The new site has now its own domain at : http://www.fashiondualite.com/

**This current URL blog will no longer be updated!!**

Enjoy the new site!

I will be working extra hard to bring you more original content on fashion, so stay tuned. I’m not dead!

I’ve also been fighting a cold, but that still doesn’t stop me from working at 12:30 at night to get this done for you.

Besides, I’m sure you all have your eyes glued to NY Fashion Week

Only a day after reporting that Hudson Bay Company owner, Richard Baker, was in hot waters with his flailing retail purchases, The Bay announced a cut back of 1,000 jobs. This cut is part of a restructuring The Bay is undergoing, claiming it will refocus the department store. I’m not quite sure how you can offer better service if department staff are taking the axe though.

Today, the Globe and Mail reports that The Bay is relying heavily on the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games to boost sales. The Bay is the official company  who will be dressing the Canadian Olympic team and will reveal their corporate logo for the Winter Games next week.

Exactly how patriotic will Canadians be about the Winter Games of 2010? The Bay had released official Olympic products for the Beijing Games last year, and failed to make any significant retail waves. Jeff Sherman, HBC’s CEO, acknowledged the shortcomings of last year’s fashion flop and promised to “not make those mistakes again.” They’re apparently working on “sought-after designs” that should have better retail longevity.

What HBC really hopes to accomplish is to reproduce Roots’ Olympic success. According to the Globe and Mail back in Oct:

The Olympics work had helped put Roots on the world map after its poor boy cap created a sensation – and a selling frenzy – at the 1998 Nagano Winter Games.

Since then, Roots had been the official outfitter for the U.S. Olympic team until last year when famed American designer Ralph Lauren designed the team’s jackets. The collaboration also proved fruitful as sales were still strong on the retail floor even after the Beijing Games were done.

Were HBC have made a collaboration with a Canadian fashion brands like Pink Tartan or DSquared, as Adidas made with Stella McCartney, that could help boost visibility for The Bay with their exclusive Olympic line.

Last year’s fashion flop – Who would actually wear these?

Another problem are the numerous licensees who are developing other Olympic products as listed by Vancouver Sun in February 2008. The list of products also include clothing apparel, which could place it in direct competition with The Bay’s designs. Although, Olympic Canadian fashion doesn’t really whip up my style senses into a frenzy.

With the news of the global recession, the implementation of Lord & Taylor into the Canadian market has been scraped for now. It will be a slow and painful process for Richard Baker to turn around two department store chains in 2 different countries.

Image credits: HBC, official Vancouver2010.com muk muk plush

According to the Wall Street Journal*, a few of Baker’s purchases have already flunked out – namely Linen n’ Things, FortunOff and the once promising Peter Som. The department stores Lord & Taylor and The Bay were said to endure a makeover in better positioning themselves in the retail market. In the US, Lord & Taylor was said to stand between Macy’s and Nordstrom. In Canada, the U.S. department store would position itself between The Bay and Holt Renfrew. Today, it would seem this projection is bleak.

The Bay, already suffering from previous mismanagement, seem to have encountered yet another setback in making a significant return to the Canadian retail market. If the department store is heading for a resale, unless by some miracle in this global recession, I fear that this branded department store will disappear off of customer’s radars, if not done so already.

*If you’re not  subscribed to WSJ, there is a technical loophole in which you can view the article if you search the following keywords in Google – “nrdc, baker, wsj”. Click on the “cache” link and you should be able to see it. Ahh technology.

Introducing Business of Fashion‘s first ever video interview with London designer Giles Deacon. To be honest, I’m quite excited for BoF, it’s a great experience to contribute to such a well-respected site and I can only hope for bigger and better things. Not to mention that I’m always deeply honored to be part of the team even if my contributions are rare gems

Here’s the teaser trailer below:

While I was sitting at my local laundromat waiting for the spin cycle to end, I picked up a past issue of the New Yorker, the March 2008 edition, and started flipping through the pages for distraction.

Although I have forgotten the title of it, I read a very interesting article about the downturn of the housing market and made a correlation between the mass foreclosures in North America with the spending habits of fellow consumers.

During the real estate boom between 1996 and 2004, borrowing credit had never been easier. Lending restrictions were lax and putting a down payment on a home was virtually non-existant. The average down payment for a home would only reach as little as 2%, leaving consumers less likely to save up for the future and spending more. This extra spending habit conveniently coupled with the rise of accessible luxury was a recipe for extravagance.

As consumers borrowed more on the easy credit available, they never thought of saving that money up for their mortgage. Fast forward 4 years later, the market crashed. With job losses, new homeowners are now at the mercy of a loan they can no longer repay. Consequentially, the extra spending on luxury and clothing eventually dried up to a trickle, leading to the current retail meltdown. Store openings have been pushed back or scrapped altogether, executives have quit, brands have been sold, and prices have fallen off a cliff.

It’s therefore safe to say that the housing market has deeply affected the retail landscape. We shouldn’t simply blame credits and loans for financial woes, we should also blame -well, ourselves…and the media.

First, consumers are held responsible for carelessness, investing in homes with no thought of consequences were they to lose their jobs or could no longer afford to pay back their mortgages. I personally find it staggering that down payments on homes can be as little as 1%, would you really want to trust people who can fork up so little money with a $200K mortgage? Also, if anyone ever paid attention to the TLC channel and the mass home makeover shows such as “Flip That House,” real estate prices have been inflated at nearly double their original value.

Second, the media has had a dramatic effect on retail sales. Advertisement had been at an all-time high, as fashion brands spruced up in and around the medias like fungi on billboards, magazines, reality series, and iPhones. Savvy marketing tactics enticed consumers with entry level luxury items, making them purchase items they normally could not afford were it not for the cheap mortgage on their brand new homes.

Further more, disposable income have shrunk from 34.5% down to 32.5% according to the UK Telegraph in 2007. In the UK, costs of essential bills have risen over the last 10 years, making spending freely less of an option.

Bottoms Down for Baby Boomers

Regaining consumer spending will not be an easy task as paying back a mortgage loan is not a quick thing to accomplish. Most home owners are baby boomers, the largest spending demographic 79 million strong in the US, pumping $2 trillion into the spending economy every year. According to the Associated Press, baby boomers will keep spending less until 2020 when retirement is on the horizon. That gives fashion retailers a little more than 10 years to work their magic to cater to Generation X and Y, and in an ever changing landscape of technology and new products, the road will be more than challenging.

For the baby boomers who were smart enough to save their spendings, there is still a chance for them to contribute significantly to the economy despite reaching past the age of retirement. But the amount will be significantly less than what they had spend in the mid 90′s and 2000′s. Retailers will have to scale back and refocus their branding if they are to swoon the ever fickle younger generations.

Granted that the colors and style are dated, but the approach and conceptualization of the commercial I find is pretty relevant to today. I think the fashion industry is in dire need of a “stranger” to come and breathe life back into our wardrobe. Sure, fashion editors spew this mantra every season, but every so-called golden designer is yesterday’s news  within 2 weeks of being announced.

Plus, when was the last time you’ve seen a memorable fashion commercial made by neither by Gap or Chanel? I don’t particularly recall any significant tv air time for fashion brands anymore. Perhaps because they are too costly to produce, considering Chanel No. 5 with Nicole Kidman cost a whopping £18million ($25 million) to produce in 2004. Too many brands rely too much on celebrity influence to sell their products when they could invest those millions into smart ad agencies and come up with a spectacular concept. If beer and sports companies can come up with the most original works during the Super Bowl, you would think fashion (who needs to be the best at – well, everything) would come up with the best ideas for their air time.

Fashion is drowning by clinging onto magazine ads, their life support needs to extend beyond magazine pages and into cyberspace and back to the tv airwaves. Mere runway shows won’t do, we want to be excited again by fashion. Calvin Klein ads begone! We want something fresh, new and exciting! This is a perfect time to bring back significant, original fashion commercials.

While browsing through TechCrunch, a site who reports on the latest startup companies and the occasional oddball news, has reported some bizarre, yet plausible stuff in the making.

Fembots: A reality?

Japan is reknown for their fascination with robots, and the journey continues as one technological institute in Hyougo introduced Manekin Robotto (Mannequin Robot), a humanoid robot that is supposed to move and act like a female model. Crude as she may look and standing only at 160cm (about 5’3″), she’s hardly what one would describe as an end of human fashion models, however, conceptually it would make for an interesting fashion show. With the right technological advancement and application, a robot model can introduce a range of new advantages (and disadvantages) on the runway.

Digital Clutch – Lipstick space not included

Designer Vivienne Tam had struck a deal with Hewlett-Packard in creating a customized laptop, the HP Mini, with a flowery design. The mini laptop is available for $699 on HP’s website and claims to be the first digital clutch. However cool the design may be, HP forgot what a clutch’s main purpose should be: carrying our credit cards and money of course! Maybe if they made a matching carrying case, now we’d be talking…

Transforming  Sneaker Sandals

Last year I blogged about UK’s female car insurance, Sheila’s Wheels, about their convertible high heels. Well it seems that the same would go for men looking to alleviate themselves with a converse-like shoe into sandals. The practicality does pose a problem. Were the person choose to wear sandals and they would have to carry the external pair around like extra luggage. At least with Sheila’s shoes, the transformation is inconspicuous.

The first purchase of the year goes to the Calvin Klein’s cable knit sweater. Bought on sale for $100 at the Forum Shops at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas. 80% lambswool and 20% cashmere. Made in China. Dry Clean only.

Only A Handful of Stores

It’s perhaps the first and only Calvin Klein store I’ve ever seen or been to, as the brand has been out of the limelight for a while, it’s only recently re-emerging and repositioning itself in the market. Considering its previous success with its perfume and jeans line in the 1980s and 1990s, I’m surprised that CK had never  officially opened any stand alone retail stores. As of late, since Francisco Costa, who had taken over as head designer for the brand, I’ve come to really appreciate the minimalistic look with luxurious fabrics on the runway. I’ve heard little about their bridge collections, so I was pleased to visit the Calvin Klein store in Vegas.

According to Wikipedia, the following brand names are as followed:

• Calvin Klein Collection (black label, top-end designer line)
• ck Calvin Klein (grey label, recently repositioned as bridge collection line)
• Calvin Klein (white label, better sportswear line)
• Calvin Klein Sport (sports version of the white label line for Macy’s)
• Calvin Klein Jeans (denimwear line)
• Calvin Klein Home (high end bedding, towel, bath rug and accessory collections)
• Calvin Klein Golf (launched in late 2007)
• Calvin Klein Underwear (underwear collections)

I have yet to see or notice an actual Calvin Klein Collection piece in the higher end department stores, it would be great to see anything up close and personal for judgement.

The store I’ve been to is clearly Calvin Klein (white label line), offering a nice collection of gray toned apparels in silks, cashmere and wool blends. The silk dresses were of nice prints, however upon touching them, they were unlined and had a familiar H&M quality to them. Prices are accessible like Banana Republic, around $50 to $500.

The cable knit sweater I bought was on sale, if you can call it that, for $100. I’ve been searching for a nice warm cable knit sweater, but can’t seem to find any in Montreal’s bargain hunting grounds. No doubt the Calvin Klein label doesn’t seem to make an appearance in our local luxury stores. It is indeed a warm sweater, however it has a tendency to leave pieces of itself on darker clothing. I had reservations about the Made in China label. An indication that it was made for cheap but with very skilled hands (or machinery). The debate comes down to: which of the evils do you choose? Have those dollars spent to support the overworked laborers in China so they can feed themselves of what little they can save? Or, not pay for the sweater and thinking of the risk that that factory may not exist in a year or so?

The purchase itself may seem like such an easy thing to do, however, our little action of buying somehow goes down much deeper to the person on the other side of the world. It’s hard to decide. Keep supporting Chinese manufacturers to feed those that need work (despite them being overworked) or not support them and take away their hard earned money.

In the end I went for the purchase. I don’t know if my purchase will help keep Chinese people their jobs or not, I don’t know if the manufacturers in Italy or Scotland should be better off with my money, eventhough on a certain standpoint, Chinese people need it much more than Europeans do. I’d like to think I’m helping the Chinese, but who can really say? This is what I wish I knew more about the manufacturing industry…where does your dollar really go?

Total spent for 2009 closet: $100.00