful Australian business with a core transeasonal product) received a cash injection of A$42.25 million from Myer, one of country’s leading department stores.

Like many of its peers, Myer has been struggling to compete with the arrival of international chains, and its net profit is expected to decline by 5 percent this year compared to 2010. According to Myer chief executive Bernie Brookes, the department store took a 65 percent stake in Sass & Bide as part of its efforts to introduce “new product categories, brands, concepts and concessions.”

To put the retail challenge in perspective, consider the hullabaloo in April when the country’s first Zara store opened in the new Westfield shopping centre, upending the stodgy local retail scene, previously sheltered from international chains that move at the pace of global fast fashion.

Australian editors spoke breathlessly about Zara’s grand opening event that had queues of VIPs forming around the block. Within three minutes of opening, more than 80 percent of the stock was snapped up leaving local Zara executives to proclaim that it was the one of the most successful Zara openings ever and underlining the insatiable appetite Australians seem to have for international fashion.

Unlike some luxury fashion brands which insist on selling the same product in the Australian winter that is being sold during the Northern hemisphere summer, Zara is tailoring its product offering to fit with local tastes and seasons. Zara spokesman Jesús Echevarría told Jess Blanch, editor in chief of Australia’s Russh Magazine, that “eighty-five per cent of Zara’s Australian merchandise has been either adapted for or tailored specifically to the Australian market.”

It’s an approach that more international labels may want to consider as the buying power of other Southern hemisphere markets in South America, the Middle East and South East Asia continues to grow.

AN ONLINE DISCONNECT

Balenciaga Gladiator Sandals at RAFW | Source: Jak and Jil

But perhaps the biggest threat to Australia’s domestic fashion industry is a virtual one. As Mary Henderson of Australia’s Marketing magazine wrote last year, “the choice for purchasing is now both international and virtual and no longer physical and domestic.”

Outside the shows, it was hard to distinguish the Australian editors’ streetstyle from that of their international counterparts at the shows in Paris and New York. Tommy Ton and Phil Oh were having a field day. It was obvious that consumers in Australia are very aware of international fashion trends, and want access to the same products and collections as their peers in other parts of the world. But consumers repeatedly complained that they weren’t able to find what they were looking for at home, online or off.

In the pre-internet era, Australian retailers were artificially protected from international competition due to the sheer distance from the rest of the world, but the internet has blown this wide open. Armed with a strong Australian dollar that makes shopping abroad a relative bargain, they are flocking online to buy the latest trends from American and European etailers like Shopbop, Net-a-Porter and Topshop, who can deliver orders to their doors in a matter of days. Australia is now the third or fourth most important market for many international fashion e-tailers, a ranking that is disproportionate to the country’s relatively small population.

For the most part, Australian retailers have been very slow to move online, citing complications with logistics and complaining about the unfair tax advantages given to international retailers, who are exempt from collecting sales tax on purchases less than 1000 Australian dollars. If Shopbop can get the goods to all the way from America to Australia without issue, it’s surprising that local retailers cannot even organise themselves to deliver domestically.

Thanks again to IMG for continuing to invite me to their international fashion events. It’s a great experience to meet so many new people and understand the ever-changing dynamics of our global industry.

Imran Amed is Founder and Editor of The Business of Fashion

LONDON, United Kingdom — As the the fashion industry grapples with the radical change that’s reshaping our business, there have been precious few opportunities to step back and discuss what it all means for the fashion system at large.

The third edition of Miu Miu’s “Musing” salons, themed The Pace of Fashion and hosted by Shala Monroque, enabled industry leaders from across the fashion spectrum to sit back and try to make sense of an industry undergoing rapid disruption and transformation. “We wanted to gather people of like minds to have a conversation,” said Monroque. “We’ve done it twice already in New York and the one topic that kept coming up was the pace of fashion.”

Following “Musing” events in New York, moderated by Andre Leon Talley, it was The Business of Fashion’s very own Imran Amed — seated between Monroque and the International Herald Tribune’s Suzy Menkes — who opened and led the conversation this time. “We all know working in this business everyday, that things have been going faster and faster and faster,” he said, citing voracious demand for new products (from both retailers and consumers) and the intense pressure for fashion businesses to deliver revenue and profit growth as two underlying causes of this overall acceleration.

But it was the impact of a third key driver, the rise of digital media, which dominated much of the evening’s dialogue, sparking a collegial debate between some of fashion’s most influential figures including Grazia’s Paula Reed, Yoox CEO Federico Marchetti, The Times’ Lisa Armstrong, blogging star Susanna Lau, and Harvey Nichols buying director Averyl Oates.

One key thread of the debate centred around the fact that the pace of fashion communication is out of sync with the pace of fashion production. Today, desire for fashion products is created instantly during (and immediately after) runway shows, as fashion consumers take in the collections at the same time as buyers and editors, but long before these products are available to purchase.

Referencing Tom Ford, who held a very private and intimate fashion show last September in New York, withholding the images from his show until his collection was actually available in stores in January, Monroque said that Ford “thought overexposure would kill the desire for the garment.”

“I think it depends on the customer,” countered Lisa Armstrong of The Telegraph. “There are still a huge number of people who are still very influenced by celebrities” who create product demand via paparazzi shots that are circulated online. Indeed, Averyl Oates of Harvey Nichols followed up by describing how consumer desire can actually increase over time, bolstered by online conversation. “The build-up of that desirability is actually very important, as well. We have customers who come into the store and put their names down who actually want to wait those three or four months,” she said.

Given the number of editors in the room, it’s not surprising that there was also much discussion about the future of fashion communication itself, especially in regards to print magazines. Held back by long lead times and old media mindsets, the consensus was that monthly magazines will face the greatest threat from digital publishers who are treading on the monthly magazines’ traditional turf of fashion news and trends.

Paula Reed, Style Director of Grazia, a weekly mass-market magazine with incredible selling power spoke of the benefit of working on a weekly basis. “To actually get stuff out there quickly … feels to me like the most incredible freedom and that’s what readers are responding to,” she said. In contrast, slower paced, artistic bi-annuals often become collectible fashion items in and of themselves, due their timeless nature and physical beauty. Penny Martin, editor of The Gentlewoman, who returned to print after eight years in the digital world said: “I am interested in the word quality. There’s a great deal of opportunity with a bi-annual to think a lot about the content.”

“I think the answer really is that there are different speeds that relate to different things,” said Ms. Menkes. “That’s what I’m taking away from this evening,” commenting that the conversation was much more positive than she had expected. “The beautiful images that have taken a great deal of work and have long been thought out, in bi-annual magazines, are part of the mix … but you also want the very speedy things. Now, we’re talking about having different layers and levels, and different speeds. I personally think that’s rather good.”

Leave it to Ms. Menkes to tie a multi-faceted and complex conversation into a succinct, neat little bow to conclude an extremely enjoyable evening. BoF was delighted to be a part of it all.

Robert Cordero is a Contributing Editor at The Business of Fashion.

Susanna Lau | Source: Citizen Couture

Today, BoF launches The Business of Blogging, a new series on the rarely discussed business side of fashion blogging. First up is Susanna Lau of Style Bubble, one of the fashion blogosphere’s most original and influential voices.

LONDON, United Kingdom — In recent years, bloggers have had a tremendous impact on the fashion community. Using the internet to build their own platforms and attract an audience, they have helped turn a once closed industry into a more dynamic and democratic global conversation, earning thousands of fans and followers in the process. But are they making money? Have they been able to successfully monetise their celebrity and their craft? Is blogging a viable business?

“In my second year at Dazed, I was turning down all these different projects that could have been money spinners and I just couldn’t commit myself to them, because I was working 12 hours a day,” says Susanna Lau, the candid and adorably quirky voice behind the highly popular personal fashion blog Style Bubble, who left her position as Commissioning Editor of DazedDigital.com in March of 2010 to concentrate on her blog and pursue the unexploited economic opportunities it was generating. “Saying ‘I don’t need the publication to anchor onto, I have a publication essentially,’ was a big thing for me,” admits Ms. Lau, whose blog currently attracts some 25,000 visitors each day.

But how exactly has Ms. Lau been able to monetise her platform? “I have advert space at the side of my blog, but it’s not a big money spinner,” she says. “How I’ve done it is working on projects that relate to the blog but aren’t necessarily always visible on the blog.”

For example, Ms. Lau was one of a handful of influential celebrities and bloggers who recently helped internet giant Google launch fashion search and personal recommendations site Boutiques.com for what was widely reported to be a one-off payment in the low five figures. “The deal was to set up a boutique like the other celebrities who were also enlisted to pick items and basically put their taste out there,” she explains. “I got a fee for setting up an account, curating a shop and picking a certain amount of items.”

Ms. Lau was also recently tapped by American retailer Gap to appear in their 2010 holiday campaign shot by Craig McDean and styled by Karl Templer. “There was a fee,” she said. “You are basically lending your image and compensated much like any model or celebrity who gets a campaign,” she continues. “It’s always one-off fees.”

“Blogging is rich with indirect opportunities, in which their presentation is commensurate with your dedication, perspective and uniqueness,” noted business strategist, sociologist, and futurist Brian Solis in a recent post on Technorati’s latest “State of the Blogosphere” study.

But what exactly is Susie Bubble selling? “It’s intangible,” she admitted. “My eye, my point of view, a certain taste, a certain way of documenting and presenting fashion; that’s supposedly what I’m selling.”

Ms. Lau also generates revenue from occasional consulting work, writing assignments and speaking engagements, but it’s fees from special projects for brands that constitute the majority of her income. “The consulting part is really small,” she said. “Ad revenue is 25 percent. Freelance writing is 10 percent. The rest of it is based on special projects that I do.”

With recent projects for Dr. Martens, Giorgio Armani, Selfridges and Hong Kong boutique Joyce, Ms. Lau appears to be extremely busy. “There are limitless opportunities; it’s been sort of nonstop,” she enthuses. But what’s the bottom line? Compared to her previous position at Dazed Digital, is there more financial opportunity in the route Ms. Lau has chosen? “Definitely,” she emphasises. “Each day I’m sort of dividing my time between four or five different things. The result of that is that you are gong to be getting more money than you are with a fixed wage at an independent publishing company.”

But with expanding economic opportunities, bloggers have come under fire for not being transparent about the role their blogs play in commercial projects for which they are compensated, prompting government regulators at the Federal Trade Commission in the United States to introduce rules requiring bloggers to disclose ties to companies whose products they review or promote or face fines. While these rules are ambiguous, probably unenforceable and do not directly impact Ms. Lau, who resides in the UK, they prompt an important question: what role does Style Bubble play in her commercial projects and how does she manage to balance her economic interests with her editorial integrity?

“They didn’t say you have to publicise it,” said Ms. Lau in reference to the Google Boutiques project. “It’s normally a sort of unwritten thing. There are no instances where I feel I am contractually obliged to write about something.” In this regard, the Gap campaign was similar. “I wasn’t obliged to write about it… but in return, they were almost automatically expecting you to write about it because it’s something you would be proud of.”

In the end, Ms. Lau published Style Bubble posts on both the Gap and Google projects. Neither was overly promotional, but adopted the authentic Susie Bubble tone the brands undoubtedly knew would resonate best with her readership.

“I’ve not done advertorial,” she underscored. “I’ve not had any instance where what I put out on the blog is of primary importance to the project. It’s secondary and supporting, but it’s never been imposed on me that I have to do it.” She asserts: “If I was contractually obliged to write about something, I would feel less inclined.”

As blogging matures and the financial opportunities become more clear, many bloggers are starting to work with agents or other professional advisors who guide them on business decisions. “I make all the decisions myself, but with money, because I’m not very good with doing it, I have a literary agent,” explains Ms. Lau, who is exploring a possible book deal. “She managed Cecelia Ahern, who wrote P.S. I Love You, which was a huge success. She’s sort of looking over everything that I do; with major projects like the Gap campaign, she looks over the contracts and makes sure everything is above boards.”

But while Susie Bubble has proven that a highly popular fashion blogger can generate income in the present, is blogging a financially viable career option over the long-term? Will Susanna Lau always be Susie Bubble? “For the foreseeable future, yes,” she said. “It is a viable career, but I’ve always questioned the longevity of fashion blogs,” she adds, pragmatically. “Brands latching onto bloggers — is it just a trend?”

Here, Ms. Lau appears to enjoy a significant first mover advantage. “The fortunate and unfortunate thing is the media seems to latch on to the same bloggers over and over again,” she observes. “I was talking to a guy from Refinery29 who said: ‘The queen bees have already been chosen. The new ones are too late’, but I don’t want to believe that.”

In a recent short film for Intel’s “Visual Life” campaign, Scott Schuman of the highly popular street style blog “The Sartorialist” says he expects to be shooting and blogging for the next “30 to 40 years.” But for Susie Bubble, whose tastemaking skills are more intangible, things are more complex. “What I’m about is not as simple as Scott — he’s a photographer, he’s got a skill set to sell to brands,” she observed. “People like The Sartorialist, Garance [Doré], Tommy [of Jak and Jil] will have real endurance because they will always have their skill, whereas people can emulate what I do well.”

However, as Style Bubble continues to grow and the number of commercial opportunities multiply, Ms. Lau has been thinking about how to better organise and structure her expanding personal enterprise for the future. “I have been thinking I should register Style Bubble as a company, just for tax reasons,” she said. “If I were to present a business plan, if I were to be applying to a bank to get a loan to do something, to get my own space or invest in staff, then I have to present what I do as a tangible thing.”

But here, Ms. Lau is of two minds. While she said that “every major [television] channel has approached me about doing something,” the very ethos of a personal style blog like Style Bubble may inherently limit future growth. “If there was a whole team behind it, I think something would be taken away,” she said. “I’m not outputting solutions, I’m outputting myself,” she says. “I don’t think it can be larger than me — it’s as large as I am.”

Vikram Alexei Kansara is Managing Editor of The Business of Fashion

Marco Santaniello T-Skirt | Source: Marco Santaniello

MILAN, Italy — And now for a fun BoF Spotlight post to end your week. We couldn’t resist a bit of colour to spice up the Spring that is finally blossoming.

Marco Santaniello‘s pop art portraits of fashion models, editors and the ubiquitous bloggerati caught our attention when we stumbled across his Facebook page a couple of months back. Since then, he has continued to churn out images of the industry’s legends and new stars, with alarming regularity.

So where did all of his colourful inspiration come from?

After a little bit of investigation we learned that Marco is a crusader against the Italian fashion industry’s formality and bureaucracy and apart from designing his own collection of graphic T’s and writing about fashion news for the MaxMara fashion blog, he worships the Rubik’s Cube, his “personal fetish” and the key influence behind his colourful illustrations, which is sitting in the BoF Spotlight this month

Here is a selection of Marco’s colourful portraits, including Susie Bubble, Anna Wintour, Agyness Deyn, and BoF’s very own Imran Amed.

Tavi Gevinson's Bow at Dior Couture | Source: Twitpic by SteffiSchuetze

LONDON, United Kingdom — A veritable firestorm erupted across fashion blogs and twitter streams this week in response to an article that appeared in London’s Independent newspaper over the weekend, highlighting Tavi Gevinson’s front row presence at the Haute Couture shows in Paris.

In a piece entitled “Fluff flies as fashion writers pick a cat fight with bloggers,” The Independent reported that “senior fashion insiders believe blogs have turned into little more than mouthpieces for fashion brands, which are increasingly using bloggers to regurgitate their press releases.”

As those controversial words rippled through the blogosphere and twittersphere, the protest and outrage came from all quarters of the fashion blogging fraternity and sorority. And, while we at the BoF were hesitant to take the bait and join the fray — the whole ‘editors versus bloggers’ story is becoming tired — it would be even worse for us to remain silent. Indeed, the Independent article raises very important issues which merit further discussion and debate, and perhaps, a more balanced perspective on this so-called “backlash” against bloggers.

In fact, this is exactly what I said when I was contacted for quotes on the Independent piece — quotes which were ultimately not used. As it turns out, several other bloggers were also asked to comment, including Susie Bubble and Helene of The Luxe Chronicles, but none of their quotes were used either. In fact, not one blogger was directly quoted to provide comment on the other side of the story. The result is an article that comes across as very black and white, on an issue that actually has many shades of grey. We are only at the very beginning of the digital revolution that is sweeping across the fashion industry. And so, to only show one side of the story does readers, and the industry as a whole, a disservice.

In the spirit of adding to the dialogue and providing a more balanced perspective, here’s some food for thought.

First, most bloggers worth their salt operate with integrity and professional values. This is not to say that bloggers are beyond reproach. There are always some bad apples in the bunch, in this case, those bloggers who accept products in exchange for positive coverage or special treatment. However, smart bloggers recognise that if they lose their independence, they will quickly lose the trust of their audiences. Simply being a mouthpiece is a short-term strategy.

So Who Isn't Bought? | Source: Bryanboy

Second, for editors from the mainstream media to hold bloggers to a different standard than that to which they hold themselves, is hypocritical. As one fashion insider told me, more than ever, major fashion editors are putting advertisers front and centre in their fashion editorial, giving smaller independent brands a miss.

“By and large, the way that bloggers respond to brands still results in content that isn’t unlike a traditional advertorial or ‘bought copy’ seen in magazines,” said Susie Bubble, author of one of the world’s most widely read fashion blogs, to the Independent, in quotes that she kindly shared with me but weren’t used in the piece.

“It is up to the blogger how they handle it and how they portray themselves.  They are accountable to their readers and if they choose to do something that strikes [readers] as being biased or ‘bought by brands,’ then they have to suffer the consequences,” she concluded.

This is more important than ever before. Now that brands have cottoned on to the influence that bloggers have, they are doing everything to seduce them and win their approval.

In theory, there is nothing wrong with bloggers building relationships with brands and gaining special access. But, if these relationships become so cozy that bloggers stop saying what they really think, they risk losing the audiences that have grown to love them. The trick for bloggers, therefore, is to maintain healthy relationships with the brands, while also staying true to their audiences — it’s a fine balance.

Finally, we must all be aware that the tensions we’re seeing simply reflect the growing pains of a new medium that’s only just finding its way. As Vikram Alexei Kansara, Managing Editor of BoF said, “Like them or not, bloggers are here to stay and should be recognised as the powerful and significant ‘Fifth Estate’ that they are. Today we are at a moment that’s not unlike the invention of the Gutenberg press. It took hundreds of years for print media to evolve beyond biased pamphleteering, so why should they expect blogging to mature over night? If anything, I would argue that blogging is maturing much faster than print ever did!”

For her part, Susie Mesure, the author of the controversial article, said “the story ended up being much shorter than initially envisaged so I couldn’t use all the comments. Writing in a paper is not like writing online as I am constrained by the word limit set by my editor. I would have liked to use all the comments I received as they were very interesting. Hopefully I may yet get the chance.”

Indeed, all of the bloggers I spoke to said that their conversations with Ms. Mesure were pleasant and interesting. Even though she may have had an preconceived agenda in mind, she was asking all the right questions. It’s just too bad she wasn’t able to share the answers.

In the end, as Helene Le Blanc of Luxe Chronicles said, “it would be a far more productive debate if, rather than sniping at bloggers such as Tavi, journalists and editors actually engaged bloggers in a genuine dialogue about the state of the industry and the ways in which social media can make fashion a more participative industry.”

Hopefully now the mainstream media will turn its focus to discussing and analysing what bloggers are saying, instead of perpetuating the unconstructive ‘us versus them’ tension. Indeed, contrary to what the article may have indicated, Ms. Mesure is  “a big fan of blogs – fashion blogs and otherwise,” she says.  “I do however think there is a danger with readers assuming bloggers are independent when there is so much ‘gifting’ and ‘seeding’ going on, which was really the main point I wanted to make.”

Imran Amed is Founder and Editor of The Business of Fashion

Christian Louboutin Laceups, courtesy of Jak and Jil

NEW YORK, United States — In seasons past, industry-watchers have spoken of the growing presence of bloggers at the New York shows, but this is the first season where bloggers have come to New York from all over the world, gaining backstage access, front-row seats and even juicy scoops, in a full-on, international blogger invasion. Bryanboy is here from Manila. Susie Bubble is here from London. And Julia and Jessie from Les Mads are here from Germany.

What’s more, at many of the shows, bloggers and web editors have been seated together, allowing for some spontaneous exchange and an opportunity to meet the faces behind some of the finest fashion websites around. Already I have met the super-smart Tommye Fitzpatrick of Fashionologie, the stylish Christene Barberich of Refinery29 and streetstyle maven Phil Oh of Streetpeeper.

But most of all, I was delighted to meet Tommy Ton, the man behind Jak and Jil, which recently won the public vote for the best fashion blog in the Dazed Digital RAW Blog awards. If there was one blog to which BoF was happy to lose, it was to Jak and Jil’s genius photography, editing and fashion moments, as captured by this humble, soft-spoken young man.

I missed Tommy on my recent trip to Toronto, but he introduced himself in the pouring rain outside the Preen show. Truly dedicated to his craft, I subsequently spotted Tommy at show after show, snapping his trademark shots of serious fashion week style — a pair of Louboutin heels here, a feather vest there, in the midst of the New York downpour — before rushing in to catch the shows himself.

In just one year, Tommy has managed to use his blog to build his own offline business as well. Apart from shooting campaigns for Lane Crawford, the venerable Hong Kong department store, he also hosts a blog on the Lane Crawford website and works with hot young designers like Rad Hourani on photo shoots and look books. Based on this kind of trajectory, you can be sure that this is only the beginning for the talented Mr. Tommy Ton.

As for his trademark style of photography which fixates on standout accessories, runway pieces and shoes, Tommy says “I like to think of myself as an editor, more than a photographer,” focusing his attention on the editors, it-girls and models, off the runway.

Imran Amed is Editor of The Business of Fashion