Warren Fashion

MIAMI – In the first major runway show for her own label in more than a decade, Cuban-American designer Isabel Toledo introduced her “watercolor” spring-summer 2012 collection in Miami.

At a gallery space in Miami‘s design district Wednesday night, Toledo showed feminine, flowing dresses in colors taken from the tropical scenery of her inspiration, the Caribbean, including the blue hues of ocean and sky.

The strapless top of an ethereal dress was emerald green, while the chiffon bottom was black. Bright orange draped another long dress that was open back, with strings attached to the sides of the pleated dress. Different shades of purple were blended in one knee-length dress. Metallic lace gold topped silver skirts, while she morphed black into white on some looks using a soft ombre technique. Delicate lace, silk, organzas, and chiffon were among her favorite fabrics, keeping in line with other trends emerging for next season on the catwalks of New York, Paris and other fashion capitals.

Toledo, who began designing in 1984, put the brakes on full-scale fashion shows after one in New York in 1998. “And then silence,” she said.

“Being a small company, you’re just not big enough to show the way that the big brands show,” she said. “And I actually felt that my work deserved a lot more attention as far as the intimacy of fashion.”

Her work certainly grabbed attention after first lady Michelle Obama wore some of her creations, including the yellow-green — aka “lemongrass” — dress and jacket that she wore the day her husband was inaugurated as president.

Toledo has since created a successful shoe and handbag collection for Payless ShoeSource, and, in fact, the models in the Miami show wore her upcoming spring collection for Payless.

“Interesting for me has been to come to another place in the country where people are open to fashion,” she said. “They want the experience to go to a fashion show. In a way it’s not business, it’s joy.”

Toledo plans to continue designing shoes (she also had collaborated with Manolo Blahnik when she was creative director at Anne Klein in 2007-08) and possibly put on more fashion shows. Her latest project, though, is a book about “life, love and fashion.”

“Roots of Style” is expected to be released in early 2012.

“People are ready to truly absorb creation, not just brands,” said Toledo’s husband and collaborator Ruben Toledo, a well-known fashion illustrator. The two have been married for nearly 30 years and continue to inspire one another.

“Everything is inspired by Ruben, everything,” Isabel Toledo. “I’m such a sedate kind of gal. And he really is the energy behind me.”

Ruben Toledo‘s artwork was prevalent in the new collection. He hand-painted many watercolor designs displayed on the accessories, from a floral motif to geometric shapes on oversized bags and floppy hats. Some of the dresses appeared to have paint smudge. And the long, straight ponytails on the models were dipped in different bright colors to resemble paint brushes.

The couple was also honored Wednesday with the Lifetime Achievement Award by Fashion Group International.

Ruben Toledo called it a “big time honor.”

“The thought that we first started doing this when we got married,” he said before turning to his wife to ask: “Did you ever think we would be doing this that long?”

“Honestly, I’ve never not thought I’d be doing this. I just never thought of it as a business,” she answered.

“Same here,” he agreed.

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QA

October 28, 2011  5:05 pm

Designer Moss Lipow is determined to give eyewear the fashion credit it deserves. The optical designer, who was named a CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund finalist in 2010, has spent the last few years researching the history of the industry of the form for a new book, Eyewear: A Visual History ($60). “No other accessory gives you as much power to control the persona you project,” he says in the afterword to the tome. “Eyewear has always been a remarkable medium, but few have fully understood its scope or potential for beauty.” Here, Lipow talks to Style.com about the evolution of the industry and reveals his vision for the future of eyewear.

As a kid, you weren’t pleased to discover you had to wear glasses. When did your attitude toward eyewear shift?
It was in my later teens—I thought I was never going to get laid. However, I had an innate sense of style and I was really able to turn glasses to my advantage and look cooler than I did before.

At the time, who was wearing cool glasses and inspiring your eyewear choices?
Marcello Mastroianni, Jean-Paul Belmondo—take your pick of movies, really. I’m not sure if it was Breathless or another movie, but Jean Seberg was wearing a really cool pair. Also, the Chocolate Watchband guitarist had a great pair and I was going for the same look. It wasn’t a mod look, exactly, but it was a look that had a lot of modernist influence.

You have amassed a very large collection of vintage frames, many of which appear in your book. Why were you so focused on collecting, specifically?
If you are going to be a serious designer you have to be a serious scholar of your medium. It was about knowing my field as thoroughly as possible so I could have a strong command of what hadn’t been done. Nothing I do looks all that much like things that have been done before. I quit collecting a while ago and then decided to generate some projects with it. It was the larval stage of my development as a designer. It’s like a grad school and the book is a doctoral thesis.

Your book is focused on the history of eyewear through the years. What glasses, in your opinion, have been the biggest game changers for the industry?
I draw connections between the flow of culture and what eyewear looks like. Licensing has become, for the time being, a very pivotal force. The first collaboration between Schiaparelli and American Optical started an industry paradigm that continued indefinitely. Probably the most important modern one was the Armani deal with Luxottica—that was huge.

Why did eyewear take so long to become legitimized in the fashion world?
Straight up, I think up until the fifties and sixties, the industry was in the hands of scientific lens manufacturers. It was always about functionality. When you started to get drugstore manufacturers, their focus was on how cool the glasses looked—that was like a watershed event. Then there was this proliferation of Hollywood movie stars wearing sunglasses and looking very glamorous and people really started to think about how eyewear can change the way people perceive you.

Where is eyewear headed?
The direction is greater self-awareness of its power as an accessory. People understand the image they are sending to the world. I think we are going to see a greater focus on better materials and on people wearing statement eyewear.

Aren’t we already seeing that right now?
Mostly only in New York. When I make styles and they are cool, the market is limited. You are going to see more of a sensibility where it gains greater acceptance. Even among people with taste, the taste will become further refined. That is the greatest potential area for expansion as a fashion item. As a designer, I would like to let people know the rich possibilities in the way they express themselves with their eyewear. I would like to help people with the language.

What’s next for you?
The biggest thing coming up is a launch of my first line in about three years because I took time off to do the book. The next thing is a fashion memoir.

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Kristin Studeman

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PARIS (Reuters) – Karl Lagerfeld, the creative force behind Chanel for nearly 30 years, is launching a fashion brand under his own name with backing from private equity firm Apax in a bid to tap into the Internet retail market.

The legendary designer in January will start selling online a ‘rock chic’ brand called Karl, with items priced in the 60 to 300 euro range.

The products will be sold exclusively for the first month through net-a-porter, the online fashion retail unit of Swiss luxury group Richemont, then on a dedicated website and starting in the spring through a few selected retailers.

The move provides further evidence the fashion world is embracing the Internet as an effective medium to sell clothes, communicate with customers and cultivate image.

Consultancy Bain Co said in a report last week it expected online luxury sales to rise 25 percent in 2011, while the sector’s sales globally are forecast to rise 13 percent at constant exchange rates.

Some fashion brands, particularly high-end ones such as Louis Vuitton, have long been reluctant to sell actively online, arguing that Web-based boutiques did not offer the same service and luxury atmosphere as bricks-and-mortar outlets.

Lagerfeld, 78, is also planning to launch in autumn 2012 a more upmarket label called “Karl Lagerfeld Paris,” sold in multi-brand and department stores, with items priced between 300 and 2,000 euros.

The collections will be distributed and produced under license by Italy’s Ittierre, which also holds licenses from Pierre Balmain, Galliano, Costume National and Gianfranco Ferre.

The fashion venture called Karl Lagerfeld BV, controlled by Apax through a majority stake, sees the more accessible line “Karl” as the main engine of growth, its head said.

“We would be disappointed if we did not multiply by four or five our sales within five years,” Pier Paolo Righi, chief executive of Karl Lagerfeld BV, told Reuters on Monday.

Financial details were not provided. Righi would only say that Apax’s investment in the venture was “substantial.”

Righi joined Karl Lagerfeld BV in August from Tommy Hilfiger which Apax sold to Philips-Van Heusen last year for 2.2 billion euros.

In addition to designing one-off collections for retailers such as HM and most recently for the French luxury lighter and pen maker ST Dupont, Lagerfeld is also the creative director of women’s ready-to-wear for Fendi, owned by LVMH.

Today, the Karl Lagerfeld brand generates more than 100 million euros ($139 million) through various licensing and co-branding deals, Righi said.

(Reporting by Astrid Wendlandt; Editing by Christian Plumb and Will Waterman)

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