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The history of Valentino.

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The Maison Valentino was founded in 1960 by Valentino Garavani and Giancarlo Giammetti. Valentino is a protagonist of international fashion, and from 2008 until 2016, has gone through an impactful creative evolution.

The Maison Valentino plays a major role in the luxury division through tradition and innovation, a necessary combination for a creative industry that generates the sense of beauty.
Valentino's fashion is displayed through the Haute Couture and Prêt-à-Porter lines for women and for men and through the Valentino Garavani accessories lines that include shoes, bags, small leather goods, eyewear, scarves, ties and fragrances. An aesthetic universe, present in over 100 countries through 175 Valentino directly-operated boutiques and over 1500 points of sale.

Stefano Sassi is the Chief Executive Officer of Valentino S.p.A., and has joined Valentino in 2006, in conjunction with the celebration of the 45th anniversary of the brand, immediately providing a new strategic vision. The CEO has guided the fashion house during years of great development, through the passage of the baton from Valentino Garavani to the Creative Directors Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli, that during the 8 years of Creative co-Direction have contributed into making Valentino one of the most successful fashion companies of the fashion system.
Paris, 7th July 2016: Valentino nominates Pierpaolo Piccioli sole Creative Director of the Maison.

An aesthetic, contemporary vision and the excellence in the execution, are the guidelines of the industrial process and of the artisanal and handmade workmanship that are entirely produced in the historic Atelier of Piazza Mignanelli in Rome, where the specialized 'Bottega Couture' couture school, has recently opened.

THE BRAND TODAY

Valentino S.p.A. is controlled since 2012 by Mayhoola for Investments LLC. The acquisition has brought a rapid growth in the potential of the Valentino brand.

Valentino is amongst the leaders of international fashion to believe in the elevated added value that derives from a global vision of style, developed through collections of Haute Couture, Prêt-à-Porter, Valentino Garavani accessories, eyewear and fragrances licensed in partnership with L'Oréal.

H.E. RACHID MOHAMED RACHID

Currently, the Chairman of the Board of Valentino Company in Italy. One of the leading luxury fashion companies worldwide.

Also, the Chairman of R2R Capital Investment Company. Having major Investments in Financial Institutions, and Operating Companies across countries. With focus on Fashion, Consumer Products, Investment Banks and Health Care.

In 2004 HE Mr. Rachid was appointed Egypt's Minister of Foreign Trade and Industry. Just two years later his portfolio was expanded to include domestic trade and the ministry was renamed the Ministry of Trade and Industry. In 2010 his portfolio was expanded to include the Ministry of Investments. He remained in the post until 2011.

Prior to taking up his ministerial appointment, he was well-known as an entrepreneur and business owner. He established Fine Foods, becoming Egypt's leading food brand, before forming a joint venture with Unilever in 1991. He was later President of Unilever's Middle East, North Africa and Turkey businesses based in London.
In 1978, HE graduated with a BSc in Production Engineering from the Faculty of Engineering at Alexandria University. He has attended several management programs, including the Advanced Management Program at Harvard Business School in 1996. He is a member of Harvard Business School Alumni.

HE is holder of "Cavaliere di Gran Croce, Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana" presented to him by the president of the Italian Republic.

STEFANO SASSI - CEO

Stefano Sassi is Chief Executive Officer of Valentino S.p.A. from December 2006. In September 2007, Valentino Garavani and Giancarlo Giammetti leave the Maison and in 2008 Stefano Sassi appoints Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli as Creative Directors. The brand has reached the objective of one billion dollars in revenues at the end of 2015.
In July 2016 Valentino nominates Pierpaolo Piccioli sole Creative Director of the Maison.

Between 1990 and 1996, Stefano Sassi has worked on strategic projects for the consultancy company Bain&Company, to then become General Manager and Board Member of Cerruti 1881, until 2001. In the same year he was appointed General Manager of the textile division of Marzotto S.p.A and later became its Chief Executive Officer.

Stefano Sassi has overseen Valentino first with the management of the investment fund Permira and then in 2012 with the acquisition by Mayhoola for Investments.

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The Maison Valentino was founded in 1960 by Valentino Garavani and Giancarlo Giammetti. Valentino is a protagonist of international fashion, and from 2008 until 2016, has gone through an impactful creative evolution.

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Italy is currently in a €2 trillion governemnt debt.

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Three of Europe's largest economies are under threat of recession, which could spell a crisis across Europe.

Dozens of companies in Germany have turned to "short-time" work - cutting employee hours - a canary in the coal mine of industrial weakness

Britain could also already be in a recession despite having not left the EU due to the uncertainty caused by Brexit.

View Markets Insider for more stories.

Three of Europe's biggest economic engines - the UK, Germany, and Italy - are sputtering simultaneously.

Eurozone growth looks "dire" in the second quarter, Pantheon Macroeconomics said in a report on July 22, "primarily thanks to a crash in German growth."

The economists see "elevated risks of outright falls in Italian and German GDP," despite the "resilient" economies of France and Spain.

Outside of the eurozone, but not yet out of Europe, the UK is stumbling as well. The National Institute for Economic and Social Research, said that uncertainty surrounding the decision to leave the EU three years ago means there's a one-in-four chance the economy could already be in recession.

Pantheon Macroeconomics

Since the end of last year, the German manufacturing sector has performed poorly and is "effectively in a recession," Pantheon Macroeconomics says.

There are other warning signs. German companies are now putting their workers on "short time." The Financial Times, citing the Ifo Center for Macroeconomics and Surveys, reported: "German industrial weakness is now beginning to leave its mark on the country's labor practices," with "more and more companies seeking to curb their wage costs by reducing employees' working hours - a sign of emptying order books and slowing output."

Read More: Germany, the backbone of Europe's economy, 'hit a brick wall' in the second quarter

Pantheon Economics

Italy's debt is a huge problem

Italy's economy, meanwhile is "still on the ropes" says Pantheon Macroeconomics head eurozone economist Claus Vistesen. GDP in Italy "probably stumbled again," falling 0.21% in the second quarter, he said in the note.

While labor data "will weaken in the second half of 2019," he said in a separate note on July 16.

Pantheon Macroeconomics
See More: Italy's 'perma-recession' could trigger a €2 trillion financial crisis that threatens the eurozone itself
However, it is debt that is one of the real issues. It currently stands at about €2 trillion ($2.25 trillion). Debt to GDP has reached 130%, a level not seen since World War II.

Jack Allen, an analyst at Capital Economics, told Business Insider back in April that the public debt ratio will probably continue rising and eventually prove unsustainable.

"This would be a bigger problem than the previous euro-zone crisis and could once again endanger the single currency itself," Allen said.

And then there's the UK

Read more: The UK might already be in a recession - before even leaving the EU

Britain's new Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, will have the challenge of tackling leaving the EU, which will likely cause decline in the economy whatever the deal.

And given that Johnson, in the run-up to being elected leader, said that Britain would leave the EU "do or die," "no deal" scenarios are now more likely.

NIESR says: "In an alternative, orderly no-deal scenario, we would expect GDP growth to fall to zero in 2020, and CPI inflation to rise above 4%."

NIESR

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The UK, German and Italian economies are all tanking at the same time | Markets Insider

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Three of Europe's largest economies are under threat of recession, which could spell a crisis across Europe. Dozens of companies in Germany have turned to "short-time" work - cutting employee hours - a canary in the coal mine of industrial weakness Britain could also already be in a recession despite having not left the EU due to the uncertainty caused by Brexit.

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Due to international customers, Valentino's garments feature Japanese wash care labels - these had to be researched to ensure that on my wash care tag I have included the appropriate symbols.

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Japanese Washing Symbols - CF Accessories

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Washing Symbols | Dryclean Symbols | Bleaching Symbols | Wringing Symbols | Drying Symbols | Ironing Symbols

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Piccioli has a profound awareness of the fashion house's traditions and this knowledge is the foundation of innovation, he claims that "no innovation can exist without a knowledge of tradition".

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'I have always loved cinema and during my adolescence I dreamed of becoming a movie director. When I discovered fashion and its narrative power, I decided to become a designer. It was for me a natural evolution of a dream.'
After High school, Pierpaolo Piccioli enrolls in the Istituto Europeo di Design, in Rome. Commitment sets in during the first years of work in the atelier. After his first experiences, in 1990 he arrives at Fendi to work on the brand's accessory line. In this period he approaches the heart of the profession: the contact with high Italian craftsmanship and the possibility of experimenting with a new approach.
'Working closely with the artisans and with the Italian expertise has been fundamental. It has allowed me to understand and perceive the rules in order to break them and rewrite them. Savoir-faire is the base of the designer profession. It is the base from which each creative process begins.'
After Fendi, together with Maria Grazia Chiuri, he arrives at Valentino to develop the emerging accessory line. It is the beginning of a challenge: to lead the great tradition of the Valentino Couture from dresses to objects, maintaining intact the tradition, the cure and the creativity of its founder. The experiment works on all fronts. In 2008, Pierpaolo Piccioli e Maria Grazia Chiuri are nominated Valentino's Creative Directors.
'From the first days, the most important task on Valentino's heritage has been to accomplish the perception, the idea and the essence of the Maison rather than reproposing pieces of its archive. It has been a creative process that took as a model the modus operandi of the Atelier of Couture. In other words, the human excellence portrayed in every single detail. From the fashion shows, to the collaborations, to the stores.'
In a just a few years, Valentino has become a brand of reference for the fashion system and an international success case. In 2016, with the exit of Maria Grazia Chiuri, Pierpaolo Piccioli is nominated sole Creative Director of the Maison. It is the start of a new era, a further evolution for the Italian brand.
'I am interested in the idea of humanism that nourishes creativity. The human connection that forms this Maison is for me the best team possible. Here I have discovered that no innovation can exist without a profound knowledge of tradition. At the same time, I know that the sense of limit that springs from this awareness gives you the freedom of thinking of how to trespass it. This, in synthesis, will be the new Valentino direction. A human narration, personal yet unanimous, of a story that is yet to be written.'

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Creative direction Maison: Pierpaolo Piccioli | Valentino

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'I have always loved cinema and during my adolescence I dreamed of becoming a movie director. When I discovered fashion and its narrative power, I decided to become a designer. It was for me a natural evolution of a dream.' After High school, Pierpaolo Piccioli enrolls in the Istituto Europeo di Design, in Rome.

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PESTEL (Economic) - No Set Minimum Wage in Italy

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PESTEL (Economic) - No Set Minimum Wage in Italy

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Italy has no set minimum wage increasing the risks of worker exploitation.

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Minimum wages in Italy are set through collective bargaining agreements at the sectoral level. According to Article 36 of the Constitution the wages must be proportionate to the quality and quantity of work done and also high enough to provide a minimum subsistence for the worker and his family.

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Inflation rates remain at their lowest since April 2018 with costs for transportation being lowered.

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Italy Inflation Rate | 2019 | Data | Chart | Calendar | Forecast | News

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Italy's annual inflation rate came in at 1.1 percent in April of 2019, following a 1.0 percent rise in the previous month and in line with preliminary estimates. It was the highest inflation rate since December 2018, as prices advanced faster for transport.

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I researched previous Valentino collaborations to decide how large my range should be. Belcourt, a Métis artist, collaborated with the brand creating only nine looks - although my range is larger due to me featuring accessories and VLTN merchandise, I created 8 dresses which are the main items of the collection.

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"The eye has to travel," said the legendary fashion editor Diana Vreeland, and when Valentino creative directors Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli were looking for a spark for their next resort collection, they set their sights on Canada. More specifically, Espanola, Ont., and Métis artist Christi Belcourt, whose pointillistic painting Water Song has been transformed into nine covetable looks that will be hitting stores later this autumn.

Belcourt collaborated with the label's fabric research and development manager Francesco Bova, who worked from high-resolution photographs of the work (which is part of the National Gallery's permanent collection) to create luxurious floral prints and embroideries. Bova travelled to Toronto with fabric samples for Belcourt's approval before they were combined with Valentino's feminine silhouettes to create a striking assortment of garments from haltertops to evening gowns.

While designer-artist collaborations have been popular since the days of Elsa Schiaparelli and Salvador Dalí, indigenous artwork has more often than not been appropriated without consent. "When fashion designers raid the world's closets for inspiration, they often do so without permission," says Susan Scafidi, founder of the Fashion Law Institute at Fordham Law School in New York City. "Too literal copying of culturally significant designs can amount to cultural misappropriation."

Belcourt, aware of fashion's tendency to misinterpret indigenous symbolism, was skeptical at first. "One of the first things I wanted to know was their view on appropriation and if they've ever been accused of appropriating anything," she says. "Have they ever put models in headdresses walking down the runway?" Her environmental activism is one of the reasons she agreed to entrust her work to Valentino, citing the label's position at the top of Greenpeace's list of "Detox Leaders" in the fashion industry.

Her acrylic paintings pay homage to Métis beadwork techniques, which she sees as a continuation of the Métis's artistic legacy. Water Song is comprised of hundreds of thousand of bead-like dots, set on a black background, depicting a cluster of flora and fauna forming a large root. "It's about water, the sacredness of water around the world. Within many indigenous cultures, water - rivers, lakes, streams, even the rain - is considered sacred because of its ability to give and sustain life," explains Belcourt.

Now in her late 40s, Belcourt began painting over two decades ago to reclaim her Métis roots. "I realized that I didn't know enough about beadwork or plants to be able to do them justice, so I had to really delve into both those areas," she says. She is a co-founder of the Onaman Collective, which mentors youth in indigenous land-based traditions, art creation and native language, and started the Walking With Our Sisters project, a commemorative art installation for missing and murdered indigenous women. The memorial incorporates almost 2,000 pairs of moccasin vamps, created by friends and families of the missing women.

Whenever starting a new project, Belcourt thinks about how her work will affect positive change and she is pleased with the complimentary feedback the Valentino collaboration has received. While fashion may not have been the most likely place for Belcourt to inspire a new audience, her collaboration sets a precedent. As Scafidi views it, "[the collaboration] represents a significant step toward broader recognition for indigenous artists and provides a model for other fashion houses."
To download the fall edition of the Globe Style Advisor iPad app, visit tgam.ca/styleadvisor starting Sept. 11.

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How Valentino collaborated with a Métis artist for a fall collection

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"The eye has to travel," said the legendary fashion editor Diana Vreeland, and when Valentino creative directors Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli were looking for a spark for their next resort collection, they set their sights on Canada.

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I planned out my launch to coincide with some of the key dates below.

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PESTEL (Social) - Inexpensive Immigrant Labour

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PESTEL (Social) - Inexpensive Immigrant Labour

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Prato, a town in Tuscany, has the highest population of Chinese immigrants who have become manufactures for luxury fashion houses who use their inexpensive labour.

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Many companies are using inexpensive immigrant labor to manufacture handbags that bear the coveted "Made in Italy" label.

The first significant wave of Chinese immigrants arrived in the industrial zone around Prato, a city fifteen miles northwest of Florence, in the nineteen-nineties. Nearly all of them came from Wenzhou, a port city south of Shanghai. For the Chinese, the culture shock was more modest than one might have expected. "The Italians were friendly," one early arrival remembered. "Like the Chinese, they called one another Uncle. They liked family." In Tuscany, business life revolved around small, interconnected firms, just as it did in Wenzhou, a city so resolutely entrepreneurial that it had resisted Mao's collectivization campaign. The Prato area was a hub for mills and workshops, some of which made clothes and leather goods for the great fashion houses. If you were willing to be paid off the books, and by the piece, Prato offered plenty of opportunities. Many Wenzhouans found jobs there. "The Italians, being canny, would subcontract out their work to the Chinese," Don Giovanni Momigli, a priest whose parish, near Prato, included an early influx of Chinese, told me. "Then they were surprised when the Chinese began to do the work on their own."

By the mid-nineties, Wenzhouans were setting up textile businesses in small garages, where they often also lived. Soon, they began renting empty workshops, paying with cash. The authorities didn't ask too many questions. Prato's business model was falling apart under the pressures of globalization. As it became harder for Italians to make a living in manufacturing, some of them welcomed the money that the Chinese workers brought into the local economy. If you could no longer be an artisan, you could still be a landlord.

Throughout the aughts, Chinese continued to show up in Tuscany. A non-stop flight was established between Wenzhou and Rome. Some migrants came with tourist visas and stayed on. Others paid smugglers huge fees, which they then had to work off, a form of indentured servitude that was enforced by the threat of violence. The long hours that the Chinese worked astonished many Italians, who were used to several weeks of paid vacation a year and five months of maternity leave. In 1989, the newspaper Corriere della Sera, using racist language still common among some Italians, published an article about a Chinese worker under the headline " YELLOW STAKHANOVITE ON THE ARNO. "

While Florence was celebrated for its premium leatherwork, Prato was best known for the production of textiles. The Wenzhou workers tacked in a third direction. They imported cheap cloth from China and turned it into what is now called pronto moda, or "fast fashion": polyester shirts, plasticky pants, insignia jackets. These items sold briskly to low-end retailers and in open-air markets throughout the world.

The Chinese firms gradually expanded their niche, making clothes for middle-tier brands, like Guess and American Eagle Outfitters. And in the past decade they have become manufacturers for Gucci, Prada, and other luxury-fashion houses, which use often inexpensive Chinese-immigrant labor to create accessories and expensive handbags that bear the coveted "Made in Italy" label. Many of them are then sold to prosperous consumers in Shanghai and Beijing. It's not just Italian brands that have profited from this cross-cultural arrangement: a Chinese leather-goods entrepreneur I recently met with just outside Prato was wearing a forty-thousand-dollar Bulgari watch.

More than ten per cent of Prato's two hundred thousand legal residents are Chinese. According to Francesco Nannucci, the head of the police's investigative unit in Prato, the city is also home to some ten thousand Chinese people who are there illegally. Prato is believed to have the second-largest Chinese population of any European city, after Paris, and it has the highest proportion of immigrants in Italy, including a large North African population.

Many locals who worked in the textile and leather industries resented the Chinese immigrants, complaining that they cared only about costs and speed, not about aesthetics, and would have had no idea how to make fine clothes and accessories if not for the local craftsmen who taught them. Simona Innocenti, a leather artisan, told me that her husband was forced out of bag-making by cheaper Chinese competitors. She said of the newcomers, "They copy, they imitate. They don't do anything original. They're like monkeys."

Although it could be argued that the Chinese have revived Prato's manufacturing industry, there has been a backlash against them. Native residents have accused Chinese immigrants of bringing crime, gang warfare, and garbage to the city. Chinese mill owners, they complain, ignore health laws and evade taxes; they use the schools and the hospitals without contributing money for them. In the early nineties, a group of Italians who worked in areas with a high concentration of immigrants sent an open letter to the Chinese government, sarcastically demanding citizenship: "We are six hundred honest workers who feel as if we were already citizens of your great country."

The strangest accusation was that the Chinese in Tuscany weren't dying-or, at least, that they weren't leaving any bodies behind. In 1991, the regional government began an investigation into why, during the previous twelve months, not a single Chinese death had been officially recorded in Prato or in two nearby towns. In 2005, the government was still mystified-that year, more than a thousand Chinese arrivals were registered, and only three deaths. Locals suspected that Chinese mobsters were disposing of corpses in exchange for passports, which they then sold to new arrivals, a scheme that took advantage of the native population's apparent inability to tell any one Chinese person from another.

There was a note of jealousy to the Pratans' complaints, as well as a reluctant respect for people who had beaten them at their own game. Elizabeth Krause, a cultural anthropologist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, has written about the changes in Prato. She told me, "While I was there, people would say to me, ' Eravamo noi i cinesi ' "-"We were the Chinese."

Even as many Italians maintained a suspicion of Chinese immigrants, they still criticized them for not contributing fully to the wider economy. Innocenti, the leather artisan, claimed that "the Chinese don't even go to the store here. They have a van that goes from factory to factory, selling Band-Aids, tampons, and chicken. And in the back of the van they have a steamer with rice." The under-the-table cash economy of Prato's Chinese factories has facilitated tax evasion. Last year, as the result of an investigation by the Italian finance ministry into five billion dollars' worth of questionable money transfers, the Bank of China, whose Milan branch had reportedly been used for half of them, paid a settlement of more than twenty million dollars. Many of the transfers, the authorities said, represented undeclared income from Chinese-run businesses, or money generated by the counterfeiting of Italian fashion goods.

In Italy, these sorts of investigations are often more show than substance, and many Chinese residents see themselves as convenient targets. "We didn't invent this way of doing business," one mill owner pointed out to me. "If you go south from Rome, you'll find people who are a lot worse than the Chinese." He speculated that some Italians disliked the Chinese for working harder than they did, and for succeeding. In the Prato area, some six thousand businesses are registered to Chinese citizens. Francesco Xia, a real-estate agent who heads a social organization for young Chinese-Italians, said, "The Chinese feel like the Jews of the thirties. Prato is a city that had a big economic crisis, and now there's a nouveau-riche class of Chinese driving fancy cars, spending money in restaurants, and dressing in the latest fashions. It's a very dangerous situation."

At a time when Europe is filled with anti-immigrant rhetoric, political extremists have pointed to the demographic shifts in Prato as proof that Italy is under siege. In February, Patrizio La Pietra, a right-wing senator, told a Prato newspaper that the city needed to confront "Chinese economic illegality," and that the underground economy had "brought the district to its knees, eliminated thousands of jobs, and exposed countless families to hunger." Such assertions have been effective: in Italy's recent national elections, Tuscany, which since the end of the Second World War had consistently supported leftist parties, gave twice as many votes to right-wing and populist parties as it did to those on the left. Giovanni Donzelli, a member of the quasi-Fascist Fratelli d'Italia party, who last month was elected a national representative, told me, "The Chinese have their own restaurants and their own banks-even their own police force. You damage the economy twice. Once, because you compete unfairly with the other businesses in the area, and the second time because the money doesn't go back into the Tuscan economic fabric." He added that he had once tried to talk with some Chinese parents at his children's school. "They had been here six or seven years, and they still didn't speak Italian," he scoffed. "Because they didn't need to!"

Prato's centro storico is a picturesque maze of streets paved with flagstones and bordered by walls that date to the early Renaissance. One Sunday in February, when I visited, many locals were doing what Italians call le vasche ("laps"), walking from one end of the district to the other, occasionally pausing to look in shopwindows. Some were on their way to family lunches, carrying plates of biscotti wrapped in shiny paper stamped with the names of the city's best bakeries. The Duomo has superb frescoes by Fra Filippo Lippi-"The most excellent of all his works," according to Vasari-and a gold-and-glass reliquary that holds what is claimed to be the sacred girdle of Mary. In a sense, it is Prato's original textile.

Just outside the city walls, in Prato's Chinatown, well-to-do Chinese families were carrying their own wrapped parcels of sweets: mashed-taro buns, red-bean cakes. Suburbanites, coming into town to see relatives, drove BMWs, Audis, and Mercedeses. (In a telling remark, more than one Italian insisted to me that no Chinese person would be caught in a Fiat Panda, one of the Italian company's most modest cars.) According to a 2015 study by a regional economic agency, Chinese residents contribute more than seven hundred million euros to Prato's provincial economy, about eleven per cent of its total.

Chinatown, though, looked dishevelled. In the alleyways, I saw that many of the windows were covered with blankets. A few days later, I accompanied authorities on several raids and learned that there were sweatshops behind some of those windows. In rooms without heat, the newest and poorest arrivals, many of them undocumented, sat bent over sewing machines, tacking collars onto shirts or affixing brightly colored stripes to jogging pants. Such pants might sell to retailers for about eight euros-a fifth of what they would cost if they were made legally by Italians.

The clothing-manufacturing operations in Chinatown tend to be small scale. After visiting the centro storico, I drove through the areas around Prato. I passed block after block of businesses with Chinese characters next to English phrases: Normcore, Feel Good, Miss & Yes. Giant, low-slung buildings combined manufacturing areas with showrooms where buyers could examine samples and place orders. Jessica Moloney, a London-born brand consultant and agent for importers, explained to me, "If you've got three to six months to wait and you need five hundred to a thousand pieces, you go to China. But if you have only two weeks and need a hundred pieces, you come to Prato." She noted, "TJ Maxx is everywhere here. I don't know anyone who isn't working with them."

The word prato means "meadow," and even here, amid structures that evoked the sprawl outside an airport, there were green spaces. In June of 2016, in one of the grassy squares bordered by cluster pines, Chinese locals held a violent protest, after two and a half years of mounting tensions. In 2013, an electrical short had caused a fire that destroyed a workshop called Teresa Moda, killing seven Chinese workers. The victims had both worked and slept in the buildings. One had died while trying to squeeze through a barred window. "I could hear the cries of the Chinese inside," an off-duty carabiniere who battled the fire told Corriere della Sera.

After the fire, the Prato authorities, with no small amount of condescension, said they'd made up their minds that they could no longer neglect the strangers living among them. They would offer Chinese immigrants the blessings of workplace protections, legal wages, and sanitary standards. Italian officials did a sweep of the Prato area, and discovered a great many unregistered mills. Between 2014 and 2017, they conducted inspections of more than eight thousand Chinese-run businesses. They knocked on the doors of mills at night and without warning, before owners could clean up, or close, or reopen down the street under a new name. Officially, the raids, part of a program called Lavoro Sicuro ("Safe Workplace"), were not focussed on any ethnicity. But everyone called them "the Chinese raids," including one of the architects of the plan, Renzo Berti, the director of the disease-prevention unit at the central-Tuscany department of health. Berti told me that the effort had improved the working conditions in the Chinese-owned mills. When the raids started, he said, ninety-three per cent of the inspected businesses were committing violations, from illegal dormitories to exposed wiring. Now the rate was thirty-five per cent. "This has been like a steamroller," he said. "We are having our effect."

The Italians have also cracked down on crime in the Chinese community. In January, the police arrested Zhang Naizhong, the alleged kingpin of the Chinese-Italian mafia, which, they said, had a large presence in Prato. Francesco Nannucci, of the Prato investigative unit, told me that Zhang was the padrino-the godfather. He added, with a laugh, "They learned their structure from the Italians." (The Italian Mob is also active in Prato, but Nannucci said that the two groups don't interact.) Nannucci estimates that eighty per cent of the city's Chinese mills paid protection money to Zhang's organization, which was also involved in drugs, prostitution, and gambling. (A recent pretrial tribunal cast doubt on the evidence, though Zhang remains under house arrest.) Before arresting Zhang, Nannucci said, police had followed him from Rome to Prato. He changed cars eight times along the way, to thwart efforts to track him; visited a restaurant, where local Chinese businessmen lined up at his table and bowed; and was eventually arrested at a hotel in Prato. Nannucci was pleased with the operation, but disappointed that he'd received little help from the Chinese Pratans. "There's a lot of omertà," he said.

The Chinese see the raids and Zhang's arrest primarily as harassment. One Chinese mill owner even pulled out a gun when police officers came to inspect his building. (The gun turned out to be fake.) Armando Chang, who owns a travel agency in the Prato area, told me, "When the Italians do an investigation, the ugly thing, in my opinion, is that they first develop a theory, then try to find the facts that go with it." He claimed that he'd never even heard of a local Chinese mafia. "I learned about them from Bruce Lee movies," he said. "But I've never seen them here." A group of Chinese professionals told me it wasn't a coincidence that the number of raids had increased during the run-up to the national elections.

During a raid in June of 2016, an elderly Chinese man got into an altercation with a carabiniere while trying to leave the mill where he worked. The man, who was carrying an infant, was reportedly jostled, and the baby fell and was injured. Word spread on social media, and several hundred Chinese soon gathered in the square, shouting and throwing rocks and bottles. Police put down the protest, and the regional government promised more raids. At that point, the Chinese foreign ministry stepped in and gently warned the Italians not to pick on its citizens. (Nearly all Chinese-born Pratans remain citizens of China.) The two sides promised to work together, but tensions remain high. Luca Zhou, the head of the Italian branch of Ramunion, a Chinese charity, said, "They rent us the factories, but they don't want to communicate with us. We need more friendship. We should be like brothers."

On the same Sunday, I walked across the square where the protest had taken place, and arrived at a huge industrial building whose façade still bore the words "BP Studio," the name of the well-known Florentine fashion house that had once occupied the space. Laundry was drying on a line. The employees standing at the entrance looked less than thrilled to see me, but they allowed me to go inside. The building, whose interior was almost the size of a soccer field, had an open floor plan; rows of Chinese women, and a few men, sewed and worked leather under fluorescent lights, even though it was Sunday. The work did not seem hard so much as unending: some people were napping, their heads resting on the sewing tables. Children played in corners or watched TV. Blouses, bright-red fake-leather bags, and key chains were stacked in neat piles, ready to be shipped. This was a quintessential pronto moda factory, able to produce clothes and accessories quickly in an era in which the fashion seasons have given way to a series of frantic commissions prompted by viral Instagram posts. A large window in the workshop looked out onto hilly pastures. Along a ridge, a shepherd was guiding a flock of sheep.

While I was in Tuscany, a Chinese mill owner I'll call Enrico-most Chinese immigrants adopt Italian first names-permitted me to visit his operation. He had requested anonymity because the fashion companies require venders to sign confidentiality agreements. In 1988, when Enrico was thirteen, he emigrated from Wenzhou with his mother. The locals were friendly at first, he said, but then, as more Wenzhouans came, the warm feelings faded. But he never seriously considered leaving. "We Chinese have a culture of adapting to the moment," he said. He told me that, as an entrepreneur, he did everything by the book-he even had a pension program for employees. But he acknowledged that not all Chinese factory owners worked this way. "If you play too closely by the rules, you'll never get started," he said. He clarified: "A Chinese person who uses a shortcut always does the hard work, too. Using the same shortcut, an Italian will work seven to eight hours. A Chinese person, if there's a goal, will work twelve."

Enrico's operation, which focussed on leather goods, had a much more refined atmosphere than factories that I had visited while accompanying police on raids. It was not unusual for a mill manager to claim that he lived alone in the adjacent bedrooms; in response, the Italian officials would point to long rows of slippers. Then the police would search the premises for undocumented workers, and a finance inspector would look for evidence of cash payments. (During one raid, I saw a health inspector peer into a rice cooker in a hallway and ask a colleague, "What the fuck are they eating here?" "Some sort of soup," the colleague answered, with a shrug.) In the end, the authorities would tabulate a fine, which usually came to several hundred euros. ("They treat us like an A.T.M.," Francesco Xia complained to me.) Undocumented immigrants were taken to police stations, where they had little to fear. Extended detention was rare, and Italy couldn't expel them to China without proof of their Chinese citizenship.

In contrast to those more humble workshops, Enrico's factory reminded me of a well-run electronics factory. The workers ate in a proper lunchroom and wore crisp uniforms. The ductwork was professional, and the wiring was encased in a dropped ceiling. The labor was divided up into stations: bending the leather into a bag shape, sewing it, installing an inner lining, and attaching buckles and straps. Leather sections waiting to be stitched into bags were neatly laid out on rolling carts, like slabs of tuna at a sushi counter. "I run a sort of special operation," Enrico said with pride. "Famous brands send us the material, and we make the finished product."

Italy's luxury-fashion industry has long struggled to lower costs without compromising on quality. In the seventies and eighties, the Pratan system of interconnected workshops ran smoothly, but in the nineties, as trade barriers fell around the world, fashion houses saw an opportunity too good to resist. Why not manufacture "Made in Italy" products in Eastern Europe and in China? They would still be designed in Milan or Florence, so the label wouldn't be a complete lie. Reports of the practice leaked out, and the brands found themselves under pressure to market their products more honestly. In 2010, Santo Versace-a politician who is also the chairman of the Versace fashion house-championed a law that contained a very Italian compromise: if two of the steps in the manufacturing process took place in Italy, the item could bear the valuable label. But the famous fashion companies continued to look for ways to make the "Made in Italy" tag mean what it was supposed to mean without forgoing profits.

As I was walking around Enrico's shop, I turned a corner and discovered dozens of nylon Prada briefcases hanging on hooks. I'd just seen the same bags for sale in Florence, for about two thousand dollars each. Around another corner were leather Dolce & Gabbana shoulder bags, with the brand's distinctive "DG" rhinestone buckles. There was an area dedicated to an élite French company's bags, which also retailed at around two thousand dollars each. On one table was a cardboard prototype. Enrico showed me the storeroom where these riches were locked up at night.

I thought of a recent visit that I had made to Scandicci, the iconic Italian leatherwork village, just outside Florence. I'd met an artisan named Andrea Calistri, whose workshop was filled with mementos from three generations of leatherworkers. He told me that he had done jobs for Gucci, Dolce & Gabbana, and Prada, but that he objected to their use of mills that violated labor laws. He had helped found an association, called "100% Made in Italy," that focussed on insuring proper labor practices, but his rhetoric was unmistakably nativist. " 'Made in Italy' means made by Italians! " he told me. He was surrounded by shelves filled with maroon leather handbags. They were supple and gorgeous. Then again, so were the bags that Enrico's employees were making.

Another Chinese entrepreneur in Prato, whom I'll call Arturo, met me in his office; two elegant Gucci bags sat on a table in front of him. The big fashion brands, he said, all have some factories of their own. (In Scandicci, I saw a new factory emblazoned with a giant " PRADA" on the façade.) But, Arturo went on, "think about it-they sell ten thousand bags a month. How are they going to produce that many? They cut the leather and make the prototypes, but that's it." He added that he had turned down work from Prada because the company didn't pay enough. (In a statement, Prada said that it "stands out for its strong ties with the artisanal craft experience typical of the Italian tradition.")

A third Chinese proprietor, whom I'll call Luigi, estimated that more than a hundred Chinese-owned workshops in Tuscany were assembling bags for the famous fashion houses. Each of these workshops, in turn, used five to ten subcontractors for tasks like stitching straps and finishing hardware. All the proprietors I met with spoke adequate Italian, but Luigi's was truly fluent. He said that his operation had filled orders from Chloé, Burberry, Fendi, Balenciaga, Saint Laurent, and Chanel. "On the level of craftsmanship, Chanel is the top, " he said, using the English word. "They're the fussiest about the quality." Working for a company like Fendi wasn't easy for a Chinese person, he went on. You had to "acquire an Italian mentality" and "conceive of the bag as an Italian would." He explained, "A Chinese person thinks only that he has to get so many bags done, but behind every bag there's a precise study of what it's about. I think the Italians are the greatest artisans in the world."

Arturo's factory was clean and organized. When the workers used sprays to dye leather, they put on masks. Representatives from the fashion brands, I was told, came to inspect the first round of bags; the rest of the order was then made to their specifications. Gucci is known for giving extensive instructions, with precise demands about the number and the length of stitches. Hiring highly skilled workers was therefore essential.

Arturo took me through the economics of doing work for luxury-fashion brands. He was paid a set fee for an order, no matter how long it took to complete. He generally lost money on the first bags he finished, but his workers got much faster with repetition, and the later iterations were profitable. When he was fulfilling Gucci contracts, he said, the company paid him an average of nineteen euros an hour. He showed me a bag that featured the company's insignia fabric, with its interlocking "G"s, and said, "This fabric would cost fifteen euros a metre. But they make millions and millions of metres, so they don't pay fifteen. Maybe ten. The leather here costs maybe fifteen to twenty euros. It's two euros for the zipper, plus the money they pay us-that's the cost. And they put it on the market at between ten and fifteen times that cost." The most skilled workers at higher-end Chinese factories make as much as two thousand euros a month-a middle-class living in Italy.

Luigi told me that, in recent years, the big fashion houses had grown more careful about their outsourcing, and had begun conducting their own private inspections of contractors' facilities. "I undergo seven audits a year for seven brands!" he said. "Conditions of work, contract terms, safety-they put your company under a microscope." The Chinese proprietors I spoke with all said that it was useful to have an Italian business partner. Luigi had one, and also several Italians working on the factory floor. He explained that having Italian employees made it "easier to get work, because the big houses feel more trusting." He said that it also meant no fashion house would dare ask him to accept less money than what it would pay an Italian.

In 2014, an Italian artisan spoke to the investigative television journalist Sabrina Giannini. Gucci had given him a big contract, he said, but the pay was so low-twenty-four euros a bag-that he had subcontracted the work to a Chinese mill, where employees worked fourteen-hour days and were paid half what he made. When the bags made it to stores, they were priced at between eight hundred and two thousand dollars. An inspector for Gucci told Giannini that he saw no reason to ask employees about their working conditions. (Gucci denounced the television report as "false" and "not evidence of our reality." The company says that, in the past few years, it has increased scrutiny of its supply chain, including subcontractors, and has "blacklisted" around seventy manufacturers.)

Recently, many Chinese mill owners have started hiring workers from countries including Syria, Pakistan, and Senegal. Several weeks before I arrived in the Prato area, a small protest was held outside a local workshop that regularly received subcontracts from a nearby firm that produces metalwork for well-known fashion brands. The workshop's Chinese proprietor had abruptly closed the operation, locking out his employees, who were mostly Senegalese, and stiffing them of their wages. They found him around the corner, in another mill that he owned, and he agreed to pay them if they met him back at the workshop. When they returned to the factory, he greeted them at the front door, and asked them to wait a minute for their money. He then walked out the back door and got into a waiting car.

Following this Keystone Cops farce, a national labor union encouraged the employees to stage several public protests. One of the employees who protested later told me that he had been paid only twelve hundred euros a month, with no benefits, to work in a freezing-cold room. He remembered working on products for companies including Ferragamo, Prada, and Dior. The crew chief, he said, "would scream at us to work faster, to get more pieces done." (The employees were officially paid a higher salary, to comply with the law, but, according to a union representative, managers required them to withdraw their "extra" wages and give that money to the owner.)

The workshop has now gone out of business-the employees were never paid what they were owed. But an enterprise run by the same owners, in the same location, continues to operate. In February, it received an order, from the same subcontracting firm, to finish seven hundred and eighty-five Chanel buckles.

After Italy became a unified nation, in 1861, Massimo d'Azeglio, a Piedmontese statesman and novelist, is said to have commented, "Now that there is an Italy, it will be necessary to make the Italians." But, until recently, few people had thought about how to make a hyphenated Italian. During one of the raids, I asked an Italian official who was there to translate Mandarin why there weren't more Chinese Pratan translators. If there were, I suggested, the mill workers might be more responsive to questions, and would not be able to talk to one another privately by switching to the Wenzhou dialect, which not even Mandarin speakers understand. She answered, brightly, "Because we're Italians! "

Tuscans may fantasize about walling themselves off from the forces of globalism, but, as the Chinese-Italian economic relationship grows ever more complex, the illusion is getting harder to maintain. The per-capita income in Wenzhou is now more than a hundred times what it was when the migration to Prato began. As a result, wage expectations in the Chinese factories in Prato are increasing. Meanwhile, the travel agent Armando Chang told me, the Chinese "are no longer coming in the same numbers." Some are even returning to Wenzhou from Prato. "You can make more money back home," Enrico said. He told me that, partly because of rising salaries in Wenzhou, he paid his Chinese manager more than he would pay an Italian.

The Chinese community in Prato is evolving rapidly. Many of the immigrants' children, having lived in Italy since birth, are looking beyond the garment and leather-goods industries. "Our kids don't want to make bags," Arturo complained. A friend of his agreed, telling me, "They all want to go to the Bocconi now!" (The Bocconi is an élite private university in Milan.) I met one such girl, an eighteen-year-old named Luisa, at a pleasant Chinese bistro called Ravioli di Cristina. (The Italians call dumplings "Chinese ravioli.") Her father sold coffee-vending machines to the Chinese mills. Chinese Pratans, she complained, thought only about money, so she had mostly Italian friends. When the young Chinese Pratan waiter, who was flirting with her, urged her to listen to a Korean pop song, she countered by recommending a song by the American d.j. duo the Chainsmokers. Her public school, Buzzi, on the eastern edge of Prato, has few Chinese students, and that-along with its specialization in engineering-was why she'd chosen it. "In the beginning, the other students ignore you," she said. But she had gradually formed friendships. "They still sometimes say racist things-they call me Yellow Face-but I joke back at them," she said.

Deborah Sarmento, a Pratan who started a tutoring organization for Chinese children whose parents work long hours, views Chinese immigration more philosophically than many of her neighbors: what the Pratans had to do, she said, was embrace what was special in their tradition while also learning from the Chinese. "We've been occupied over and over since we were Borgo al Cornio," she said. "First the Etruscans, then the Longobards, then the Florentines and the Spanish. And we were always able to overcome by looking at our roots. It gives you a chance to really understand what it means to be from Prato."

Sara Lin, a thirty-eight-year-old fashion designer with a blond streak in her short black hair, is another sign of change. Her parents had brought her with them to Italy when she was seven; her father worked in textiles near Milan, and her mother had a dressmaking company in Tuscany. At first, Lin felt disoriented. "All the Italians looked the same," she recalled. "It was hard to tell one face from another." But she soon settled in and began to excel at school, in part because she was good at math. In her early teens, she returned to China for two years to improve her Chinese and learn about the culture. She didn't fit in. "That was a more racist society than the one here!" she said.

After finishing high school, she entered the fashion industry. Later, she and her husband worked on bags for Valentino and Gucci. Eventually, she realized that she wanted more-she wanted to design. In 2008, she acquired the rights to a once famous Florentine handbag brand, Desmo. "At first, I encountered a lot of resistance and defiance from the Florentine inner crowd," she recalled. But Lin, along with an Italian business partner, successfully revived Desmo, creating a line of leather bags that sell for a few hundred dollars each. (The company's Web site notes that all Desmo bags are "Made in Tuscany" and "crafted by the skillful hands of experts.") Lin then had a more ambitious idea: to make a "deconstructable" purse. She showed me what she called a Pop Bag. You took bright, playful component pieces-a back, a front, adjustable straps, and so on-and clipped them together to build your own bag. You could slot in different colored panels, depending on your preferences. Yes, it was silly, but it was also a modern and witty gloss on what many other Chinese were doing around Prato: assembling bags.

Lin felt that she had both the grit of the Chinese-"When I was pregnant, nineteen years ago, I was in the workshop at noon and giving birth at three"-and the flexibility of the Italians. China gave her discipline; Italy gave her possibilities. She argued that, "in China, what a man can do with one word takes a woman five. A woman in China needs grinding determination and force. But here in Italy it's the reverse. A woman, one word. A man, five." In 2016, Lin opened her first Pop Bag store, full of glistening fixtures and backlit shelving, on Via Calimala, in Florence. And, a few weeks ago, she opened a kiosk at the Time Warner Center, in New York City. She had initially imagined something as splashy as her Florentine boutique, but Manhattan is a long way from Prato, and she is a careful entrepreneur. Her Pop Bags are also sold in China. When I asked her if Chinese sales were helped by the fact that she was born there, she was unsure how to respond. "I don't know," she said. "We haven't done a study on it." ♦

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The Chinese Workers Who Assemble Designer Bags in Tuscany

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D. T. Max on companies that are using inexpensive immigrant labor to manufacture handbags that bear the coveted "Made in Italy" label.

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Italy has various public holidays throughout the year, all of which have the ability to impact lead times.

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PESTEL (Technological) - Advanced Machinery and Robotics

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PESTEL (Technological) - Advanced Machinery and Robotics

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Italy is amongst the world's leaders in industrial machinery. "40% of Italian manufacturing companies use 3-D printers for fast prototyping, and 25% use robotics in the manufacturing process.”

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When your thoughts turn to Italy, which products, services, and industries immediately come to mind? "You probably think of food, fast cars, fashion, wine, design, tourism-and all of that is good," says Michele Scannavini, president of the Italian Trade Agency ( ITA), which promotes the internationalization of Italian companies. But now Italy's leaders want the world to recognize their country's 21 st-century strengths in advanced manufacturing, machinery, robotics, and related areas as well.

"Italy is going through a very important and radical transformation from traditional manufacturing to advanced, flexible manufacturing," says Scannavini, who joined the ITA in June 2016 after working in Italy's private sector for more than 30 years. At first glance, that transition might seem especially daunting given that Italian industry consists primarily of small and midsize enterprises (SMEs), he says. Often family-owned, these SMEs simply can't match the financial resources of giant global enterprises based in Germany, the United States, and elsewhere.

In reality, though, modest size provides competitive advantage for Italian companies, Scannavini continues: "They are nimble and flexible and very fast to adopt new technologies." In fact, he notes, what some might consider "the technologies of tomorrow" are already widely used in Italy: "Today, 40 percent of Italian manufacturing companies use 3-D printers for fast prototyping, and 25 percent use robotics in the manufacturing process."

All those factors are adding up to burnish Italy's profile as a global leader in manufacturing and related industries, as illustrated by a few key statistics.

Europe's second-largest manufacturing economy, and home to some of the region's most environmentally efficient manufacturing systems.

Europe's third-largest exporter of flexible manufacturing technologies, including robotics, with $9.6 billion in Italian exports to the United States alone.

Among just five countries worldwide with a manufacturing trade surplus exceeding $100 billion.

But that's just the beginning.

Masters of Machinery

Italy is also among the world leaders in industrial machinery. It ranks second worldwide in global competitiveness in that industry and is among the world's top three producers of machined parts. More than 4,600 companies are producing machinery and related products in Italy today, employing nearly 180,000 people. That's a significant chunk of the workforce in a country with a population of just under 60 million.

More than 70 percent of Italian-made machinery is exported to other markets worldwide, says Alberto Maria Sacchi, a board member and past president of Federmacchine, the federation of associations representing Italian machinery manufacturers. And that percentage is likely to keep increasing: Overall exports of Italian-made machinery increased by 17 percent in the past year alone.

Much of that output heads to the United States. Machinery accounts for fully 25 percent of all Italian exports to the United States each year. More than 500 Italian machinery companies conduct business with U.S. organizations such as Ford, Boeing, and NASA, to name just a few partners.

All those achievements resulted from "an industrial model based on networks of small and midsize enterprises working together swiftly with strong, lasting connections in the supply chain and with end users," Sacchi says.

A Future Based on Collaboration

In September 2016, the Italian Ministry of Economic Development launched its Industrial National Plan 4.0-"Industry 4.0," for short-which Scannavini describes as supporting "the digitization of the Italian economy." The long-term strategic plan is designed to generate billions of dollars for technology research and innovation through tax breaks, venture-capital support for startups, and other public and private sources.

The plan also includes a strong educational component. The Italian government plans to create four or five centers of competence at top Italian universities in Milan, Pisa, and other locations. Collectively, those centers will shoot for some ambitious 10-year targets: training 200,000 students and 3,000 managers, and awarding 1,400 PhDs "on topics related to innovation, high technology, and the industry of the future," Scannavini says.

At the same time, Italy's leaders emphasize that their nation's future depends on collaborating with companies, agencies, and universities from beyond their own borders, including those in the United States.

Two recent examples came March 2016. First was the ITA's i3 Forum on advanced manufacturing, in which Italian officials repeatedly emphasized the importance of Italian-U.S. partnerships and trade. Additionally, as part of a long-term partnership with the Italian government, IBM announced plans to launch its first Watson Health European Center of Excellence in Milan. (The site is near the planned Human Technopole Italy 2040 campus, which Italian authorities expect will eventually house up to 1,500 researchers working in areas such as genomics, big data, aging, and nutrition.

IBM's center will bring together data scientists, engineers, researchers, and designers-all specialists in Watson Health, which brings the advanced cognitive-computing capability of IBM's Watson to the analysis of health-care data. "The center will be responsible for developing new diagnostic systems, new therapeutic solutions, and personalized medicine," Scannavini says.

IBM, which pledged to invest up to $150 million in the new center over the next several years, says company leaders envision the center becoming the hub of "a pan-European ecosystem for health-care reform, research, and health-tech startup"-in other words, another source for collaboration.

IBM calls Italy a natural location for Watson Health's first European center of excellence due to the nation's "commitment to health and wellness." That doesn't surprise Scannavini, who notes that Italy boasts one of the highest levels of life expectancy (second only to Japan), low infant-mortality rates, and one of the world's top health-care systems-all according to the World Health Agency (WHO).

Another example: In June 2016, Lamborghini launched the Advanced Composite Structures Laboratory (ACSL) in Seattle to conduct research on improving the strong, lightweight carbon-fiber-component materials used in the company's high-end sports cars. While the Pacific Northwest is half a world away from the Italian automaker's headquarters in Sant'Agata Bolognese, Seattle was a strategic choice for the lab because of Lamborghini's ongoing collaboration with Boeing, which also uses carbon fiber in its aircraft and aerospace products.

The Italian Trade Agency plans to support additional collaborations between Italian and American research organizations. It also plans road shows in several American cities, including Boston, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, and New York this year and next; those session will feature discussions focusing on advanced manufacturing, aerospace, biotechnology, and startup opportunities.

On Italy's Horizon

While taking pride in their country's successes in the technology, manufacturing, and machinery industries, Italian business leaders are also seeking untapped opportunities in other fields.

One of Scannavini's top priorities is increasing Italy's presence in the digital universe. There's plenty of room for growth in that area. "We're almost starting from scratch, unfortunately," he said in a November 2016 interview with ItalyEurope24, a digital business publication. In that Q&A, Scannavini noted that only about 10 percent of Italian companies sell goods or services online, and only 25 percent use the Web for purchasing. "We absolutely have to catch up," he concluded.

Meanwhile, he and other Italian business leaders reiterate that competitive advantage, both today and in the future, will almost certainly go to the companies most skilled at forging strong partnerships-regardless of which industries they're in. Scannavini sums it up this way: "Through collaboration comes innovation."

For more information, including a searchable directory of more than 55,000 Italian manufacturers and suppliers, please visit the Italian Trade Agency website. For information on Italian machinery manufacturers, please visit the Federmacchine website.

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Italy Transforms Itself into a High-Tech Hotbed

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When your thoughts turn to Italy, which products, services, and industries immediately come to mind? "You probably think of food, fast cars, fashion, wine, design, tourism-and all of that is good," says Michele Scannavini, president of the Italian Trade Agency ( ITA), which promotes the internationalization of Italian companies.

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Although my project proposal claims that the exhibition will be held in Westfield White City I have decided against this due to the prestige and proximity of the Royal Academy of Arts to the Valentino store.

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Having visited a previous exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts I knew where within the building I wanted to host my exhibition. Having a clear image of the size of each room was extremely important as it helped me plan the contents of each room.

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A key aspect of my exhibition was for it to be interactive so researching previous interactive museums was essential for my project.

- 3D mapping technology was used to project animation onto the Belton House during the Christmas season, this has given me creative inspirition me into the ways that I could advertise the exhibition at the RA whilst also making it interactive.

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Museums, heritage centres and even art galleries understand the importance of an interactive experience - they help educate, increases dwell time and make for a more enjoyable experience for your guests.

We've looked at ten of the best interactive museum exhibitions around the world that have used both 'high-tech' and 'low-tech' installations to create a better experience.

High-tech

LightBall Orchestra, Singapore

A full and immersive light show that is meant for play. Children and adults alike can be seen in the video interacting with the exhibition - a great idea for a venue with a large-scale space that needs filling!

Low-tech

American Museum of Jewish Heritage, USA

Just look at what can be achieved with paper and string! This emotional tribute deals with the issues of Jewish immigration in the US and pulls the attention of guests to an important part of the exhibition.

High-tech

Barcelona FC video table, Spain

How else can you display 50 years of football footage? Barcelona FC's answer is to put the content into the hands of their guests at Camp Nou, allowing them to choose the iconic goals and games they want to watch.

Low-tech

Museum of Sex, USA

Of course, the Museum of Sex has a Breast Bouncy Castle! This is just one of many exhibitions within the museum that is used to tell the story of physical intimacy and playfulness.

High-Tech

Belton House, UK

The power of projection mapping when combined with a heritage centre, cannot be underestimated. This brilliant use of National Trust property, Belton House, is a great example of what can be done to drive footfall during seasonal periods.

Low-tech

Florence Nightingale Museum, UK

Dedicated to the most famous nurse in the UK, the Florence Nightingale Museum mixes medical knowledge and historical moments of importance. This low-tech interactive exhibition is experienced through the guests' use of a stethoscope.

High-tech

Museo Atlantico, Spain

The exhibition may look "low-tech" but the way you experience it can't be further from the truth. Buried at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Lanzarote, this exhibition needs diving equipment to see it.

Low-tech

Container exhibition, Japan

Tokyo's Designer Week was home to a fascinating exhibition by Danijel Meshtrovich Kurinčič. His hidden exhibition challenged guests to poke their heads into holes of the unknown.

High-tech

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC, USA

It wouldn't seem possible to showcase the wonders of the sea on a New York Boulevard, but that is exactly what National Geographic achieved using smart technology and hyper-realistic screens.

Low-tech

Hammer Museum, USA

Even supermarkets have embraced the low-tech and interactive technique of voting. Hammer Museum's use of chips to vote makes guests not only engage with the exhibition, but makes a conscious effort to ask for their opinion.

Balancing the tech

It's not all about the latest technology to engage visitors. Great museum experiences come from a stimulating of the senses, to provide an educational insight into a world we've never experienced.

Make people sniff, stare, listen, touch and even taste their way through the story you are telling. These ten destinations have done it very well, to critical and guest acclaim.

If you know of a destination that could do with some help to create a great guest experience let us know. We are taking nominations for our Helping Hands Project - Win £10,000 in guest experience design support. [Click below]

Photo Credits: SEGD, Timeout, Groupon, Pinterest

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10 of the best interactive museum exhibitions - Katapult

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Museums, heritage centres and even art galleries understand the importance of an interactive experience - they help educate, increases dwell time and make for a more enjoyable experience for your guests. We've looked at ten of the best interactive museum exhibitions around the world that have used both 'high-tech' and 'low-tech' installations to create a better experience.

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Key dates and what I aim to do each week.

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Interactive Climate-Centric Exhibits : Olafur Eliasson Exhibition

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Olafur Eliasson Exhibition - An Olafur Eliasson exhibition is on at the Tate Modern in London and it will run until January 5th, 2020. The event features intricate, magnanimous...

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Initial Concept (Artistic Collaboration)                                   - Gen Z isn't content with traditional art

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Initial Concept (Artistic Collaboration)                                   - Gen Z isn't content with traditional art

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My initial idea was to do a collaboration with an artist and create a pop up showcasing the artists work. However, after reading this article, it was brought to me that younger generations don't interact with art in the "traditional sense", they interact with art "electronically" so showcasing the artwork used in the designs of the garments might not particularly appeal to everybody. This inspired my concept of doing an interactive exhibition to engage younger demographics.

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"Move Over Millennials, It's Gen Z's Turn to Kill Off Industries," warned a headline in the San Francisco Chronicle's business section this past August. The accompanying article predicts the demise of brick-and-mortar retail, magazine publishing, and major-league football, among other sectors-all, allegedly, at the hands of Gen Z. Should arts institutions be added to the list?

Today's arts organizations are in the midst of a crisis. Walk into a museum or go to a play, and you will observe firsthand what the statistics have been telling us: The current audience and donor pool is primarily Baby Boomers. While Millennials have been reluctant to pay for subscriptions and memberships, or to make donations to civic organizations, Gen Z (defined as Americans aged 18 to 25) looks to be even more resistant to what conventional arts organizations have on offer. And arts organizations are struggling to respond.

Results from the Survey of Public Participation in the Arts, conducted by the National Endowment for the Arts every five years since 1982, tell a story of declining attendance at traditional performing and visual arts offerings, with the most significant audience declines among those under 45. "Arts Consumption Through Electronic Media," a category tracked for the first time in the 2012 survey, shows that 71 percent of Americans participate in the arts electronically, as compared with 49 percent who participate in the visual and performing arts in person. The 2017 data is expected to show a continuation of these trends.

Against this backdrop, and having done extensive interviews with Gen Z'ers about their art preferences, I offer an impressionistic view of Gen Z's relation to the arts, and of the implications for organizations working to ensure that the arts can flourish and enrich the lives of all people.

We know that young people have always been slower to get involved in civic organizations. And we know young people are spending significantly more time online than older people. But the divide separating Gen Z from arts organizations cuts deeper.

Based on my interviews with representatives of this generation, for Gen Z'ers, daily life provides constant opportunities to be both artist and subject. Think of the selfie, which is self-promotion but also personal expression: "This is how I want you to see me," and also: "This is how I see the world." Just as the Medicis, the famous patrons of Florentine art during the Italian Renaissance, paid visual artists to depict family members posed with birds, maps of the world, and religious figures, Gen Z'ers use their social media identities as homages to themselves-and as ways to signify and depict the world around them.

Gen Z'ers create their own art: They are active makers of photographs, videos, music, memes, and Web pages. Gen Z'ers also like to be their own curators of art: They make playlists and Instagram feeds, and seek out recommendations of new art experiences from their friends. Further, Gen Z'ers act as distributors of art: They routinely pass on to others what they have created and curated.

In other words, Gen Z has a deeply personal relationship with the processes of creating, curating, and distributing art, so why would they visit a museum or a concert hall or a playhouse to see what someone else-especially someone older-is presenting?

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In their conversations with me, members of Gen Z say they need an active rather than a passive experience with the arts. No more interested in a Temple-on the Hill for quiet contemplation, Gen Z wants their lived arts experiences to offer the personalization and interactivity of their virtual ones. They want instant connections to people and their stories, to move seamlessly between high culture and low, between art, design, and fashion. They want to post, comment, and like.

Some entities, though primarily not arts organizations, have capitalized on this trend. The Museum of Ice Cream (MOIC) has staked out a corner just down the street from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and the Museum of the African Diaspora. Every day, about 1,700 people, mostly Gen Z, pay $38 to queue for a series of Instragrammable moments, including the chance to eat ice cream while posing on a plastic rainbow unicorn as friends click and share.

Instead of adding my "harrumph" to the chorus of arts pundits who see the demise of culture with every new museum devoted to a food or a superhero, I decided to visit the MOIC and see for myself. I did not learn much about ice cream (or anything else, for that matter). But I did have fun in the sprinkle pool. While not an artistic organization, nor an aspirational model for one, the MOIC leadership knows a thing or two about how to attract and retain new audiences.

Some leaders of traditional arts organizations are rising to this Gen Z challenge while hewing to their artistic and educational mission. The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art is a notable example, with a young adult visitor pool that is the envy of the museum's peer institutions; over 45 percent of attendees at SFMOMA are under 35 years old, per statistics from the museum. Beyond offering reduced admission to visitors aged 19 to 24 and coffee bars adjacent to the exhibition spaces, the museum partners with tech companies to integrate participatory experiences throughout the museum. Recently, visitors could enter virtual worlds inspired by René Magritte paintings. The photography galleries feature an interactive space called Self Composed, where visitors can reimagine and create their own selfies.

At the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, where I am a life trustee and former board chair, I have had a ring-side view of the kind of transformation that is possible. In the past, the museum had only episodic success attracting younger audiences. Now on any typical visit to the MCA, you will see young adults donning audio or virtual-reality headsets to interact with participatory art in the galleries, and attending events in the the Commons, a space reconfigured with hanging plants, lounge chairs, and board-game tables. According to the museum website, the Commons "is meant to encourage formal and informal dialogue as well as interaction among artists, visitors, and communities.'' While the MCA aims to serve all ages, these recent changes have been especially appealing to younger visitors.

Michael Darling, chief curator at the MCA, describes the museum's approach to young people as a "radical welcome." Beyond redesigning spaces to be conducive to gathering and sharing, the museum's most radical changes have been to its programming.

"Gen Z gives us no slack," Darling observes. "They demand art that is relevant to their concerns. Not satisfied with being 'responded to' by arts organizations, they demand a seat at the table. We have to reflect the tide of the times."

Recognizing that the habits and patterns of Gen Z can take them "deeper and deeper into their own world and interests," Darling and his colleagues at the MCA are working to mine "the macro issues that resonate across and beyond the cohort, such as issues of identity, race, human rights, inequality, [and] social justice," Darling says. "Fortunately, there is lots of great art that deals with these topics."

Changes such as those underway at the MCA are not without risk of alienating the patrons who are still most responsible for the economic well-being of arts organizations. An environment that feels lively and inviting to a Gen Z'er might put off a Baby Boomer. While visiting the major international art fairs this past spring, the MCA's director, Madeleine Grynsztejn, remarked on this disconnect: "What the commercial art dealers are showing and selling to their clientele [who also happen to be art museums' major donors] is less and less like what is in our galleries."

Even assuming that leaders of arts organization can succeed at balancing their offerings to meet the needs and expectations of both younger and older audiences, the arts still face a more serious generational threat. Many members of Gen Z and the cohorts that follow haven't been raised to visit museums, concert halls, and playhouses. Cuts in arts education for public schools have made the annual museum field trip a thing of the past for kids in the poorer school districts. Many schools have no art programs whatsoever. Most of the children attending these schools come from families and communities with little or no access to art.

Research shows that the single biggest predictor of arts participation as an adult is exposure to arts as a child. Further positive benefits of early arts exposure include improved academic performance, social behavior, and emotional well-being. A report published by the National Endowment for the Arts in 2012 focusing on at-risk youth found that "socially and economically disadvantaged children and teenagers who have high levels of arts engagement or arts learning show more positive outcomes in a variety of areas than their low-arts-engaged peers." Those outcomes extend to "school grades, test scores, honors society membership, high school graduation, college enrollment and achievement, volunteering, and engagement in school or local politics."

In the face of such persuasive evidence, there is an urgent need for more organizations to work toward ensuring that every child in every school has access to the arts.

Beyond the widening education gap, increasing income inequality threatens the entire arts ecosystem. Thankfully, even in the most abject and inhospitable places, there will always be those who persevere in making art and those who seek out ways to experience it. But artists and the network of organizations that link them to audiences need patrons in order to survive. What will happen to our great institutions if the rising generations can no longer afford to attend or support them? How will we make up for the artists who find it impossible to make both art and a living?

The stakes are serious if you believe, as I do, that the arts are essential to a life well lived in a civil society. And while arts organizations alone cannot reverse the tide of inequality and its potentially devastating implications for the arts, they are among the civic institutions that can play a leadership role. Engaging Gen Z'ers in active discourse with a rich variety of art and artists is a worthy place to begin. To that end, arts organizations must rethink their programs and financial infrastructure to ensure their continued vitality and relevance. Gen Z will be a responsive audience once the social institutions that nourish the arts begin to offer aesthetic experiences that better reflect their lived experiences. That entails risk, but business as usual is no longer an option for these institutions.

(Photo: Pacific Standard)

Understanding Gen Z, a collaboration between Pacific Standard and Stanford's Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, investigates the historical context and social science research that helps explain the next generation. Join our newsletter to see new stories, and let us know your thoughts on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Understanding Gen Z was made possible by Stanford University's Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS) and its director, Margaret Levi, who hosted the iGen Project. Further support came from the Knight Foundation.

See more in this series:
Blending, Nesting, and Multitasking: How Gen Z'ers Use the Library

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How We Can Teach Gen Z a Better Kind of Media Literacy

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There's a clear need to rethink what "impact" means, given the concept's distorting effect on students' priorities and ethics.

How to Make College More Relevant for Gen Z

With a nimbler approach to the curriculum, we can help this generation develop their ideals into real-world solutions.

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Why Gen Z Isn't Content With Traditional Museum-Viewing

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"Move Over Millennials, It's Gen Z's Turn to Kill Off Industries," warned a headline in the San Francisco Chronicle's business section this past August. The accompanying article predicts the demise of brick-and-mortar retail, magazine publishing, and major-league football, among other sectors-all, allegedly, at the hands of Gen Z.

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Interview with Piccioli (creative director) 

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Interview with Piccioli (creative director) 

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"I want couture to be for today's generation". I used this interview to backup my concept as appealing to younger generations is one of Piccioi's aims.

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In his haste, Pierpaolo Piccioli parks his Mercedes on the bias across two parking spaces at the train station in Nettuno-just as the Rome-bound 12:07 that we were meant to catch whistles out of the station. Piccioli commutes from here every working day to beat the notorious Roman traffic, taking a chauffeured car home at night, but even so he still hasn't quite mastered the system. Just how often does he miss that train? "Three times a week," he cracks, his lugubrious eyes twinkling in the winter sunlight.

Piccioli cranks the car into reverse, and we bound on through the flat Roman countryside at breakneck speed to catch the same train before it arrives a couple of stops down the line. Eschewing the trappings of fame and fortune that Valentino Garavani and his partner, Giancarlo Giammetti, embraced so fulsomely has become an essential part of Piccioli's shtick. Not for him the Bacons and Hockneys and Warhols, the storied château in France, the chalet in Gstaad, the villa on the Appian Way, the stuccoed London town house, the Manhattan pied-à-terre, the yacht-all of them scattered with issues of ¡Hola! and crowded with the real-life glamorous faces seen in its pages.

"Valentino was the brand himself," says Piccioli as we settle in for our short commute-time Piccioli usually reserves for catching up on iconic old Italian movies on his laptop. "Now everything is about communities-about sharing values, not surfaces-and I want Valentino to be a couture house that is relevant for today for young people. I never wanted to substitute the lifestyle of Valentino for my own," he adds firmly. "If you're not in an ivory tower, I think you can dream more."

Piccioli has remained a remarkably private man: It is a small miracle that he has invited me into his inner world, but I am fast discovering that within it, the designer practices what he preaches. He has chosen, for instance, not to live in Rome itself, but in this provincial seaside place an hour's journey south.

Growing up in Nettuno, however, surfing the waves crashing just off its coastline, Piccioli always felt something of an outsider. "I wanted to escape," he says. "I didn't think I belonged to this place or these people. I always was figuring out what was there beyond the sea."

Although fascinated by fashion, he had no idea that it could be a career, so he studied literature at Rome University-where his girlfriend, Simona Caggia, whom he had met in high school, was studying law.

He later discovered that the city's Istituto Europeo di Design had recently begun an experimental fashion program, and so, with his parents' bemused support, he studied there too. Even then, though, he felt an outsider. The old friends who were making the same commute with him from Nettuno began viewing him differently simply because he was studying fashion. "I was too 'gay' for them!" Piccioli says. "I was different from all my gay friends, too, because I had a girlfriend. But I had a lot of passion-and you learn to be alone, in a way. When you're a kid, it's not as good. But when you grow up, you understand that that can be your strength-not to be in any of those boxes."

Piccioli was scouted at school for an internship with Brunello Cucinelli. He surprised the company by asking to be paid. "It was important for me to show that I could make a real job out of this passion," he explains.

The opportunity, as Piccioli recalls, was "fantastic-the brand was very small [then], so I had the opportunity to see all the processes, from going to Paris for the fabrics, to the fittings, to the advertising campaign. They gave me a big picture of the job."

Upon graduating, Piccioli joined the team at Fendi with his design-school friend Maria Grazia Chiuri. The atmosphere of the company-run by the formidable quintet of Fendi sisters and Anna Fendi's daughter, Silvia Venturini, and with inspirational creative direction from a freelancing Karl Lagerfeld -"was very 'family,' " Piccioli recalls, and he and Chiuri stayed there for eight years, until they were hired by Valentino to develop the brand's nascent accessories division.

"I was happy that I arrived there when I was all grown up," says Piccioli. "Until I was 30, I thought that fashion was a very nice place. At Valentino, I finally understood the system of fashion. Valentino was formal-very, very formal. There was a ritual, and I liked that."

Piccioli and Chiuri arrived in January and were expecting to work on Valentino's following fall collection, but the designer tasked them with working on spring instead. With only two months to find materials and production facilities, they agreed-on the condition that they could work independently and show Valentino only the finished results. "We didn't have time to share anything with him," Piccioli explains.

After the casual working environments that he had known, Piccioli surprised the house's reverential teams by turning up to work in trainers and freely offering his opinions-and occasional criticisms-of Valentino's work.

"Mr. Valentino is so secure in himself," says Piccioli, "that if our proposal was better than his, he could choose that. That's something I really learned from him: to work with people that contribute, not just execute."

In the end, Valentino was entranced by what they had produced, and their collaboration began. "I loved working with him," says Piccioli. "I loved to hear him talking about his dreams of a dress drawn with one line."

Valentino retired in 2008 and was replaced by Alessandra Facchinetti, but less than one year later she had left and Piccioli and Chiuri were appointed co-creative directors. In their own reset, Piccioli and Chiuri looked at Valentino's glamorous past through the prism of iconic imagery, with the goal, Piccioli says, of "reestablishing the codes before moving away." Their fey vision replaced jet-set sexiness with long-sleeved, high-necked fairy-tale dresses that expressed a quality Piccioli describes as "grace"-and were given a modern edge with polite punk accessories.

This powerful new identity was also linked to the history of Rome itself, a city that Piccioli loves, as he explains, for its "layers-from paganism to Pasolini" (not to mention the A.S. Roma football team that he and his son, Pietro, support so passionately).

In 2016, Chiuri left to become the creative director of Dior, and Piccioli assumed Valentino's creative mantle on his own.

"It was different," he recalls. "I remember very well the first week trying to understand what part of our past was more mine." Piccioli was inspired by his daughter's reading of Nietzsche, with the philosopher's injunction to be aware of your past without being weighed down by its heaviness.

"Know who you are," his friend Franca Sozzani, Italian Vogue's late editor, enjoined him. "You just have to be yourself."

Piccioli moved his show to the princely Hôtel Salomon de Rothschild, with its ghosts and its layered histories; commissioned his friend Alexandre Desplat-the Academy Award-winning composer of The Shape of Water and The Grand Budapest Hotel -to produce an original soundtrack; and began exploring moments of seismic change in history, from illuminated manuscripts giving way to the printing press ("a real revolution, as the digital one is now") to the aesthetic rebirth of Italy after the devastation of World War II.

"I started to work only on instinct," he remembers, "and from the first moment, it was different. When there are two, you have to share, to explain. Now I just feel it."

The collection, although informed by the work that he produced with Chiuri-who was there in the front row for support-revealed the unbridled romanticism and fantasy of Piccioli's singular vision.

Like Chiuri, Piccioli is grounded by his family life. After law school, Caggia worked in real estate for seven years, but when she discovered that she was pregnant with their daughter Benedetta, now 21, she decided to focus on her family. (The couple's son, Pietro, is now nineteen, and their younger daughter, Stella, is twelve.) Piccioli was drawn back to his childhood home to raise their family, finally appreciating the "enchantment" of a place that he knew so well, and the couple settled in a 1940s modernist villa in the heart of town. There is a family-friendly swimming pool in the modest garden, where a rescue dog named Miranda ("after Priestly!") romps, but it is not a trophy establishment in the Garavani-Giammetti mold. Recently, however, Piccioli has added another property to his family's real-estate portfolio-a holiday retreat a mere fifteen minutes' walk from home.

Piccioli had admired the green-shuttered, pink-washed Belle Epoque mansion and envied its near-private beach since he was a little boy gamboling in the waves below. From the heights of its paved gardens, one can make out the foundations of a Roman villa half-buried in the sand far below. The house is in the throes of a renovation, the bedrooms a work in progress, but downstairs Piccioli works in the light-spangled study, surrounded by his decorative-arts library. On the walls, his children's early drawings jostle Richard Haines's fashion studies of his work. "This is where I come to be alone-to think, to sketch," says Piccioli. "It's really peaceful-it's a kind of 'no place.' " The perfect setting, then, for the man who, less than a week before, won Designer of the Year at the British Fashion Awards -but who has eschewed even a dedicated Wikipedia page.

When we stop in town for an espresso at Piccioli's favorite café, the barista insists on adding an almond cookie to our order as she congratulates him: A local magazine has just published a front-page story about the prestigious award alongside their coverage of the town's costumed medieval pageant, and a number of townspeople have already come up to congratulate him. "I didn't know a British award could be so popular here," he says, with sheepish pride.

Today, I hope we have a beautiful couture fitting," says Piccioli as we finally settle into the train. He has been working on the collection since September. "Even simple dresses need time," he explains. "It's a crazy process . . . but I love that." Piccioli sees couture as "the dream" of the house. "I want to get Valentino away from the idea of couture as something that belongs to the past," he adds. "I really want Valentino to be a couture house of today-to meld couture and street; to do T-shirts and opera coats with the same care. I think the culture of the house-uniqueness, extravagance-has to be in every single product."

An hour later, we are off the train and at the Palazzo Gabrielli-Mignanelli, the company's Renaissance corporate headquarters at the foot of the Spanish Steps, where the palazzo's couture ateliers are abuzz. To prove Piccioli's point, there are seven craftspeople, each wearing the traditional white laboratory coat, painstakingly hand-rolling 1,700 meters of tiny ruffles of oyster organza and finishing them with minuscule stitches for a single dress that will ultimately require more than 1,000 hours of work. The sketches on the walls spell the story of the collection, which revisits Valentino's romantic floral prints from the 1970s and '80s and experiments with the electrifying colors that remind Piccioli of "eighties TV."

Piccioli and Chiuri were accused of insensitive cultural appropriation after their spring 2016 ready-to-wear show, which featured a cast of largely white girls in an African-inspired collection with their hair dressed in cornrows. Today Piccioli is enthusiastically embracing a message of inclusivity by showing his latest collection largely on women of color. "It's a great statement for black girls to not be marginalized," he says. "Let's put them in the center of the picture." His inspiration boards are covered with images of Renaissance black Madonnas, the figures in Kerry James Marshall paintings, and tastemaking women from the pages of 1960s Jet and Ebony magazines. Piccioli has already started work on the casting, with help from stylist Joe McKenna, the famed Azzedine Alaïa whisperer who is part of Piccioli's starry show team along with makeup maven Pat McGrath and hairdresser Guido Palau. (In the end, 48 out of the 65 models were black, with a teary-eyed Naomi Campbell sporting the finale look.)

The designer is joined in the fittings by Benedetta, who is following in his footsteps by studying literature at the University of Rome and has come to see him on her lunch break. Piccioli himself lunches every day in a narrow room next to his palatial office-"I don't have time to go out," he says-where one wall of images of his designs for the house faces off against the iconic imagery of Valentino's era-defining clothes.

In addition to his work on collections and new stores, Piccioli has been traveling back and forth to Luxembourg to work on costumes for the Japanese composer Teizo Matsumura's opera, Silence, and took a week off to collaborate on a short movie with style-hungry auteur Luca Guadagnino. He also spends time with haute couture clients, and with the actresses who now often require exclusive designs for their red carpet appearances-although Piccioli recalls that Lady Gaga reserved look 35 from the fall haute couture, a vast crinoline of soft pink feathers, practically the moment that Kaia Gerber wafted through the Salomon de Rothschild salons wearing it. Gaga subsequently donned the dress to the Venice Film Festival premiere of A Star Is Born. ("She was to die for," remembers Piccioli, who escorted her.)

After lunch, Piccioli pops into his offices, one of which was Valentino's former aerie (the flowery Traviata tapestries now replaced by photographs of David Bowie and Serge Gainsbourg). In the magnificent room next door, a sixteenth-century pope once came to meet with his family. Giammetti once held court here, too, surrounded by Italian Empire furniture and extraordinary examples of 1930s Scuola Romana art. "It was intimidating," recalls Piccioli. "For me, it has to be more comfortable." He has added convivial seating areas for meetings.

His design team alone is 70 strong. "I want people that share the same passion I do," says Piccioli. "They die for fashion!" Mindful of Valentino's example, "I try to have people say what they think," he adds. Piccioli wanted to change the logo, for instance, which he found too commercial-"but the kids on the teams were obsessed with it," he says, "and I re-saw it with their eyes." The resulting VLTN abbreviation now appears on everything from T-shirts to an intarsia mink coat.

Together, Piccioli and his design army are responsible for two women's ready-to-wear shows a year, two pre-collections, two haute couture collections, two men's collections, two men's pre-collections, four annual accessories collections, and more work still for the lower-priced Red Valentino line. The pre-collection presentations in particular, once shown quietly to buyers and rarely to the press, have now assumed an importance that reflects their preeminent commercial significance. On November 27, for instance, Piccioli presented the pre-fall 2019 installment in a raw concrete warehouse space in Tokyo, where he decided to play with "the well-known codes of the house-red, ruffles, bows"-and collaborated with the artist Izumi Miyazaki and with Jun Takahashi from Undercover (a relationship that Piccioli is developing for his fall 2019 ready-to-wear). "It's a new experience every collection," he says.

He is unusually attuned to his host country-still the largest luxury market in the world after the United States. "I'm very impressed by the poetry of Japan's culture," says Piccioli, who first visited the country some 25 years ago. "It's so modern, with a sense of tradition that is romantic, not nostalgic. You feel the symbolic, ritualistic act of dressing up," he tells me. "It's almost like a ceremony. In Japan, even streetwear is more sophisticated, more cultivated." Backstage, as he greeted the playful Dynel-wigged influencers who had been flown in from around the world, along with the glitteringly chic local clients, Piccioli was already thinking about the men's fall 2019 and the spring 2019 haute couture collections, a little over a month away, and I was reminded of a quote from Heraclitus that he included in one of the albums of sketches, inspiration images, and even seating charts that he assembles to celebrate each of his collections: "The sun is new each day."
Watch: At Valentino, Fantasy Meets Reality for Spring 2019:

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Inside the Private World of Valentino's Pierpaolo Piccioli

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In his haste, Pierpaolo Piccioli parks his Mercedes on the bias across two parking spaces at the train station in Nettuno-just as the Rome-bound 12:07 that we were meant to catch whistles out of the station.

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Interactive Selfie Exhibitions : museum of me

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museum of me - Museums often boast interactive experiences that are designed to leave museum-goers incredibly inspired, but the Museum of Me (MOME) in Bangkok, Th...

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Artistic Collaborations | Valentino Online Boutique

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Discover the exclusive artistic collaborations of Valentino Garavani and the fine collections. Visit the Valentino Online Boutique.

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Looking at the CADS that I had chosen, I then decided on what I thought would be the most appropriate fabric for each style. I had also placed them in order of price (prices were allocated by looking at Valentino's current range). Planning this out beforehand helped me in creating my merchandising strategy as I had an idea about prices and fabrics.

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The inspiration behind my INP.

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Selfie-obsessed and experience-hungry, today's generation of young consumers are flocking to the rich and immersive expositions created by luxury brands in droves.
Between Louis Vuitton's "Volez, Voguez, Voyage", Gucci's "The Artist is Present" and Prada 's Rongzhai art space, 2018 has been a busy year for Chinese fashionistas looking to keep up with the bourgeoning number of luxury brand-fronted exhibitions across the country. To put things in perspective, these are just those that made headlines in November alone.

Though luxury brands have long been patrons of contemporary art, these recent exhibits in China are a departure from brand art patronages of the past. No longer a branded display of high art curated for the elite, contemporary branded exhibits in China are now created with digital natives in mind - consumers who increasingly demand more experience from brands. In the past, exhibitions used to be about bringing legitimacy and credibility to a luxury brand, boosting its equity. Today, however, exhibitions are here to engage Chinese millennials and widen their perception of what luxury could be.

Hosting an art exhibition in China is strategic simply because it taps into specific cultural contexts. First of all, China's digital-first social environment is taking the selfie culture to a whole other level. With many Chinese millennials having normalized this "I-post-therefore-I-am" mindset, every meal and experience needs to be photographed, edited, and documented on social media. If posting museum selfies is considered a popular thing to do all over the world, it is a must among the young in China. The Chinese term "打卡 Da ka", which literally means "to clock in", is frequently associated with museum selfies, likening the experience to an obligatory one.

Secondly, attending an art exhibition connotes a certain level of class in China. In the more socially rigid 20 th century, many saw frequenting art spaces as a pastime of the bourgeoisie - something distinctly detached from the masses. Nowadays, while showcasing one's appreciation for art on social media is no longer seen as a "detached" activity, the subtle connotation of one belonging to an elevated social class remains. China is also home to a different demographic of art goers than other markets. If the typical museum visitors are middle-aged couples in Western countries, those in China are novelty-loving, style-conscious millennials. Besides owning luxury products, they also want to possess experiences that are signifiers of high taste.

Let's take a look at how three recent branded exhibits leverage China's digital culture to make their message known:

#LouisVuittonVVVShanghai#

November 16th, 2018 through February 2nd, 2019
The best photo spots according to Louis Vuitton
Image: @Louis Vuitton's Weibo The #LouisVuittonVVV# community on RED
Image: RED (Xiao Hong Shu)
Part of a global tour, Louis Vuitton's "Volez, Voguez, Voyage" in Shanghai stands out with its democratic digital approach that is rarely seen in the luxury world. Through collaborations with mass market Chinese lifestyle applications like MoBike (a bike sharing service) and Dianping (a popular review and rating app), Louis Vuitton invites the public to see the exhibit as part of their "top things to do" in Shanghai. This is largely in line with LVMH CFO Jean-Jacques Guiony's comments in an interview early this year. "We are not concerned about overexposure - the risk is to lack momentum," he said.

A Mini Program dedicated to the VVV exhibit also fuses the museum experience with social media-friendly initiatives. Besides practical information, the Mini Program also features a selfie section with specially designed Louis Vuitton-branded stickers, and a video section that allows for the production of social media-ready clips.
The WeChat Mini Program designed for the VVV exhibit Image: Louis Vuitton
Gucci Exhibit "The Artist is Present"

October 11 through December 16 2018
The best photo spots according to Gucci
Image: @Gucci's Weibo The #GucciExhibit# page on RED
Image: RED (Xiao Hong Shu)
Users on social commerce platform RED (Xiao Hong Shu) often refer to the Gucci exhibition as a "photo paradise" in their entries. To further drive this point home, Gucci's Weibo also features chosen selfies from creative director Alessandro Michele and artist Maurizio Cattelan at the show. Equipped with immersive colors, highly Instagrammable murals, and an interesting exhibition concept of redefining originality, the Gucci exhibit meets both milllenials' need for photos and irony.

Prada's Rong Zhai Project

Inaugurated on October 12, 2017
Actor Mokelili posting the Prada Rongzhai visit Image The #PradaRongzhai# page on RED
Image: RED (Xiao Hong Shu): @Mokelili's Weibo
As Fondazione Prada's restoration project in Shanghai, Rongzhai has gained a solid reputation among China's fashion crowd, attracting more than 10,000 visitors since the house opened in October 2017. A trip to Prada's Rongzhai offers one a peek into China's top influencer circle. Fashionistas from all over the country make their way there as though it were a pilgrimage site, dressed stylishly and trailed after by a professional photographer. In fact, the #PradaRongzhai# hashtag community on RED features many instructional posts on "what to wear to a Rongzhai show".

In the past, an exhibition might have been a brand's marketing tool to impact the elite. But today it is an inclusive, inviting space for the public to experience the glamour before owning it. In an era where digital influence and selfie culture reign supreme, these designer art spaces increasingly resonate with the young.

1. From Storytelling to Live Experiences

In an age of attention scarcity, branded art spaces offer visitors a rare chance for story immersion, and of course, content to pepper one's social media feed with. Storytelling alone isn't enough for luxury houses to create a unique edge in China's new experience economy anymore. Now, consumers want to live that story too.

2. Be as Culturally Sensitive as Possible

As the recent Dolce & Gabbana scandal revealed, displaying any kind of culturally superior attitude can lead to tragic consequences in China. As a trending comment during the D&G social media storm describes, "you are welcome to demonstrate cultural difference, but not cultural superiority."

3. Give Visitors Their "15 minutes of fame"
Cover Image: Louis Vuitton
Pop artist Andy Warhol once said, "In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes." The Chinese social media landscape today has proved Warhol's fame theory true. In fact, Chinese consumers are constantly scouting for photo opportunities and brag-worthy experiences. With their social media-friendly visuals, these branded exhibits have provided just the right fix.

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How Luxury Brands Are Reaching China's Millennials Shoppers with Art Exhibitions

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Selfie-obsessed and experience-hungry, today's generation of young consumers are flocking to the rich and immersive expositions created by luxury brands in droves. Between Louis Vuitton's "Volez, Voguez, Voyage", Gucci's "The Artist is Present" and Prada 's Rongzhai art space, 2018 has been a busy year for Chinese fashionistas looking to keep up with the bourgeoning number of luxury brand-fronted exhibitions across the country.

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Luxury brands are more accessible via platforms such as Net-a-Porter.

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Luxury is a concept that has always been hard to define. And in today's industry, where fashion has been "democratised" and almost everything is accessible to everyone, where a brand name is as coveted as craftsmanship, and where exclusivity can apply as much to a £4,000 handbag as a £40 T-shirt, luxury has taken on different meanings.

For some, luxury equals expensive, and this can still be the case. At the time of writing, the priciest womenswear items available of high-end etailer Net-a-Porter are a £17,600 embellished and embroidered gown by Valentino and an alligator-skin tote by The Row, costing an eye-watering £37,275. That is not to mention a £170,000 Buccellati gold, pearl and diamond necklace.

While clearly very expensive, these items exemplify one of the key shifts in luxury. It is no longer a world of surly security guards and marble-fitted boutiques on London's Bond Street. Luxury purchases are accessible anywhere, any time, thanks to the internet.

Access has changed luxury. And not only is it easy to shop thanks to the industry's digital transformation - where even the laggards are now embracing ecommerce - but the social media boom means consumers are more exposed to the world of luxury fashion, and in turn, want to show off their luxury purchases via their own social posts.

One of luxury's current success stories is luxury group Kering's golden brand Gucci, whose revenue topped €8bn (£7bn) for the full year 2018 - a 33.4% increase on 2017. Gucci has utilised this powerful social media shift to its advantage, which has had a noticeable impact on its product.

While Net-a-Porter stocks a £12,490 bag and a £9,800 crystal trimmed sequinned jacket by Gucci, it also offers the brand's logo heavy, Instagram-ready £90 socks, £170 phone cases and £215 pool sliders - and it sells them like hot cakes.

This demonstrates two things: that the goal posts of what is perceived as luxury have widened dramatically, and that luxury shopping habits have shifted. Now, more than ever, the mixing of high street and high end price points - which emerged as a trend with streetwear enthusiasts - stretches across consumer profiles more and more.

Take a trip to one of the London stores of Browns, traditionally a luxury retailer. In its menswear department you will find a £5,770 Gucci coat, but also £35 Champion T-shirts, £40 Versace underwear and £55 Vans plimsolls.

This is echoed at Selfridges ' London flagship on Oxford Street, which late last year opened a 18,000 sq ft "designer street" space, specifically created to cater to this new type of mix-and-match luxury shopper.

These changes have given renewed life to the luxury logo-driven purchase, whereby a brand name and, more importantly, visible branding, is as much the definition of luxury as the item itself. Quality and craftsmanship no longer define what constitutes a luxury item. But is a simple cotton T-shirt with a Balenciaga logo printed across the chest luxury? The £325 price tag would suggest so.

There are other forms of new luxury, too. You could argue that Supreme, the game-changing skate brand that took the non-seasonal "drop" approach mainstream and regularly has customers queuing up outside its stores eager for new products, is luxury today. These relatively affordable products, such as £40 T-shirts, sell out in minutes, making limited edition - or at least hard-to-get - items that come without the punchy price a new standard of luxe.

Experiences have been a buzzy retail concept for the past couple of years, and offer another example of a new type of luxury not defined by price point. For instance, value retailer Primark has opened its largest store in the world in Birmingham, and the huge, five-floor shop features several experiential additions, such as themed cafes and a Duck & Dry Xpress hair salon, offering treatments for as little as £17. It is rolling this approach out to several more key stores.

For me, convenience is another form of luxury in fashion: simple ordering, swift delivery, easy returns. I can buy something from Mr Porter in the morning and be wearing it by the evening, and not at an exorbitant cost.

Similarly, in-store service is an aspect of luxury. But it is not just about personal shopping suites and glasses of champagne. An informed, helpful, friendly member of staff, in a high-end store or on the high street, can turn an average shopping trip into a memorable, luxurious experience. And it happens all too infrequently.

Price is no longer the only criterion of luxury, as today's shopper wants the luxury experience - whether it be a sense of exclusivity, a level of service or great convenience - no matter where they are shopping. Brands and retailers need to adjust - playing in the luxury space no longer means simply selling expensive clothes.

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Comment: Understanding the evolution of luxury

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Luxury is a concept that has always been hard to define. And in today's industry, where fashion has been "democratised" and almost everything is accessible to everyone, where a brand name is as coveted as craftsmanship, and where exclusivity can apply as much to a £4,000 handbag as a £40 T-shirt, luxury has taken on different meanings.

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Spending Shifts from Tourist Destinations

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Spending Shifts from Tourist Destinations

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Luxury goods brands have reported that spending by Chinese customers have shifted from tourist destinations to their home turf. This of course has knock off effects as the luxury sector in the UK suffer as a consequence.

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Hermès, the French leather goods manufacturer behind the $10,000 plus Birkin and Kelly handbags, said on Thursday that strong demand in mainland China helped its sales grow at a faster pace in the first quarter.

The company, which recently confirmed that it would be pushing into cosmetics as of 2020, reported a 16 percent rise in sales to 1.6 billion euros ($1.78 billion) in the first quarter.

They were up 12 percent at constant exchange rates, accelerating from the 9.6 percent growth notched up in the previous three months.

This showed "the continuation of a dynamic trend, particularly in China", Chief Executive Axel Dumas said in a statement.

Several luxury goods peers, from Louis Vuitton owner LVMH to Gucci parent Kering, have reported similar trends so far in 2019 as spending by Chinese customers shifts from tourist destinations overseas to their home turf.

Hermès' leather goods division was particularly strong in the first quarter, while the unit that makes its famed squared silk scarves and neckties continued to lag.

© Thomson Reuters 2019 All rights reserved.

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Hermès first-quarter sales steam ahead on China strength

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Hermès, the French leather goods manufacturer behind the $10,000 plus Birkin and Kelly handbags, said on Thursday that strong demand in mainland China helped its sales grow at a faster pace in the first quarter.

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Fashion rental is on the rise and Valentino has successfully captures this trend by having its RedValentino featured on Rent the Runway.

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Spending has Shifted due to Tariff Drops

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Spending has Shifted due to Tariff Drops

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Chinese shoppers are purchasing luxury locally because of levelled out prices as import tariffs have dropped.

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Louis Vuitton, LVMH's biggest sales driver, has beefed up stocks of its handbags and other luxury wares to feed its growing online business in mainland China, as Chinese consumers spend more at home, its management told analysts.

See catwalk
Louis Vuitton - Cruise Collection2020 - Womenswear - New York

Chinese shoppers are increasingly splurging on high-end fashion and accessories locally rather than overseas, encouraged by a leveling out of prices as import tariffs drop, although that has penalized some brands struggling to capture the shift.

Vuitton is benefiting thanks in part to a Chinese e-commerce push, according to analysts who attended a two-day closed-door briefing with the brand and LVMH.

More broadly, demand for Vuitton products within mainland China was still at "unheard of" levels, its CEO Michael Burke was quoted as saying. LVMH had no immediate comment.

"Although only a third of spend on Louis Vuitton is currently local, this is growing twice as fast and a 50:50 split is now on the cards," Citi analyst Flavio Cereda wrote in a note.

Over the past nine months, Vuitton shifted inventories from neighboring countries to its e-commerce site in China, which now accounted for 8 percent of the brand's sales there, Cereda added.

Vuitton launched its online business in China in mid-2017 - just after Kering-owned rival Gucci - with Prada and Hermes following suit.

Jeweller Tiffany, which has suffered from sharply lower spending among Chinese tourists in the United States, said this week it also planned to invest in e-commerce operations in China.

Relations between the world's two largest economies have soured amid a trade war, adding to a tougher backdrop for luxury firms in their biggest markets.

But Vuitton gave a rosy view of its U.S. business and told analysts it had opened its third U.S. handbag manufacturing site, in Texas.
"Investors should be reassured by Louis Vuitton's 'healthy' trends in Asia and the United States," RBC Capital Markets analyst Rogerio Fujimori wrote.

LVMH shares were flat at the close of trading on Thursday, after rising more than 2 percent earlier in the day and hitting record highs of 357.10 euros ($403.27).

Vuitton, with annual sales around the 10.5 billion-euro mark, aims to make 1 billion euros in revenues from its watches and jewellery in the coming years, RBC's Fujimori added.

It has already passed that threshold in its women's and men's clothing ranges, Fujimori's said.

Asked by analysts whether LVMH might buy Chanel - after the French label sparked speculation it was on the block when it published earnings for the first time last June - the group's CFO Jean-Jacques Guiony said its size would be a challenge for any buyer.

Guiony said Chanel was worth closer to 100 billion euros than the 50 billion euros often cited in media reports, Jefferies' Cereda wrote.
Chanel did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

© Thomson Reuters 2019 All rights reserved.

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Louis Vuitton sees demand in mainland China picking up steam

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Louis Vuitton, LVMH's biggest sales driver, has beefed up stocks of its handbags and other luxury wares to feed its growing online business in mainland China, as Chinese consumers spend more at home, its management told analysts.

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"Valentino uses fur, angora, wool and leather without specifying sources" deterring environmentally conscious consumers.

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Anti-establishment protests such as the Yellow Vest protests in France threaten the luxury industry.

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By Laurence Benaïm March 21, 2019 17:16

PARIS, France -Has luxury become a dirty word in France, the world's temple to luxury? Judging by the recent outbursts of populist violence in the country's capital you might think so. "Thanks for the cashmere" was just one tag left by "black bloc" protesters last Saturday on a luxury storefront on the Champs Elysées in Paris, where stores belonging to Bulgari, Longchamp, and Lacoste were ransacked and looted. In all, 80 stores on the world-famous avenue were hit - just when the "Yellow Vests" movement appeared to be losing momentum with lower turnouts on the streets. But it seems that "Musty France" - a phrase invoked some twenty years ago by writer Philippe Sollers and more recently in a mid-February headline in weekly news magazine Le Point - is here to stay; "Musty France" which, according to Le Point, "hates Jews, politicians, the police and capitalists..." And luxury?

On the nearby Rue Saint Honoré, a protester had tagged "Le luxe pour tous" ("Luxury for everyone"), a reflection of just how much the recent violence reflects the paradoxical fascination and rejection, hatred and desire for luxury goods that is embedded in popular French society, and is now reaching a boiling point. Luxury is a symbol of success, but it is also a scapegoat. In a country where the fashion industry generates €150 billion a year - surpassing the automotive and aeronautics sectors - and employs some 580,000 people, it is nonetheless accused of being anti-social. In this context, Hedi Slimane's latest collection - sublimating the discreet charm of the bourgeoisie with its riding boots, Harris Tweed jackets and cashmere sweaters - was perhaps the most radical of the recent Paris Fashion Week.

Verbal assaults on the evils of money are nothing new in France. They are actually a treasured part of the country's cultural heritage.

Of course, verbal assaults on the evils of money are nothing new in France. They are actually a treasured part of the country's cultural heritage. "Behind each great fortune there lies a great crime," wrote Balzac. François Mitterrand, president of the French Republic between 1981 and 1995, himself denounced "king money that ruins and rots down to the consciousness of men." In a country where the fear of losing one's job prevails - even though unemployment in 2018 fell to 8.8 percent of the working population, the lowest in ten years - the hatred of money has metastasised and hybridised with a populist egalitarian ethos that is proliferating against a backdrop of conspiracy theories, anti-Semitism and a hodgepodge of social worries.

"This talk of suspicion is sure to have an effect on our vision of success. The industry of indignation?" wrote French philosopher Pascal Bruckner in 2014. "Now that a growing mass of our compatriots can no longer afford to live decently, we are going to explain to them that prosperity is shameful and degrading."

The parallels with the country's pre-revolutionary Ancien Régime stand out. "Revolution 1789" was graffitied on the smashed window of Repetto's Champs-Elysées store last Saturday. The protesters' placards made reference after reference to the French Revolution with the Yellow Vests in the role of the "sans-culottes." Brigitte Macron, who ordered a new porcelain set from the Manufacture de Sèvres and is personally involved in the refurbishment of the Elysées Palace's Banqueting Hall, Winter Gardens and Napoleon Salon, was compared to Marie Antoinette.

In Sérotonine, Michel Houellebecq's latest best-seller, the author predicted this malaise. The book depicts a country bereft of ideals and transcendence, crushed by widespread depression. "A civilisation dies merely through weariness and self-disgust. What could social democracy have to offer me? Obviously nothing, just perpetuation of dearth, a call for oblivion." Paris versus the suburbs? Avenue Montaigne versus the Agora shopping mall? Slimane versus Houellebecq? The two have one thing in common: they hardly ever speak publicly. In France, the art of silence has become integral to producing one's art.

Paris has the stomach of an ostrich. It digests everything and assimilates nothing.

France has become a minefield partitioned by ideological struggle. Victimhood is now more popular than apprenticeship. Luxury has become surface bling endangered by its own accessibility. Meanwhile at certain elite French universities, the word luxury is not to be uttered. Marc Abelès, author of "An Ethnologist in the Land of Luxury" who lived through the May 1968 uprising, denounces the "do-gooder" correctness he sees among some academics. "Luxury has always retained a fragrance of the forbidden," he says. "Today, in university circles, showing an interest in luxury comes across as, dare I say it, a luxury."

And yet, paradoxically, Masters courses in the business of luxury are spreading fast. What's more, business is thriving for the behemoths of French luxury: LVMH, L'Oréal, and Hermès alone account for one quarter of sales recorded by the 100 largest luxury firms worldwide in a sector that is set to reach €320 billion to €365 billion in sales by 2025, and has captured the imagination of China's newly minted millionaires and a new generation of millennials. This, though the temple is burning!

Paris has fallen under the spell of concrete led by architect Le Corbusier, a latter-day sorcerer's apprentice. He, who back in the 1920s decried the "venerable carrions, the tripe of old styles" of cathedrals and the Palace of Versailles, may in his own way have begun the burial of the decorative arts and luxury in the cultural imagination of France. Presently, Olivier Gabet, director of the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, is facing challenges as he plans an exhibition on luxury - scheduled to initially open in Dubai in 2020. Sponsors are few, and for good reason. Luxury in France is under attack.

And yet, in the very same country, there are signs that luxury is fighting back. Just look at the artisans, florists, jewellers and chocolate makers celebrating the call of luxury on a daily basis with their apple tarts, cashmere sweaters and the celebrated "point de 14" saddle-stitch by Hermès. Fourteen couture stitches, no more, no less. That is because luxury in Paris is a way of life, a way of committing to a craft, totally and absolutely. To quote Jean Cocteau, "Paris has the stomach of an ostrich. It digests everything and assimilates nothing. It is what gives it a look of meekness masking a boundless capacity for resistance." A very different kind of resistance.
Related Articles: Symbols of Luxury Smashed in Paris Yellow Vest Protests In Paris, 'Yellow Vest' Protests Cut Sharply Into Luxury Trade

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Has Luxury Become a Dirty Word in France?

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By Laurence Benaïm March 21, 2019 17:16 PARIS, France - Has luxury become a dirty word in France, the world's temple to luxury? Judging by the recent outbursts of populist violence in the country's capital you might think so.

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Net-a-Porter has developed a new sustainability platform, Valentino could take initiatives to be more sustainable to appeal to conscious consumers.

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Net-A-Porter is bringing together a selection of sustainable fashion brands under a new platform called Net Sustain. Launching with 26 brands and 500 products, the edit includes exclusive capsules from Stella McCartney, Mother of Pearl x BBC Earth and Maggie Marilyn.

Net-A-Porter

Net-A-Porter said Net Sustain will offer customers a way to identify the brands and products that meet at least one of five key attributes from the retailer's sustainability criteria. These range from using 'considered' materials and processes to reducing waste in their supply chain.

The Net Sustain platform will live in a dedicated section of the Net-A-Porter site, and its products and brands will receive a badge so that customers know they are part of the ethical edit.

Other brands included in the initial lineup are Ninety Percent, Fisch, Lem Lem, Peony, Veja, Hereu, Nannacay, and Chopard, with more brands and products set to be added throughout the season and over time. Beauty will be added within the next year.

"This is an important milestone in our sustainability journey at Net-A-Porter. We have always wanted to provide our customer with the best products and allow them to make informed choices when shopping on the site. Our sustainable edit provides our customers with the knowledge they need, understanding that they can trust that these brands have been carefully reviewed and meet our criteria for inclusion. Our aim is to give a voice to the brands that are truly making positive changes by providing them with a platform to highlight their best practice," said Elizabeth von der Goltz, global buying director of Net-A-Porter.

To celebrate the addition of Net Sustain, Net-A-Porter is launching a campaign captured by photographer Ben Weller and fronted by model Vivian Solari.

Copyright © 2019 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved.

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Net-A-Porter is bringing together a selection of sustainable fashion brands under a new platform called Net Sustain. Launching with 26 brands and 500 products, the edit includes exclusive capsules from Stella McCartney, Mother of Pearl x BBC Earth and Maggie Marilyn.

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Luxury Sector Most at Risk in Regards to Brexit 

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Luxury Sector Most at Risk in Regards to Brexit 

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"The Luxury Goods sector comes at the very top of the red alert list with 39% of companies in this sector flagged as ‘in danger’ and 33% already operating at a loss."

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A potential no-deal Brexit would hurt a number of UK industries more than others with both luxury goods and the fashion sector generally among those set to suffer the most, new analysis shows.

A no-deal Brexit would hit UK luxury and fashion hardest, new analysis shows

Plimsoll Publishing said that both luxury goods producers and clothing firms are highly at risk in the event of no deal being struck with the EU before Britain leaves the trading bloc. Both of those sectors are in the top 10 list of the industries likely to suffer most.

The findings were produced using latest data from Companies House, combined with the researcher's Plimsoll Model analytical tool. It said that with 43% of UK exports in goods and services going to countries within the EU, the absence of a deal would be disastrous for some sectors.

In fact, the Luxury Goods sector comes at the very top of the red alert list with 39% of companies in this sector flagged as 'in danger' and 33% already operating at a loss.

In a varied list that also includes New Media companies, Oil & Gas, Subsea Engineering, Biotechnology and Marine Contractors, Clothing Designers show up too, with 32% of them in danger and 31% already loss-making.

Looking at both luxury and clothing, 55% of the former have an export business, which means higher tariffs and more red tape could be a massive problem. And for clothing designers, the number exporting is an even higher 63%.

Christopher Evans, Senior Analyst at Plimsoll said: "The chances of the UK leaving the EU without a trade deal appear to have increased significantly of late. While some openly welcome such an outcome, for many industries it will make a tough job even harder.

"Many UK sectors rely on the frictionless trade and common regulations that being in the EU affords them, however, this could all change on Friday 29th March 2019 and a number of markets could experience severe disruption".

Only this week, UK Prime Minister Theresa May had said that a no-deal Brexit "wouldn't be the end of the world".

Copyright © 2019 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved.

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Luxury and fashion most "at risk" from Brexit - report

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A potential no-deal Brexit would hurt a number of UK industries more than others with both luxury goods and the fashion sector generally among those set to suffer the most, new analysis shows. Plimsoll Publishing said that both luxury goods producers and clothing firms are highly at risk in the event of no deal being struck with the EU before Britain leaves the trading bloc.

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A no deal could result in import tariffs of up to 12%.

Goods are being stopped at borders.

75% of all British fashion industry components have to be imported, Brexit would ensure delays.

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Shortly before the EU referendum in 2016, the British Fashion Council (BFC) conducted a poll involving 500 designers. It revealed that 90 per cent of them planned to vote Remain.

It should come as no surprise, then, that after three years of shambolic negotiations, the fashion industry's concerns about leaving the EU are very much still in tact.

In January, the BFC said a no-deal Brexit "should be avoided at all costs" and voiced its support for a Final Say vote, a stance that countless designers - from Vivienne Westwood to Katharine Hamnett - have since backed up.

"The ongoing uncertainty and confusion that a no deal creates will have a negative impact on our industry, where investment is already impacted from the uncertainty being faced," read the organisation's statement.

Adam Mansell, CEO at the UK Fashion and Textile Association, explained that a no deal could result in import tariffs of up to 12 per cent.

"This could leave the UK industry with an export tariff bill of hundreds of millions of pounds," he tells The Independent.

"Some UK fashion companies are already being treated as if we're not members of the EU," he added. "People in the industry aren't placing orders and goods are being stopped at borders."

Elsewhere, major industry players have cited fears that bowing out with no deal will lead to higher manufacturing prices and loss of talented staff.

The fashion industry is also dominated by small medium enterprises (SMEs), many of whom would not have the cash flow to survive a no-deal scenario.

As the exit date looms ominously over our divided nation, here's where British fashion designers stand on Brexit now.

Katharine Hamnett

Katharine Hamnett has been one of the most vocal anti-Brexit voices in the fashion industry. This is largely due to the 71-year-old designer's famous slogan T-shirts, which bear phrases such as: "Fashion Hates Brexit", "Second Referendum Now" and "Cancel Brexit". Having founded her namesake label in 1979, Hamnett has 40 years of experience under her belt.

Speaking to The Independent, the designer explains that restricting free movement in a post-Brexit landscape would be a "catastrophe" for the fashion industry.

"Fashion personnel come from all over the world, and British designers, the best in the world, travel all over," she adds.

"Roughly 75 per cent of all British fashion industry components have to be imported, so Brexit would ensure delays, which are fatal to a brand's reputation. Nothing is better than what we already have: being members of the EU."

Richard Malone

Richard Malone might've only graduated from Central Saint Martins in 2014, but the Irish designer has already established himself as one of the most exciting talents in the industry. His collections are lauded for their sculptural influences and avant-garde patterns.

"What makes the fashion industry in London so rich and creative is the mix of the brilliant cultures that you find here," Malone enthuses.

"Not only does Brexit mean we're going to miss out on the unique perspectives that fuel the creativity London is known for, but we're going to lose so much talent after leaving the EU and especially in the event of no deal," he tells The Independent.

Malone also argued that Brexit will have a huge impact in terms of losing valuable team members.

"People don't seem to realise that we're already experiencing a shortage of skills, and that's going to get significantly worse if we're not well prepared," he added.

"I came to London almost eight years ago, and Brexit just feels like a turn in the completely wrong direction."

Henry Holland

Henry Holland is famed for his loud and eye-catching designs that boast a firm celebrity following, with Lily Allen, actor Jaime Winstone and model Agyness Deyn all longtime supporters of his label.

Having risen to attention in 2006 for his graphic slogan T-shirts that bore phrases such as "I'll Tell You Who's Boss Kate Moss", Holland has always been viewed as a confident and fearless fashion figurehead.

As a made-to-order manufacturing business, Holland says he thinks the main challenges would be managing relationships with his wholesale partners around the world.

"We have now sold our autumn/winter 2019 collection and will possibly be delivering post Brexit," he adds. "But in light of increased tariffs, shipping delays and the overall impact of the strength of the pound, it's hard to see how Brexit will have any positive effects whether there is a deal or not."

The designer explains that his team have ultimately sold an entire collection with "no idea" what the cost of these goods will be to them when the time comes to import them.

"Our margins for the next year are a complete guess and this has potentially catastrophic effects on the entire industry," he added.

"There are obviously mitigating factors in terms of where the bulk of the manufacturing is done for many brands - luckily a large portion of ours is done outside of Europe - but the effect on the exchange rates and import and export tariffs, for want of a better word, remain."

Matty Bovan

Matty Bovan is one of the fledgling design talents in the industry, whose eponymous brand is worn by well-heeled folk like model-of-the-moment Adwoa Aboah.

Speaking to The Independent, the 28-year-old York-based designer reveals his stores have "thankfully" already received their spring deliveries, which has alleviated some of the Brexit-induced pressure.

"There's been so much up in the air regarding Brexit," he says, "and no one has been able to offer definitive advice to someone such as myself.

"I feel it's still early to speculate what will happen next. I'd like to see how things settle further. We have several new stores showing interest, so let's see how this impacts things."

Hannah Weiland

Hannah Weiland founded Shrimps in 2013, launching the label with a single faux fur coat. The brand has since evolved into a popular outerwear, clothing and accessories business, whose fans include Alexa Chung and Kate Moss.

"As a small, London based-brand, we work and trade with businesses based within the EU, that helps us to keep costs down and helps us to achieve the results we want within our means, as well as hire international talent," Weiland tells The Independent.

"Brexit would really compromise this for us and for our customers, not to mention the negative impact on the economy in general that would come from such a drastic change, which will inevitably be disastrous for the fashion and luxury industry."

Bella Freud

Bella Freud has been running her namesake London-based label since the early 1990s and is famed for her plush, slim-fitting slogan jumpers.

"I don't know anyone in the fashion business who voted leave," the womenswear designer tells The Independent.

Freud adds that the loss in value of the pound has already had an adverse effect on the UK fashion industry.

"The cost of importing fabrics and finished goods is eroding the profit margin, which is affecting every stage of the supply chain. Consumer confidence has been seriously battered with the drop in house prices.

"This is before Brexit has even happened."

Olivia von Halle

Olivia von Halle has been adding a heady dose of glamour to our nightwear since 2011. The London-based label has made a name for itself by selling matching silk pyjama sets that are far too fancy to actually sleep in. Celebrity fans include Selena Gomez, Bella Hadid and Jennifer Lopez.

Unlike some of her industry comrades, Von Halle is marginally more optimistic about what Brexit means for her.

"The fashion industry now is such a global business that I don't think Brexit will have a huge impact in terms of sales in the luxury sector," she tells The Independent.

"What happens with Brexit does not fundamentally change demand. However, we will perhaps see more of an impact for British brands when it comes to staffing, in offices and stores, if we lose the free movement of people within the EU."

Von Halle added that she is in the fortunate position given the fact that her business extends beyond the borders of the EU, and explained that the way Brexit impacts fashion brands will largely depend on where they import their goods from.

"Therefore the direct impact on our business not being a member of the EU is less significant than it could be," she continues. "In fact as an exporter of luxury goods the effect on the currency and the weakness against the dollar has been good for business.

"We import most of our goods from China and export the majority to the US with markets like Canada and Australia also being significant. So any future trade deals we could strike with those countries to lower tariffs would be hugely beneficial."

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From Henry Holland to Katharine Hamnett, what British fashion designers say Brexit means for them

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Shortly before the EU referendum in 2016, the British Fashion Council (BFC) conducted a poll involving 500 designers. It revealed that 90 per cent of them planned to vote Remain. It should come as no surprise, then, that after three years of shambolic negotiations, the fashion industry's concerns about leaving the EU are very much still in tact.

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"Whatever happens, the price of a pair of jeans will, in all likeliness, go up. It’s tariffs, and an exodus of [European] shop staff, designers, warehouse staff, delivery drivers…"

The pool of available staff is likely to shrink, meaning an inflationary impact on wages.

"Shipping will entail many more additional steps. It will be a logistical nightmare."

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Lifestyle ES Magazine

The British fashion industry relies on international trade, thrives on a global pool of talent - and has made no secret of its desire to remain in the EU. So how is it preparing as we enter the final countdown to Brexit? Lucy Tobin investigates

B

ritain's fashion industry didn't vote for Brexit: 90 per cent of designers told the British Fashion Council they were voting remain.

But with less than seven months to go before the UK formally cuts its ties with the European Union, this £28 billion sector has to get three very different looks ready to future-proof business.

Richard Lim, chief executive of analyst Retail Economics, outlines the potential scenarios: 'Hard Brexit - where existing trade deals disappear, and designers, retailers and manufacturers would have to pay to trade with the EU - would mean clothing and footwear tariffs of about 11 per cent, or just over £1 billion more each year.' A second option is a free trade agreement, 'but we don't know what kind of strings will be attached - it's hard for businesses to plan'. Third, the UK could remain part of the customs union, but that seems unlikely given that Theresa May has already rejected this path.

'Whatever happens, the price of a pair of jeans will, in all likeliness, go up after Brexit,' says Lim. 'It's tariffs, and an exodus of [European] shop staff, designers, warehouse staff, delivery drivers... As we "take control of our borders", the pool of available staff is likely to shrink, meaning an inflationary impact on wages. It's likely to be massively disruptive.'

The UK imports almost £10 billion worth of clothes and shoes from Europe each year; more than 10,000 European staff work in the British fashion industry. It has become a microcosm of UK Plc's struggle to deal with the referendum result.

Katharine Hamnett has sold thousands of her 'CANCEL BREXIT' T-shirts and has released a new version, 'FASHION HATES BREXIT'. She is campaigning for a second referendum, but has a contingency plan, too. She has set up her own Italian company, near Venice, 'to handle production and logistics, so we don't get snarled up in complicated Brexit red tape and import and export problems for our manufacturing and shipments'.

'It's terrifying that we know so little about "the deal" - the fashion industry works so far in advance, and it feels like we are in a blackout room and having to use a crystal ball to find our way out,' says Frances Card, fashion consultant and former Matchesfashion.com COO. Her concern is echoed by Clare Hornby of ME+EM, whose Breton T-shirts are loved by the Duchess of Cambridge. Meanwhile, photographer Nick Knight is unequivocal. 'The overwhelming evidence and general agreement on all sides now is that this country and its communities will be considerably worse off both economically and culturally if we leave the EU,' he says.

It's not all bad. The Brexit-fuelled crash in the value of the pound has seen surging numbers of Chinese, Arab and American fashion tourists chucking cash at the West End's fanciest tills. But higher sales may not be enough to offset rising foreign manufacturing costs and an influx of shoppers may be balanced by an outflux of international talent from the industry. José Neves, founder of luxury online platform Farfetch, put it like this at last year's Web Summit in Lisbon: 'We have 25 different nationalities in our London office. If [Brexit] jeopardises that, it'll be a major loss.' Writer and consultant Nick Vinson points out, 'Many great "British" designers are European and proud of it': Mary Katrantzou is Greek, Simone Rocha is Irish, Peter Pilotto is Austrian-Italian.

Loud and clear: Katharine Hamnett's T-shirt

Stephanie Phair, chair of the British Fashion Council, says that 'making sure young people from all around the world have access to creative education and skills to protect our home-grown talent pipeline' is a post-Brexit priority. 'It's extremely important that we remain open and accessible to international talent,' she adds. The BFC helps run the fashion arm of the Home Office's Tier 1 visa scheme, giving 2,000 top designers from outside the EU fast-tracked visas. 'In light of Brexit, this is something that is incredibly important.'

Stylist Tamara Cincik set up Fashion Roundtable to make sure the industry's concerns were heard. 'Fishing makes £1.4 billion for the UK economy, fashion almost £30 billion, but we only hear about cod,' she says. 'I know of two long-established London brands, one in accessories, one in women's and menswear, moving to Portugal, and a large fash-tech business looking to relocate its logistics to Italy. With a hard Brexit or no deal, swathes of fashion firms expect to leave,' she adds.

Universities claim the talent drain isn't happening yet. The London College of Fashion says its proportion of EU applicants hasn't dropped over the past year. The college's head, professor Frances Corner, is a rare positive voice: 'Brexit gives us an opportunity to ask what sort of fashionable future we want. Ideas and thoughts can't be tied down to national boundaries, they will always break through,' she says. But she mourns the end of EU funding, and potentially of the Erasmus scheme, which enables students and staff to work elsewhere in Europe.

The International Trade Secretary, Liam Fox, has said that Brexit is 'an unprecedented opportunity to create a trading environment that delivers for our country, our businesses and our citizens'. And it's true that Brexit isn't a wardrobe disaster for every London company in the fashion industry. Vote Leave's push for the return of 'made in Britain' is already bearing fruit in the unlikely location of Haringey. At a dazzling white workshop in Zone 2, Jenny Holloway runs Fashion Enter, where 107 stitchers, cutters and designers manufacture womenswear for Marks & Spencer, Asos, Matthew Williamson and Preen, among others. Since the referendum, she's had Tesco and Arcadia come knocking. 'Brexit, and the chaos in Turkey, mean manufacturing is drifting back to the UK,' Holloway says.

The in-crowd: right, designers Sid Bryan and Cozette McCreery express support for the remain campaign during one of their label's catwalk shows in 2016 /

'We can go from idea to delivery in three weeks.' However, some 80 per cent of her stitchers are Eastern European. 'When [the Brexit vote] first happened, two went home immediately - they felt unloved and unwanted. We used to have skilled workers from Bulgaria, Romania and Poland knocking on the door every week - that's stopped completely.'

UK makers also need something to make their clothes from - and there aren't any cotton fields in Seven Sisters. Three quarters of materials used in the UK are imported. If there is no deal, UK manufacturers will be subject to a bewildering array of tariffs.

'Manufacturers will face reams of paperwork for each component part,' Anna Tobin, at Ready for Brexit, explains. 'Plus there are possible technical barriers to trade - if a country decides a British clothing firm's standards aren't high enough, it could be barred. Then there's the possible port queues delaying shipments, new VAT rules that mean importers will have to pay their 20 per cent upfront, and potential delays at immigration for foreign buyers.

'Business that's done unthinkingly now - shipping in cloth from Italian mills, sourcing components from China, Turkey and India, transporting finished clothes and models over to Paris or Milan for the shows, and product lines into stores in Europe - will entail many more additional steps. It will be a logistical nightmare.'

Spaniard Álvaro González makes the sandals of his eponymous shoe brand in Florence, sells them in his Marylebone shop plus wholesale worldwide via Matchesfashion.com, Mr Porter and Browns Fashion, all based in London. 'Delivery for SS19 is just before [Brexit day] but our next collection, which we are designing now, is a concern - we have no way of knowing how we can sell and deliver it. We wholesale in euros, and sell in our store and via e-commerce in pounds. Our margins are at risk with exchange rate fluctuations.'

Stephen Sidkin, fashion law partner at Fox Williams whose clients include La Perla and Orla Kiely, believes the industry is not well prepared: 'Many fashion firms are adopting the ostrich position - which could prove painful.' But he admits they have no choice. 'By next week, many brands will have decided what individual pieces from their SS19 collections to manufacture - but unless they are paying in sterling, how can they know where exchange rates will be when payment for overseas manufacturing becomes due? Or what customs duties will be payable both into the UK and into the EU?'

All of which means that experts are worried about London losing its reputation as a global fashion capital. Last month, Superdry founder Julian Dunkerton gave £1m to the People's Vote campaign for a second referendum. Frances Card, meanwhile, adds: 'We came back from a major exodus of designers and top models at London Fashion Week around a decade ago - it was hard to do. The threat of [Brexit's] potential loss cuts through all aspects of our industry - disaster for our stores, businesses and carefully nurtured brands, and the freedom to move everything and everyone easily across borders. Don't let's lose our place again.'

Illustrations by Michelle Thompson

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How will Brexit impact the UK fashion industry?

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The British fashion industry relies on international trade, thrives on a global pool of talent - and has made no secret of its desire to remain in the EU. So how is it preparing as we enter the final countdown to Brexit? Lucy Tobin investigates

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The brand has taken initiatives to appeal to digital natives. 

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The brand has taken initiatives to appeal to digital natives. 

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In 2011, Valentino had opened up a "digital fashion museum" showcasing 50 years worth of designs, original sketches, photographs and runway videos. It also featured digital master classes in which audiences had the ability to digitally interact.

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The idea is to open up the archives, with the online facilities offering unlimited possibilities for interconnections and cross-references. A key outfit can thus be seen up close in intimate detail in 3-D, with explanations of its cut and craftsmanship, as well as when and where it was first shown and who subsequently wore it. Typical examples would be the gown created for Elizabeth Taylor for the Hollywood premiere of "Spartacus" or the bridal dress of Jacqueline Kennedy for her marriage to Aristotle Onassis in 1968.

The significance of the initiative is twofold: It brings the history of Valentino (who retired from the house that bears his name in 2008) to the wired generation in the language of YouTube and Facebook. And it gives the designer a fashion afterlife in which he and Mr. Giammetti are totally in control, though the reality is that the Valentino brand has continued with a new chief executive officer and design duo.

Significantly, there is no external curator for the Web project. In a classic museum exhibition, there might have been a different interpretation of the legacy or the clothes could have been put in the context of other Italian designers.

Mr. Giammetti, so long in control of the house of Valentino, has thus created a virtual immortality and a chosen place in fashion history.

For students - and for historians - the result is a generous offering that comes from a nonprofit association and makes the archive globally available. It is also a shot across the bows of classic museums that increasingly see fashion as a crowd pleaser and money spinner. For example, "Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty," a paying exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York this year, had a record and lucrative attendance; and at any given time exhibitions from the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, such as the hat show of milliner Stephen Jones, are touring.

When contacted on this subject, museum curators refrained from commenting, until they had seen the online archives after the launch this week.

The Valentino project will surely be studied by other brands looking to control a heritage. This year, Gucci opened its own private brick-and-mortar museum: in fact, a magnificent ancient stone edifice in the historical heart of Florence, where a selected history of Gucci is offered to a paying public by the Italian brand.

"But we don't want Valentino to be just from the past," Mr. Giammetti says of his project. "We want something alive for the future."

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Valentino Virtual Fashion Museum Opens Its Doors

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The idea is to open up the archives, with the online facilities offering unlimited possibilities for interconnections and cross-references. A key outfit can thus be seen up close in intimate detail in 3-D, with explanations of its cut and craftsmanship, as well as when and where it was first shown and who subsequently wore it.

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Brand Vision (Tradition vs. Innovation) 

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Brand Vision (Tradition vs. Innovation) 

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The creative director of Valentino seeks to maintain the house's culture of couture but to also reflect  the present time. He quotes "I love to think about the past, but not see the past." His goal is to keep Valentino relevant and "not dusty."

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For Valentino's creative director Pierpaolo Piccioli, the couture runway is a platform for peak creativity. This was certainly evident in the designer's most recent couture range, where gratifying construction met bursts of hypersaturated hues and swaggering proportions; it was arguably one of the most spectacular and free-spirited couture offerings to date. The collection received a standing ovation and reminded the world that while sneakers and T-shirts might be covetable, they still aren't the rarest, most magical or of-the-moment things in reach.

At Vogue's Forces of Fashion conference on Thursday, Piccioli, who in 2016 became Valentino's sole creative director, spoke about his multilayered vision for the brand, how he has made the storied house relevant in 2018 and how he handles couture.

Piccioli wasn't brought up in the lavish world of couture, though he did fantasize about fashion. "When I was a kid, I felt that fashion was something so far from everything," Piccioli told moderator Hamish Bowles. "I wanted to escape from the places that felt too small for me."

He later enrolled in Rome's Instituto Europeo di Design to study fashion, but there Piccioli explained that he was fascinated with politics and was considered an outsider - a role he continues to take pride in because it allows him to see beauty in a different way and to think alone. Perhaps it is Piccioli's individualistic nature and desire for moments of isolation that have made his designs at Valentino completely his own.

Piccioli attributes some of his openness to experimentation and newness to working on the accessory line for Fendi in 1990. "I arrived at Fendi when I was a kid, and it was incredible because it was a school where we learned that anything is possible," Piccioli said. "We would experiment with everything in a very free way."

After Fendi, together with Maria Grazia Chiuri, Piccioli went to Valentino in 1999 to develop the emerging accessory line. It was a change of pace for the designer. "Valentino was much more formal," he explained. "Everybody wore a suit and tie. When I arrived there, it was July, and I was wearing flip-flops." But despite his choice of casual footwear, he got on quite well at the luxury house. Piccioli and Chiuri revamped the brand's handbag and eyewear collections and were put in charge of designing Red Valentino in 2003. Five years later, Chiuri and Piccioli were appointed co-creative directors when Valentino Garavani retired.

This was the first time Piccioli was tasked with not only designing product, but also creating a vision for the brand. And for Piccioli - the reluctant fashion superstar who prefers to live a quiet life by the sea - his vision was all about maintaining the house's culture of couture and updating its values to reflect the present time. "I feel that my job is giving my vision of beauty, but in relation to the times you are living in," he said.

What has emerged are a series of couture collections rooted in dreams and ready-to-wear offerings that speak to the present time. "Ready-to-wear has to catch the zeitgeist," Piccioli said. "Ready-to-wear is about culture and the idea of uniqueness."

But the handmade fantasies have been strong players in his vision for the brand: "Couture for me is the DNA of the brand," Piccioli said. "When you do couture, you can't do it last minute: you need time, because couture is made of rituals. It's an experience."

Growing up, Piccioli never saw couture up-close; he only interacted with such designs through photographs. So it was all a fantasy, until he landed at Valentino: "When I arrived, I asked to see the pieces because I wanted to touch them," he said. "But when I saw these dresses, they were not what I pictured in my mind - they were more heavy, more structured, so it was not the lightness that I imagined." In that moment, he decided not to reference the archives for his couture collections; instead he would rely on his own vision. "I love to think about that past, but not to see the past," he noted.

While couture isn't always considered the most relevant or youthful sector of the fashion industry, Piccioli is working to change that. Valentino's atelier comprises two age groups: One made up of women in their 60s, who pass the techniques on, and one made up of people in their late 20s. "There's a new generation in their 20s that rediscovered the poetry of doing couture," Piccioli said. "It's nice to see this relationship, and it creates a new energy."

The designer is also looking to breathe that youthfulness into the brand as a whole. His goal is to keep Valentino relevant and "not dusty." For Piccioli, that means the brand is not just promoting a lifestyle, but also fostering a community.

"Lifestyle is a group of people who share faces; communities are groups of people that share lives," Piccioli concluded. "I want to keep the idea of luxury and culture, but take Valentino from an exclusive brand to an inclusive brand."
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Pierpaolo Piccioli on Maintaining Valentino's Culture of Couture and Updating Its Values to Reflect 2018

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For Valentino's creative director Pierpaolo Piccioli, the couture runway is a platform for peak creativity. This was certainly evident in the designer's most recent couture range, where gratifying construction met bursts of hypersaturated hues and swaggering proportions; it was arguably one of the most spectacular and free-spirited couture offerings to date.

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Co-creative directors Chiuri and Piccioli had taken over Valentino, designing and being known for dresses that are "regal and conservative .... like church dresses, with high collars but with lively filigree or floral lace patterns."

- When designing my range I aim to keep this in mind so that the range aligns with their brand identity.

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The designers Pierpaolo Piccioli, far left, and Maria Grazia Chiuri, center, with Valentino Garavani at their Fashion Week party last week. Credit Credit Valerio Mezzanotti for The New York Times

PARIS - The setting was a white-paneled reception hall in the stately Salomon de Rothschild mansion, where a long dining table had been set with blue-and-white Delftware candelabras and vases filled with irises and hydrangea blossoms. Among them, silver platters were piled, obscenely high, with unblemished raspberries, blackberries, strawberries and red grapes.

Standing in front of this table on Tuesday night were the designers who took over the Valentino label in late 2008: Maria Grazia Chiuri, kohl-eyed and almost nunlike in a black dress with a white collar, and Pierpaolo Piccioli, skinny in a Sinatra suit, with a boyish face. It was their party, to mark the reopening this week of the Valentino store on Avenue Montaigne, which had been overhauled by the architect David Chipperfield to reflect their vision of the label.

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Pierpaolo Piccioli, left, and Maria Grazia Chiuri acknowledged applause after the presentation of Valentino's fall ready-to-wear collection on Tuesday in Paris. Credit Thibault Camus/Associated Press

And to one side, though no less visible, was Valentino Garavani himself, with his business partner, Giancarlo Giammetti, the men who made Valentino a household name, and a legendary one at that.

A look from the fall 2013 collection. Credit Valerio Mezzanotti for The New York Times

More than any other designer who has walked away from a fashion empire - Hubert de Givenchy or Emanuel Ungaro or, to a lesser degree, Calvin Klein - Mr. Garavani, at 80, has remained in the spotlight since his ostensible retirement in 2008.

That year, the documentary " Valentino: The Last Emperor " made him a celebrity for a new generation of customers, and he and Mr. Giammetti have since created an online museum, in 2011, and also participated in a major couture exhibition that closed last week in London. Two weeks ago, they attended every major party in Los Angeles on the Oscars circuit, at the same time that the Valentino company was trying to lure celebrities with red-carpet dresses from the most recent couture collections designed by Ms. Chiuri and Mr. Piccioli. (There were two successes, with Sally Field and Jennifer Aniston, and one major embarrassment, with Anne Hathaway.)

When they first took over the collection, Ms. Chiuri and Mr. Piccioli were described as "very Valentino," which was meant as a compliment, at least in the eyes of Mr. Garavani's loyalists, if not critics who wanted to see something new. There was red, there was lace, there were cocktail dresses. Having designed accessories for Valentino for a decade, they understood, perhaps better than anyone, the codes of his house. Alessandra Facchinetti, a former Gucci designer, had immediately succeeded Mr. Garavani, but she was fired after two seasons of going too far in her own direction. (Ms. Facchinetti has recently joined Tod's as creative director.)

Another fall 2013 look. Credit Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images

From above, Sally Field and Jennifer Aniston wore Valentino gowns at the Academy Awards; Adele wore Valentino at the Grammys; and Allison Williams did so at the Vanity Fair party after the Oscars. Credit Lucas Jackson/Reuters

Ms. Chiuri and Mr. Piccioli are, as Cathy Horyn, the fashion critic of The New York Times, wrote of their spring couture show, "more self-critical and demanding." It is probably not a coincidence that this change coincides with a restructuring of the Valentino business and a new investor that has put it on more solid financial footing. Valentino was acquired last July by Mayhoola, an investor group from Qatar.

Credit Lucy Nicholson/Reuters

Fashion was a smaller industry then, the designers less competitive and less formal. When Ms. Chiuri was offered a job at Fendi, she asked Mr. Piccioli to join her. More than 20 years later, they describe themselves as "like an old couple." They often dress alike. Ms. Chiuri, during a meeting in Valentino's substantial offices on the Place Vendôme, wore a fine-gauge black sweater over a dress shirt with a white collar buttoned to the top. Mr. Piccioli wore a midnight blue sweater over a white buttoned-up shirt with an overdyed camouflage necktie. But each has an independent family life and a spouse, Ms. Chiuri with two children and Mr. Piccioli with three.

Credit Christopher Polk/Getty Images For Naras

Credit Jordan Strauss/Invision, via Jordan Strauss/Invision/Ap

Ms. Chiuri and Mr. Piccioli are becoming more recognizable as the faces of Valentino. The store design by Mr. Chipperfield, like the clothes, is intended to portray modernity. The walls and floors are made of gray terrazzo marble, and the once-white boxes are divided into smaller rooms to differentiate shoes, ready-to-wear or evening wear. Valentino's sales, $510 million in 2012, have improved, and lucrative accessories, like sandals studded with small spikes, now account for nearly half of sales in some stores. There is also a revitalized men's wear business, with well-received collections and plans for new stores just for men.

"We are not trying to make fashion in the traditional way," said Stefano Sassi, the chief executive of the label. "We should be more iconic, not just because of the red or the evening gowns, but because of this kind of statement, too."

Of course, Valentino would not be Valentino without the glamour. Lavish dinners are part of the image, only now, instead of Jackie Kennedy and Jackie Collins, you will find a French actress like Cécile Cassel, or Jessica Alba. But not, at least at the dinner in Paris, Ms. Hathaway, a longtime member of the Valentino "family" whose last-moment switch to a Prada apron dress at the Oscars ruffled some feathers at the Valentino company. Oddly, they did not belong to Ms. Chiuri or Mr. Piccioli, who designed the dress but supported Ms. Hathaway's decision.

"What we try to say as designers is that beauty is how you feel in the moment," he said. "Respecting women means respecting their choices."

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PARIS - The setting was a white-paneled reception hall in the stately Salomon de Rothschild mansion, where a long dining table had been set with blue-and-white Delftware candelabras and vases filled with irises and hydrangea blossoms. Among them, silver platters were piled, obscenely high, with unblemished raspberries, blackberries, strawberries and red grapes.

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The brand has become widely recognised for their rockstud heels which have sold out every season since launching in 2011. They have become an iconic accessory due to their "timeless quality and being edgy enough to make a subtle statement."

- When designing my range I hope to incorporate rockstuds into my accessories, however, I am yet to figure out how to achieve this as it is unlikely that CADS will feature such details.

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The £650 Valentino heels loved by everyone from A-listers to royalty and reality stars (but why DO Rockstud shoes continue to sell out every season?)

Shoes can go up to £1,445 for embellished versions

Have sold out every season since they were launched in 2010

Have been named as best fashion investment as they hold value

A-listers like Reese Witherspoon are fans as well as Princess Mary of Denmark

From the red carpet in Hollywood to royal palaces and even clattering along the streets of Essex as TOWIE is filmed, they're the shoes that celebrities can't get enough of.

Since launching in 2010, Valentino's Rockstud heels have sold out every season, despite costing from around £650 and as much as £1,445 for a highly embellished pair.

The platinum studded heels are fast becoming an iconic accessory, worn by everyone from Princess Mary of Denmark to Reese Witherspoon, teamed with everything from casual ripped jeans and shorts to red carpet dresses.

According to A-list stylist Natalie Robinson, their popularity is down to a killer combination of having timeless quality while being edgy enough to make a subtle statement.

'Since the rise of Valentino Rockstud heels, every fashionista about town owns a pair or at least a decent replica from the high street,' she explained.

'It's rather unusual that we can't get enough of the Rockstud trend that has dominated the footwear industry season after season, as consumer behaviour can be fickle.

'Nonetheless, Rockstuds clearly have staying power due to their versatility I believe. For example, they make a classic court shoe look edgy with a twist, yet they're appropriate enough to compliment any outfit.'

Natalie believes their appeal is likely to continue because they're extremely versatile.

Indeed, stars such as Nicky Hilton have the heels in all the colours of the rainbow.

'The reason for the enduring popularity of Rockstuds is in their detail,' she said. 'They come in metallic gold and silver and a multitude of colours, standing out just enough to make an outfit look dynamic.

'Sometimes, we need the right detail, whether in size and/or colour, to uplift a classic ensemble.

'This trend is more like an accessory; an add-on feature to characterise a particular look. Overall, you can rock any outfit with Rockstuds.

'They have a timeless quality hence why they are versatile and more than just a fad.'

A bonus of the shoes popularity is that if you do own a pair or are planning to treat yourself, it will be money well spent.

The shoes have been identified by second hand designer goods website Vestiaire Collective as being among the pieces that have the highest resale value.

And Harpers Bazaar have listed the shoes among the top ten best designer investments as you stand to get most of your money back if you sell them on.

And with colours changing every season, you could even stand to make more as older styles are discontinued and become sought after.

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Why do Valentino Rockstud heels remain so popular?

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Shoes can go up to £1,445 for embellished versions Have sold out every season since they were launched in 2010 Have been named as best fashion investment as they hold value A-listers like Reese Witherspoon are fans as well as Princess Mary of Denmark From the red carpet in Hollywood to royal palaces and even clattering along the streets of Essex as TOWIE is filmed, they're the shoes that celebrities can't get enough of.

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Piccioli had introduced a new shortened logo "VLTN" influenced by millennials offering customers logo printed garments in a world where "hyper-branded aesthetic is pivotal."

- When designing my range I aim to incorporate some logo printed merch for younger generations who want to display brand loyalty but might not have the capital to purchase the gowns in the range.

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Once upon a time, Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli were fashion's power duo. For more than a decade, the long-term creative partners collaborated under Valentino. Beginning with Red Valentino, before taking over the Italian house's accessories range and then the entire brand itself in 2008, redefining the maison's brand codes as co-creative directors. They were inseparable - until they weren't. In 2016, Chiuri moved to Dior, while Piccioli stayed. It was simultaenously the end of a chapter and the beginning of another. Enter: VLTN.

Its timid introduction was through Piccioli's Spring 2018 menswear collection, where the VLTN logo appeared cautiously on the front of crisp white button-ups and graphic t-shirts. Backstage ahead of the show, Piccioli said of his new shortened lettering, "It's one of the logos of the house from the '80s. I didn't like it, because I knew it. But I have a lot of young guys on our team, and they loved it. I like to listen to them - you have to listen, to learn. So I tried to re-set my eyes. And I started to see it in a different way."

This fresh perspective had been gradually raising its volume ever since Chiuri's departure. Spearheading the house single-handedly, Piccioli ushered in a new era for the brand, anchoring his references on today's streets. Tracksuits, sneakers, bomber jackets became recurring staples. But it wasn't until VLTN that the change made its noticeable mark.

Its next entries were grand. VLTN pop-ups mushroomed from New York to Hong Kong, carrying a line of merch - tees, sliders, socks, basketballs - with the new logo slapped on. Then came VLTN's first appearance on womenswear. The Moncler Genius project revealed Piccioli's entry of sheeny puffer coats emblazoned with the now-recognisable four letters.

Now, even bolder, Piccioli's Pre-Fall 2018 womenswear wholly embraced the logo influx. VLTN is plastered on bags of all stripes, including a witty leather "paper shopping bags", and intarsia'd in black on the back of a white mink. Pointed toe stilettos, combat boots and sneakers are stamped with the abbreviation.

It's worth noting that the shortened logo does not replace Valentino's current one on a collective scale. VLTN serves its purpose in acknowledging the peripheral influence of millennials, earning brand currency via logo-printed offerings at a time when streetwear's hyper-branded and irony-laden aesthetic is pivotal.

Of course, Piccioli wouldn't be the first to hit refresh on a time-tested logo, nor would he be the last. Recently, Riccardo Tisci unveiled a skinny Helvetica-esque Burberry logo, designed by legendary graphic designer Peter Saville. Raf Simons, too, commissioned Saville to revamp Calvin Klein's into distinctive all-caps.

Logos are, after all, talismanic signifiers for brand loyalists. Minor tweaks and permanent updates denote bigger changes set for execution. Be it a reflection of a wider cultural zeitgeist or a new direction altogether, sometimes all it takes is a clever logo refresh.
Valentino's VLTN Pre-Fall 2018 pieces are now available in boutiques.

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lifestyleasia the meaning behind valentino’s new logo

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The meaning behind Valentino's new logo, VLTN

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Once upon a time, Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli were fashion's power duo. For more than a decade, the long-term creative partners collaborated under Valentino. Beginning with Red Valentino, before taking over the Italian house's accessories range and then the entire brand itself in 2008, redefining the maison's brand codes as co-creative directors.

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As Instagram increases as a direct shopping channel Valentino could take advantage of this to increase convenience and appeal to digital natives.

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As use of Instagram as a direct shopping channel increases, the opportunity for brands to capitalise on impulse purchases is growing too, according to analysts.

Instagram Shopping is a key channel for impulse fashion buys

Some 38.7% of online shoppers aged between 16 and 24 have used Instagram Shopping to buy, and retailers targeting this demographic "should recognise the potential of social media beyond a marketing tool and as an additional sales platform that is especially effective at driving impulse purchases," according to data and analytics company GlobalData.

At present, Instagram Shopping is a tool that allows retailers to tag items featured in their Instagram posts, so consumers cam click on the product to get through to the specific page on a retailer's website. But Instagram is developing its offer and shopping directly within the app is now possible for some brands, further adding to the impulse buy potential.

Retail analyst Emily Salter said of all this: "Retailers targeting young consumers need to seize the opportunity created by the new shopping habits of this demographic as they increasingly use Instagram Shopping as a platform to make purchases. Using the tool, retailers can promote specific products to a huge number of followers (for example, H&M and Asos have 30m and 9.3m respectively) and engaged shoppers, in particular boosting impulse purchases."

The extra value of Instagram for impulse buys also comes from the fact that every user's Instagram journey is heavily personalised as they can follow retailers and hashtags they're interested in specifically and use the Explore function to search content themes, view relevant posts and search for accounts, tags and places. "The content seen is therefore refined so consumers are more exposed to relevant products than they may be on a retailer's website or app, unless personalisation is effectively employed," GlobalData added.

While it quoted two of the giants of fashion retail as examples of brands that have huge Instagram followings, the researchers also said that the channel is key "for smaller retailers without the resources or ability to use personalisation or develop an effective and attractive app." That's because Instagram Shopping "offers a way to boost mobile sales with less investment."

And Instagram is also important as it's one of the quickest ways to tap the trend momentum. "Instagram presents retailers with a means to react quickly to trends by highlighting popular and talked-about pieces as they emerge, and engage with consumers to build brand loyalty - especially important in the highly competitive young fashion market," GlobalData said.

But Salter also warned that riding the wave of the social media channel could go badly wrong if retailers don't adjust their business models to ensure they have the means to meet sudden demand.

"Stock availability is vital to ensure the effective use of Instagram Shopping, as the products featured and tagged [there will] have heightened visibility compared to the rest of the retailer's products," Salter added. "Retailers should be prepared for greater popularity of featured items and use forecasts based on previous reactions to avoid stock selling out too quickly."

She cited M&S having mentioned products on Instagram Shopping that rapidly sell out, "leading to numerous comments from frustrated shoppers, creating a more negative perception of the shopping experience."

Copyright © 2019 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved.

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Instagram Shopping gives retailers a chance to boost impulse buys say analysts

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News retail : Use of Instagram as a direct shopping channel is rising and the opportunity for brands to capitalise on impulse buys is growing too, analysts say, adding that this could boost small fashion retailers as well as large. (#1102127)

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Brands like Louis Vuitton have bigger budgets for marketing and are at the forefront of social media marketing threatening to overshadow Valentino.

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Big-spending luxury brands like Gucci, Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior are splashing out on everything from dance-fuelled fashion shows to teams of advisers as they target social media platforms in the hunt for young shoppers.

See catwalk
Christian Dior - Cruise Collection2020 - Womenswear - Marrakech

Without the entry barriers of magazine advertising - where a one page glossy ad can cost tens of thousands of dollars - sites like Instagram, a fashionista favourite, have allowed unknown labels to find an audience with canny or eye-catching campaigns.

But big bucks are changing the game as cash rich luxury goods groups like LVMH and Kering hike their social media budgets, giving them vast means to drown out rivals on platforms once seen as a leveller for brands big and small.

As the use of bloggers and influencers becomes mainstream, fees per sponsored post commanded by those with four million followers have reached well over 20,000 euros ($22,546), according to marketing experts.

Less active than some smaller brands on networking platforms even five years ago, luxury's leading players are now leapfrogging the competition.

Kering - owner of fast-growing Gucci, which scored the highest level of publicity impact on social media last year according to data trackers Tribe Dynamics - on Friday said that half its 2018 media budget was spent on digital advertising, up from 20 percent only three years earlier.

"There's a big shift in how we're thinking about advertising and creating aspiration," Kering's digital chief Gregory Boutte told journalists on the sidelines of an investor day.

"Now with every type of social platform, you need different types of videos, of pictures. You don't create content on YouTube as you do on TV."

Kering does not reveal its total advertising expenditure.

Its cross-town rival LVMH increased its total marketing spending at the fastest rate in seven years in 2018 to 5.6 billion euros ($6.3 billion), reaching 12% of group revenues - more than most brands that disclose this budget and topped only by another big online trendsetter, privately-owned Chanel.

Louis Vuitton, LVMH's major sales driver, also now allocates half its marketing costs to digital media, the brand's CEO Michael Burke said at a closed-door briefing this week, according to Citi analysts.

LVMH declined to comment.

Vuitton, as well as LVMH's Christian Dior, Marc Jacobs and Givenchy labels were among Tribe Dynamics' top 10 brands last year, with Kering's Saint Laurent and Balenciaga also making the cut. The firm quantifies how much social media buzz is worth, including non-paid for content.

EMBRACING THE NEW

Rewind three years, and Italy's Valentino, seven times smaller then than Vuitton, outflanked peers in the Instagram stakes, coming first in a listing by Engagement Labs which measured the most effective brands on social media.

Valentino's formula was simple, mixing content generated by fans with its own professional photos, while answering online comments - a standard approach for labels now, but which helped fuel a sales spike at the Mayhoola-owned firm at the time.

Valentino's Instagram followers have doubled to 12.4 million since, though revenue growth has slowed; Vuitton's followers have almost tripled to 32.1 million, and revenues are still expanding at a robust pace.

Marketing investments are just one factor separating luxury brands riding high on demand from markets like China and those struggling to make a mark, with product designs and funkier store strategies playing a role too.

And funds only go so far, with social media savvy also making a difference.

Gucci co-designed a collection in 2016 with "Guccighost", a street artist who painted quirky versions of its logos around New York and posted them online, helping its social media credentials, Tribe Dynamics' co-founder Conor Begley said.

"Gucci embraced those connections. Usually a brand would have sent attorneys after him," Begley said. "That sends a message to other content creators who think 'Oh My God, maybe I'll get to work with Gucci' if I post about them".

BIG GROUPS, BIG MEANS

As digital investments rise, mid-sized luxury labels are now in an increasingly awkward spot as they try and stay visible.

"The ones that are suffering are those in the middle, of an average size, which are stuck between the small innovative pure digital players and the big groups with big means," said Michael Jais, CEO of Launchmetrics, which compiles digital data on the fashion industry.

Italian shoemaker Tod's is among a clutch of brands in turnaround mode investing more in social media in a bid to revive sales - a strategy welcomed by analysts but which will likely keep weighing on its profit margins, some said.

Analysts at HSBC, which have a "reduce" rating on Tod's, said in a note this week that it was losing ground and "facing intense competitive pressure" as LVMH and Kering pushed funds into online marketing.

Just over 10% of social media influencers earned $100,000 or more a year in 2018, according to a Launchmetrics report, compared to 3.7% in 2017, though hiring the most popular bloggers is only one of the costs involved.

"The big groups understood they had to invest more in experiences - what happens around a catwalk show, exhibits, store openings," said Uche Pezard, CEO of Luxe Corp, which advises brands on strategy.

"That's what's expensive, not the technology. That's what's changed in the past five to eight years."

© Thomson Reuters 2019 All rights reserved.

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How luxury brands are raising the stakes on Instagram

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Big-spending luxury brands like Gucci, Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior are splashing out on everything from dance-fuelled fashion shows to teams of advisers as they target social media platforms in the hunt for young shoppers.

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The counterfeiting of luxury handbags threatens to damage reputations and notions of “exclusivity”.

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Counterfeiting is much more than the fake Louis Vuitton and Gucci bags we see on market corners during summer holidays.

The Global Brand Counterfeiting Report 2018 estimates that the losses suffered due to global online counterfeiting has amounted to 323 Billion USD in the year 2017, with luxury brands incurring a loss of 30.3 billion dollars through internet sales.

The report analyses the size, mode, trade routes and issues underlying counterfeiting of high end consumer goods, specifically clothing, textile, footwear, cosmetics, handbags, and watches. The estimated losses due to counterfeiting of high end consumer goods amounted to 98 Billion USD which includes counterfeiting from offline as well as online mediums.

The global counterfeit market is booming

The globalization of trade and communication has offered unparalleled opportunities for organized crimes to engage in illicit trade and counterfeiting so as to increase their economic influence. The report has focused on those economies where the consumers have the highest buying power namely, France, Germany, Hong Kong, China, Italy, Japan, Singapore, UAE, UK, and the USA.

Counterfeiting seems to be an untamable business with high profits, and a research paper published by Emerald Insight in Malaysia looks from the consumer perspective to explain consumer purchase intention towards counterfeit luxury goods.

Buyers of fake goods have a sense of denial

Buying a fake handbag requires some sort of denial of responsibility from the buyer, which is precisely what the report found. The results showed denial of copyright and social risk are significant predictors of consumers' purchase intention towards counterfeit luxury goods. Interestingly, condemnation of the condemners, psychological and prosecution risks were found to have no significant relationships with purchase intention towards counterfeit luxury goods.

Is there any harm in buying a fake Chanel handbag or Louboutin shoes? David Wall, professor of criminology at Leeds University, asks the BBC. "Counterfeited goods provoke a lot of outrage, but what about?" Most people who buy a fake Rolex for 10 dollars know it is not a 'real' Rolex. There is also a skill required for the manufacturing of items to look like the original. Buyers of fake products don't expect them to last in the same way they do when they invest in the original.

While luxury brands are a quick to say fake brands are denting their profits, how likely is it that somebody who buys a fake bag for 20 pounds would invest in the real Louis Vuitton that costs thousands of euros? The dilemma appears to be a moral one and one of copyright.

Some even argue that the fake market bolsters the genuine one as it raises brand awareness. And when it comes to ethics, how do we know for certain the garments we buy from H&M, Primark and other cheap fast fashion companies are ethically sourced? As David Wall states, "Fashion is a complex market and counterfeit fashion is just as complex,"

Photo credit: Counterfeit and real Louis Vuitton

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Global counterfeiting costs luxury brands billions of dollars

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Counterfeiting is much more than the fake Louis Vuitton and Gucci bags we see on market corners during summer holidays. The Global Brand Counterfeiting Report 2018 estimates that the losses suffered due to global online counterfeiting has amounted to 323 Billion USD in the year 2017, with luxury brands incurring a loss of 30.3 billion dollars through internet sales.

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Interactive Exhibitions - Interactive exhibitions have the power to pull the audience closer to artworks, performances, and installations. The act of engagement creates a mo...

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Throughout the course of my project I have been collecting images on Pinterest which have sparked inspiration, some of these ideas such as the ceiling flower arrangements I've ended up using in my project.

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Discover recipes, home ideas, style inspiration and other ideas to try.

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Millennials crave experiences, brands need to find ways to intensify these desires.

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Living to The Fullest: How Does the Millennial Lifestyle Affect Hospitality and Retail?

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Millennials choose to spend their money on experiences-such as traveling, concerts and eating out-rather than things. This is a huge paradigm shift from the Boomers' zest for accumulation of status/wealth symbols, their sense of status by creating a sense of belonging to status brands and by staying

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The first room of my exhibition is planned to be a "runway" with tracking cameras, to allow each visitor to walk down by themselves I decided to allow 10 visitors in every 10 minutes - this gave me a total number of 21,600 visitors, compered to Dior's visitation numbers this is significantly less however.

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For product development I used Valentino's A/W19 Couture collection for inspiration.

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Thomas Webb, a multi-disciplinary artist and "creative hacker" has worked with Valentino on multiple occasions, creating interactive pop-ups.

- This was key to my research as it gave me an insight into the ways that the brand has previously used technology.

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Thomas Webb is a multi-disciplinary artist and creative hacker living in London, UK.
Growing up in the nineties with a dad who in his own childhood was a prodigy video game programmer, Webb's first memories of art are the very games his dad programmed. Outrun and Roadblasters, late nights and early mornings spent gaming cultivated within him a love for this pixelated, neon grit that's gone on to inspire his own work and many others across art, music, cinema and broader pop culture.

Webb's love of technology, devices and computers continued to grow from this young age and with it too a mindset of taking things apart to put them back together in a different way - leading to his unique artistic style seen today. One of his first hacking exploits involved hacking into his school's computer system when he was 13; displeased with the lack of justice against his bullies, Webb decided to take matters into his own hands... Webb has now developed an extensive creative hacking background, and you'll find Webb leading keynotes around the world, such as his recent talk TedxBucharest about how artists of the future think.

During his talks, Webb often highlights how a lack of understanding of the technology around us leads to an underappreciation of it. By breaking down techniques and theories of technology, Webb highlights in his keynotes the art involved in technological processes, carefully constructed code holding the same potential beauty as a typical piece of art. Webb today continues to champion this thinking through his artwork, using the same techniques to create thought-provoking artwork.

While always a creative at heart, 2018 is the year Webb wholeheartedly threw himself into the world of art. Despite perceived success by his peers before this shift, Webb had long been unhappy and frustrated in his work, suffering from depression and struggling with the implications of having ADHD. After searching for various forms of help, Webb knew he had to look inward; it was time to make some drastic changes, and so he did. His first piece 'Rainfall', programmed in a café, was the start of his artistic journey proper - from there Webb knew he had found his calling.6 months later, Webb invested every penny to his name towards a solo exhibition 'Strangers', an instance of art using real data to be used and updated in real-time. Through this, Webb's art is an ever-evolving narrative where anybody and everybody can be the author - employing millions of users to define and shape the artistic message of his work in real-time.

Featured in the Evening Standard and receiving high praise from attendees, 'Strangers' further propelled Webb into the world of art through an invitation to collaborate with internationally acclaimed fashion brand Valentino - embracing Webb's innovative direction and style. Highlights of this collaboration include a takeover of the iconic Shibuya Square, Webb's first showing of his digital infinity mirror creation in Munich, a hologram infinity room in Dubai and a 6 storey high 'infinity monolith' in South Korea.

Through Thomas' recent digital infinity mirror work, he offers a new art medium that removes the 'tv screen' element of digital art. Instead, he presents a dynamic reflection on both topical social issues such as mental health or climate change and also the viewer; allowing for an unparalleled level of immersion. These artworks further build on concepts shown at 'Stranger's, through utilising real-time data, Webb only furthers the level of absorption in his art.

In January 2019 Webb joined internationally recognised production company, The Mill+ as a director and with it directed his first film for MyTheresa and Valentino.

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lowkey hard being awesome HYPEBEASTFORBESWIREDL'OFFICIEL Thomas Webb is a multi-disciplinary artist and creative hacker living in London, UK.Growing up in the nineties with a dad who in his own childhood was a prodigy video game programmer, Webb's first memories of art are the very games his dad programmed.

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instant online international freight quotes

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The colour red has been associated with the brand for decades, with the 'red dress' becoming a Valentino signature.

“For the Valentino maison, red is not just a colour; it is a non-fading mark, a logo, an iconic element of the brand, a value.” - Valentino Garavani

- When designing my range I aim to keep this in mind and feature the colour red in hopes of staying true to the brands identity.

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The History of Valentino - The 'Emperor Of Fashion'

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High-end fabrics, trimming, buttons and dressmaking materials. Couture fabric specialists. 25,000+ luxury fabrics online and in store. Royal Warrant holders since 2001.

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To complete my fashionability map I looked at the top fashion brands for 2019. The list was compiled by analysing online shopping behaviours of 5 million-plus customers revealing what customers are looking and actually shopping for. To complete my map I picked out brands from this list that more or less so aligned with Valentino.

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This is according to fashion search platform Lyst's first-quarter index, which analyses the online shopping behaviour of its 5 million-plus shoppers each month.

In the first three months of 2019, these were the 20 most searched, browsed and purchased brands on Lyst:

This is the first time that Lyst has expanded the list from 10 to 20 brands, following a "turbulent" first quarter for the fashion industry which showed lots of "volatility and change" it said.

Designer Virgil Abloh's Off-White reclaimed the top spot as the "hottest" brand in fashion right now, after being overtaken by Gucci in the final quarter of 2018.

It was succeeded by several luxury household names, including nine Italian labels, such as Valentino, Fendi and Prada.

French designer Saint Laurent meanwhile jumped the most places - up 17 spots from the previous quarter to 10th place. Dolce & Gabbana and Valentino climbed six and five places respectively.

Outerwear specialist Moncler fell nine places - from fourth to 13 this quarter - which could be a result of warmer weather as summer approaches.

Trends-wise, small accessories are the ones to watch, as "Instagram-friendly" products proved to be particularly popular at the beginning of the year.

All but two of Lyst's top 10 women's products were footwear and accessories, and Alexander McQueen's oversized-sole sneakers clinched the top spot ( check out Drapers' guide to the chunky sneaker trend here).

Prada's stud-embellished headband was Lyst's second "hottest" product this quarter (with a 300% increase in searches) followed in third place by the Jacquemus Le Chiquito bag, which boosted the brand's social impressions by 1,831% over the period.

Determined by volume of social media mentions, searches, page views, interactions and sales, these are the top 10 women's products of 2019 to date:

1. Alexander McQueen oversized-sole sneakers

2. Prada stud-embellished headband

3. Jacquemus Le Chiquito bag

4. Gucci logo belt

5. Sandy Liang shearling jacket

6. Fendi baguette bag

7. Nike Pro hijab

8. Gucci Ace sneakers

9. Proenza Schouler tie-dye turtleneck

10. Chloé Sawyer slides

For the first time ever, all of the top 10 men's products were shoes - seven of which were Nike - as the sneaker market "continues to power exponential growth for both luxury and sportswear brands" Lyst reflected.

Nike's placement follows a string of collaborations (including a tie-up with Supreme, the Nike LDV Waffle X Sacai, and Nike X Fear of God) and resulted in more than 7 million social mentions in the last three months.

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This is according to fashion search platform Lyst's first-quarter index, which analyses the online shopping behaviour of its 5 million-plus shoppers each month. In the first three months of 2019, these were the 20 most searched, browsed and purchased brands on Lyst: This is the first time that Lyst has expanded the list from 10 to 20 brands, following a "turbulent" first quarter for the fashion industry which showed lots of "volatility and change" it said.

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I used EDITED and each brands exit prices to determine where to place each brand on the map.

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Valentino) 

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Valentino) 

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I looked at Valentino's "new arrivals" to determined where to place them on the map in terms of fashionability. (Refer to INP report for analysis)

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New collection woman | Valentino Online Boutique

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New collection woman | Valentino Online Boutique

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Explore women's latest arrivals by Valentino. Visit the website and shop now your designer iconic clothes on the Valentino Online Boutique.

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Prada) 

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Prada) 

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I looked at Prada's "new arrivals" to determined where to place them on the map in terms of fashionability. (Refer to INP report for analysis)

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Visit the Prada official e-store, find out the New Prada New Arrivals collection for Women and buy online now.

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Gucci)

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Gucci)

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I looked at Gucci's "new arrivals" to determined where to place them on the map in terms of fashionability. (Refer to INP report for analysis)

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The 'What's New' section is updated every week with the new women's arrivals. Enjoy complimentary express shipping and gift wrapping.

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Fendi) 

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Fendi) 

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I looked at Fendi's "new arrivals" to determined where to place them on the map in terms of fashionability. (Refer to INP report for analysis)

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New Arrivals - Designer Clothing for Women | Fendi

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Find new arrivals in women's accessories on official Fendi stores like luxury bags, shoes, fashion jewellery etc.

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Saint Laurent) 

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Saint Laurent) 

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I looked at Saint Laurent's "new arrivals" to determined where to place them on the map in terms of fashionability. (Refer to INP report for analysis)

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Louis Vuitton)

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Brand Positioning - Fashionability (Louis Vuitton)

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I looked at Louis Vuitton's "new arrivals" to determined where to place them on the map in terms of fashionability. (Refer to INP report for analysis)

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New This Season Collection for Women | LOUIS VUITTON

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LOUIS VUITTON Official International Website - Discover our latest Women's New This Season collection, exclusively on louisvuitton.com and in Louis Vuitton Stores

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"Major environmental issues currently facing Italy include air pollution, polluted inland waters, acid rain, and insufficient industrial waste treatment and disposal programs".

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The ADU-500 Data Logger is an ultra-low power, wireless RTU with data logging and alarming capabilities. The battery-powered RTU integrates two analog inputs, three digital inputs, one pulse counter input and several excitation options for powering measuring transducers.

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Italy: Environmental Issues, Policies and Clean Technology

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The ADU-500 Data Logger is an ultra-low power, wireless RTU with data logging and alarming capabilities. The battery-powered RTU integrates two analog inputs, three digital inputs, one pulse counter input and several excitation options for powering measuring transducers.

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Aim for this week was:

Complete my concept

Complete a brand summary

(containing brand positioning + brand identity)

Complete a customer profile

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Aim for this week was:

PEST

SWOT

Comp Shop

Primary Research

(exhibition visit)

Secondary Research

(previous artistic collaborations + brand exhibitions)

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Aim for this week was:

Research trends

(key details + fabrics)

Create a moodboard for said trend

Create a range

Plan sales after the completion of my range

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Large Scale Placement

"The large-scale placement print look is set to expand catapulted by the popularity of placement florals ... Look for veiled sheers that incorporate layered prints, lending a dimensional effect that will work well for key items such as the illusion dress and the sheer-layered skirt."

- The artwork created by the artist I have chosen to collaborate with would work incredibly well for this trend as she paints in large brushstrokes so it would be interesting to enlarge these onto garments.

- As sheer garments are predicted to be one of the key items for this trend I incorporated them into my range.

Art in Fashion

"Artinfashion remains even more relevant as IRL boutiques continue to merge gallery and retail spaces to cultivate emotion in design ...
Selling points: seek collaborations with real artists; be sure to convey the story behind the print to drive emotional connection."

- Backs up my artistic collaboration concept, however, I will have to decide how to convey the story of the artwork to consumers.

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Although Valentino is a high-end brand and more notorious for making trends rather than following them, I used this report as a guide to ensure that I am following trends that customers will be interested in.

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Valentino, alongside all of its competitors are very accessories heavy - I took this into consideration when creating my range so that it would appeal to customers who are more interested in branded accessories rather than garments.

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"25 to 34 year olds spend on average £145 per pair [of sunglasses] and 28% of consumers are happy to spend more than £160 when buying from big-name brands."

- Upon reading this article, I decided to include sunglasses into my range as the age bracket aligned with the brands target customer.

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Many young UK consumers spend an average of £145 on a pair of sunglasses, a new study has shown. Yet despite this relatively high figure, many of them aren't particularly interested in sunglasses' protective effects and seem to be focusing more on the fashion element.

Silhouette Eyewear

A survey commissioned by Sightsavers and People's Postcode Lottery, which works with the charity, said that overall, 26% of British men spend more than £100 on a pair of sunglasses, although only 14% of British women do the same. And 54% of men own two or three pairs, slightly ahead of the 50% of women who own that many.

But the biggest spenders come into the 25 to 34 age bracket, spending £145 per pair, as mentioned above.

Almost all Britons (90%) wear sunglasses at some point, but the survey showed that only 40% do so in order to protect their eyes from UV damage. In fact, 30% are completely unaware of the damage that UV can do and a massive 69% don't know that it can cause cataracts, a problem affecting 65 million people around the world.

And in addition to the sunglass wearers who are unaware of the problems, 15% of people in the UK can't see the point of sunglasses and 17% think they're a waste of money.

It's interesting as well that only 28% of consumers buy their sunglasses from an optician and that when they do, they expect to spend less. They spend £86 on average when buying from an eye specialist but are happy to spend more than £160 when buying from big-name brands.

Copyright © 2019 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved.

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Young Britons spend £145 on sunglasses, pay more for fashion than for protection

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News industry : ​Many young Britons spend an average of £145 on a pair of sunglasses, a new study has shown. Yet despite this relatively high figure, many aren't interested in sunglasses' protective effects and focus more on fashion. (#1115140)

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When completing my brand research it was brought to my attention that the brand has a shortened logo (VLTN) to appeal to millennials. Valentino's website features a section displaying all of the items which feature this logo - I used this for inspiration when creating my merchandise.

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VLTN - Check out the latest collections by Valentino. Shop now on the official Online Boutique.

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Aim for this week was:

Sourcing Strategy

(country of origin advantages/disadvantages + supplier type + PESTEL + logistics)

Buyer's Pack

(specification sheet + tags + open cost + testing)

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As most luxury retailers rely on international customers I researched Chinese public holidays so that the release of my collection aligned with one of their key holidays.

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Holidays and observances in China in 2020

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Overview of holidays and many observances in China during the year 2020

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Chinese Public Holiday - 1st of May (Labour Day)

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Chinese Public Holiday - 1st of May (Labour Day)

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The Chinese government has extended labour day from 3 days off to 4 days off which saw an increase in travel to nearby destinations. Those with additional paid time off created weeklong vacations further overseas with 49% of Chinese tourists opting for trips lasting between four and six days with tours to the U.S, Europe and the Middle East selling out.

- I used this report to back up the release date of the collection.

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As the International Labor Day holiday approaches on May 1, Chinese travelers are finalizing their itineraries, with short-haul destinations being the top choices for vacation. This is one of the shorter national holidays in China and it comes less than a month after Tomb Sweeping Day (Qingming), which saw millions of tourists explore international and domestic destinations.

In March, the Chinese government extended the May 1st holiday to four days from three days, meaning that Chinese tourists were not able to book their trips as far in advance as they are used to. But that hasn't stopped jetsetters from taking advantage of the extra day, which has pushed online travel agencies to adjust their offerings.

The brief holiday had already benefited nearby international destinations, as many travelers don't have enough paid vacation days to extend the holiday further. Those who have additional paid time off, however, are likely to use three days to create a weeklong vacation farther overseas.

China's largest online travel agency Ctrip.com International noted that the holiday will see 50 percent more trips than during Tomb Sweeping Day, reaching about 160 million. Last year, the three-day holiday saw 147 million Chinese tourists travel, an increase of 9.3 percent from the previous year.

The most popular destinations for the short holiday are islands, including Bali in Indonesia and Boracay in the Philippines, according to data from online travel agency Tongcheng-Elong. Additionally, the platform saw popularity in booking trips, Sri Lanka, though those trips may be cancelled following the recent terror attacks in the country that injured at least four Chinese citizens. Ctrip has already introduced fee-free refunds for travelers who wish to cancel their planned trips to Sri Lanka, and it is even assisting tourists already in the country.

Japan and South Korea are also expected to see an influx of Chinese visitors during the holiday. However, Chinese tourists to Japan are already encountering a lack of hotel rooms and restaurant reservations as millions of Japanese will also travel during their own weeklong holiday. This has also increased the price of available hotel rooms. Tongcheng-Elong noted that hotel rates for the week have increased in popular destinations Bangkok, Singapore, Tokyo, and Osaka, as well as in the Thai cities of Chiang Mai and Pattaya. The company added that 18.2 percent of hotel reservations on the platform are for four- and five-star hotels.

As the many travelers will opt for a brief trip, they are expected to pack as much sightseeing as possible into the limited time. This is good news for tour operators that offer evening tours that can be paired with sightseeing trips during the day.

About 49 percent of Chinese tourists have opted for trips lasting between four and six days during the holiday period, according to Ctrip. The company told Chinese media Sina that tours to some popular destinations, including those to the U.S., Europe, and Middle East, have sold out for the travel period.

Family travel platform Lvmama reported that 58 percent of its customers only booked trips for one to three days during the period. The company add, however, that it has seen outbound travel for the period grow by 8 percent from the previous year. The U.S. was the seventh most popular outbound destination on the platform.

Online travel agencies have had to adjust to the changes to the travel dates and Chinese tourists' desire to add days to their already-booked trips. This has meant that platforms may not have available tours or hotel rooms for the extra days as they need to have deals in place months in advance.

Assuming the Chinese government maintains the four-day holiday in the following years, more Chinese citizens are likely to use their paid vacation days in the future to further maximize their travel plans.

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Extended May 1 Holiday Creates Opportunities, Challenges | Jing Travel

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As the International Labor Day holiday approaches on May 1, Chinese travelers are finalizing their itineraries, with short-haul destinations being the top choices for vacation. This is one of the shorter national holidays in China and it comes less than a month after Tomb Sweeping Day (Qingming), which saw millions of tourists explore international and domestic destinations.

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All garments will be yarn dyed, although this is the best method of dying garments I had to conduct research into whether there are any constraints to this.

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Key statistics outlining the reasons why customers purchase luxury.

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PESTEL (Environmental) - Greenhouse Gasses Limit

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PESTEL (Environmental) - Greenhouse Gasses Limit

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Italy has national targets for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions so factories must abide by the legal limits.

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The Environmental Code in Italy covers the main regulations for environmental protection in the country and is in line with the European laws and principles regarding pollution or sustainable development.

Italian companies that operate in various business fields must pay attention to this Code and obtain the right permits for functioning. The main agencies in charge with environmental control are the Ministry of Economic Development, the Ministry of Environment and other local health authorities.

The team of experts at our law firm in Italy can give you specific details about the environmental laws and how they apply to your business.

The Italian Ministry of the Environment or the authorities in the province or region where the business operates issue the Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC) authorizations (valid for 10-12 years). The Sole Environmental Licenses in Italy are valid for 15 years and there are no special restrictions on the transfer of these authorizations.

Italy imposes strict regulations for the disposal of waste water. The authorization to perform such actions is issued by the province where the company or factory is located and subsoil discharges are prohibited. Companies in Italy that do not comply with the regulatory regime for water pollution can face criminal and administrative sanctions. Those who discharge certain dangerous substances face imprisonment from two months to two years.

Permits and licenses are also needed in Italy for operations that qualify as air polluters. Air emission authorizations and Sole Environmental Licenses are necessary for certain businesses and they must be renewed accordingly.

Waste disposal is either regulated according to the IPPC authorization or through other regimes. Special waste must be delivered accordingly to a third party that handles waste management. The transport, recovery, disposal or inter-mediation of waste is to be performed only with the required permits and authorizations.

Italy also has national targets for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, renewable energy (wind power) or energy efficiency. According to EU Directives, greenhouse gas emission is controlled and factories, power plants and other installations in Italy must observe the legal limits.

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italian laws for environmental protection

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The Environmental Code in Italy covers the main regulations for environmental protection in the country and is in line with the European laws and principles regarding pollution or sustainable development. Italian companies that operate in various business fields must pay attention to this Code and obtain the right permits for functioning.

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My project proposal states that the exhibition will be curated by Es Devlin, a set designer. It was therefore crucial to research all her previous work so that the exhibition I design will take into consideration her influences.

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Dynamic, saccharine, voluptuous.
Q. What does winning the ACS/City & Guilds of London Art School Studio Residency mean for you as an artist?
It's incredibly motivating and encouraging to have been selected for the prize which has tempered any anxiety about leaving the structure and support of the MA. The certainty of having a studio for 12 months creates another period for developing my practice away from commercial pressures. The prize has enabled me to work full time in the studio and rent enough space to continue working on the large scale, which I find so exciting.

I have already rented a beautiful studio in Borough for 12 months with heaps of natural light and a view of The London Eye. It's a great central location making it convenient for studio visits and it's also in walking distance from Tate Modern, White Cube and other amazing south London galleries.
Q. What medium do you mainly work with and why?
I am a painter. Because of its prevalent role in art history, painting really forms the basis of Western aesthetics. Its influence is therefore ever present in contemporary visual culture. Its long history as a valued art form, widely documented, discussed and written about, has created a wide-reaching network of associations and meaning which extend beyond the visual into myth, politics, ideologies and so on.

This makes it a very rich and evocative language to play with. I also find the material qualities of paint and the happenstance nature of the painting process extremely satisfying. I can be engaged with conceptual investigation and at the same experience a child-like pleasure in the gooey messiness of the material.
Q. Where do you find most inspiration for your work?
Le rire de la Méduse, oil on linen, 210 x 180cm © Flora Yukhnovich
Image courtesy of ACS
Q. Take us through your working process.
I am always thinking about painting and ideas can be triggered by anything - an Old Master painting, a book I'm reading or a TV advert for wireless broadband (my latest inspiration!). I try to stay alert to my subjective response. My current body of work grew out my awareness of my own prejudices towards aesthetics deemed to be feminine. I realised that this was because the aesthetic attributes which we understand to be feminine were not at all true to my lived experience of being female. My recent paintings have been playing with ways of addressing this disparity.

I start by drawing and painting small studies of imagery that interests me to absorb the marks into my sensibilities and muscle memory. The actual painting process is fairly intuitive. Each mark is determined by the last as I respond to the evolving painting.
Q. Can you remember the first work of art that you created? What was it and why was it so memorable?
I sometimes photograph the work and paint directly onto the photos, or collage images together in Photoshop, but I mostly like to stay blind to the final piece. It's really a case of narrowing possibilities until there aren't any left. Then the work is finished.

I have always drawn, painted, and made things. There isn't one particular work that I remember but there are several landmark works which have determined where I am now with my practice - moments where something that has eluded me finally comes to fruition or a work which has surprised me, opening up a new territory to explore.

Flora's paint palette
Image courtesy of ACS

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Student Spotlight: Flora Yukhnovich, City & Guilds of London Art School - Artists' Collecting Society

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Dynamic, saccharine, voluptuous. Q. What does winning the ACS/City & Guilds of London Art School Studio Residency mean for you as an artist? It's incredibly motivating and encouraging to have been selected for the prize which has tempered any anxiety about leaving the structure and support of the MA.

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Yukhnovich manipulates colour and form to explore the representation of the female form and the male gaze as well as the associations of the superficial, decorative and domestic present in the Rococo. As Yukhnovich states: "I see a discrepancy between the aesthetic qualities we perceive to be feminine i.e.

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PESTEL (Legal) - Legislations to Protect 'Made in Italy'

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PESTEL (Legal) - Legislations to Protect 'Made in Italy'

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There are legislations in place which state that two phases of the production process have to be carried out in Italy to brand the garment with a 'made in Italy' tag.

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In record short time and with the support of the whole political spectrum, new legislation was recently passed by the Italian Parliament for the protection of the " Made in Italy " appellation.

Under this new legislation all " Made in Italy " finished and "intermediate" textiles, leather and footwear products offered for sale, must bear a compulsory label certifying compliance with Italian work practices and rules, health and safety legislation, exclusion of minors` exploitation and compliance with European environmental rules.

Products may only be labelled " Made in Italy " if they are mostly produced in Italy, that is, if at least two phases of the relevant production process have been carried in Italy. Production processes include:

a) in textiles: spinning, weaving, finishing and packaging, and this applies to natural fibers, artificial and synthetic imports.

b) in the leather sector: tanning, cutting, preparation, assembly and finishing including imported raw hides,

c) in the footwear sector: tanning, processing of the upper assembly and finishing, even if using imported raw hides.

The new compulsory labels must also show where each production phase was carried out and enable their "tracking". Textile products extend to accessories, furnishing and furniture.

Where the product offered for sale does not qualify as " Made in Italy ", the compulsory label must show the country of origin in compliance with European legislation.

The actual detail of the new label regulations will be ironed out in Ministerial Decrees to be issued within four months, after this new legislation has been notified to the European Commission, and has been considered both by the Commission and the other Member States, under the applicable Directive.

These provisions are heavily sanctioned .

Where an individual is in breach, fines range between Euro 10,000 and Euro 50,000, subject to a discretional, further increase of up to 2/3 of these amounts. Where there are repeated breaches of this legislation, the sanction is imprisonment for a term ranging between one and three years.

Where a commercial enterprise is involved, fines range between Euro 30,000 and Euro 70,000 with the discretional, further increase of up to 2/3 of these amounts. Where breaches are reiterated, the offending commercial concern can be suspended, and prevented from carrying out any commercial activity for a period ranging between a month to one year.

This new legislation will only came into force on the 1st October 2010, to ensure that the prior approval of the European Commission is obtained.
Claudio Del Giudice 09.04.2010 - Copyrights reserved

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New rules for the protection of "Made in Italy"

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In record short time and with the support of the whole political spectrum, new legislation was recently passed by the Italian Parliament for the protection of the "Made in Italy" appellation. Under this new legislation all "Made in Italy" finished and "intermediate" textiles, leather

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The report:
"The Oliver Wyman report notes that authentic, social and shareable experiences are now the top reason for traveling ... Chinese travellers are particularly drawn to experiences they can participate in socially and then share via Instagram or WeChat."

- The exhibition launching the collection will be designed to encourage photography, participation and social media sharing

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Chinese tourists are no longer going overseas primarily to shop. As the Chinese middle classes grow in size and wealth, Chinese residents are increasingly becoming international tourists-and the reasons they travel overseas are evolving.

According to a recent survey of 2,000 Chinese travelers by Oliver Wyman, Chinese tourists made 140 million outbound trips in 2018-a 13.5 percent increase over 2017. Chinese tourists are getting bolder, both about where they go and what they experience at their destination-and these changes are affecting where and what these travelers spend their money on. According to The Telegraph , outside of China, the top destinations of these travelers are Thailand, Japan, Vietnam, South Korea and Singapore. And beyond Asia, the U.S. and Italy are their top destinations.

Spending on Experiences Is Increasing

Chinese travelers are spending more money at destinations that are farther from home, according to a survey by Nielsen and Alipay , with average spend in the U.S. being $4,462 and average spend in Hong Kong being $2,487 in 2017. The survey shows that "spending by Chinese tourists reached $261.1 billion in 2016" and that, on average, each Chinese tourist spent $5,565 on overseas travel in 2017.

This spend is going toward exploring new experiences. The Oliver Wyman report notes that authentic, social and shareable experiences are now the top reason for traveling-while shopping, as a reason for traveling, has dropped dramatically, from 91 percent in 2016 to 41 percent in 2018. This could have significant implications for companies connected to Chinese tourism right along the value chain.
Exhibit 1: Chinese Travelers Travel Less for Shopping and More for Sightseeing, Particularly for City Views/Local Culture
Social Media Driving the Shared Experience

Chinese travelers are particularly drawn to experiences they can participate in socially and then share via Instagram or WeChat. The report by Nielsen and Alipay shows that "for Chinese tourists who are generally well-off, tourist attractions and the travel experience are more important factors than the costs that might be incurred."

As shopping is replaced by other spend items, the overall spend by Chinese tourists is declining slightly.
Exhibit 2: Average Trip Spend Decreased Along with Average Shopping Spend
Seeking Authentic Experiences

Chinese travelers are increasingly headed to places like Iceland, Europe and North America. As they seek more authentic experiences, fifty-six percent of the respondents in the Nielsen survey noted that "beauty and uniqueness of a given destination is their primary consideration" when choosing where to travel.
Exhibit 3: Chinese Travelers Seek Out More Authentic Experiences
Chinese travelers are getting more adventurous in what they eat as well and are increasingly willing to try local cuisines. They often use websites dedicated to ratings and reviews to find restaurants that will allow them to experience the authentic flavors of their destination.

"Travel allows me to broaden my horizons, while offering me a chance to experience other people's lifestyles and learn about different cultures," says one survey respondent in the study by Nielsen and Alipay.

Along with a greater curiosity for local cuisine, Chinese travelers are staying in more boutique hotels and in the homes of locals. Like restaurants, hotels and homes are at the mercy of online reviews. Travelers weigh location, cleanliness and price more heavily than amenities and rewards programs, often associated with larger hotel chains.
Exhibit 4: Online Reviews Are a Key Lever for Hotels
"Given the digitally savvy characteristics of today's Chinese traveler, marketing to them requires a specific, localized approach," according to the Olivery Wyman report. Chinese consumers have taken quickly to e-commerce and mobile payments as well as sharing their experiences on social platforms.

Eighty percent of respondents in the survey reported sharing their experiences on WeChat, and according to Oliver Wyman, nothing beats WeChat to generate positive word of mouth for your company. By creating a presence on social channels, including platforms dedicated to reviews, companies can manage their reputation, resolve any problems and cultivate positive interactions between their company and the community online-ultimately drawing Chinese travelers to their offerings.

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Chinese Tourists Are Going International-and Their Travel Habits Are Evolving

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Chinese tourists are no longer going overseas primarily to shop. As the Chinese middle classes grow in size and wealth, Chinese residents are increasingly becoming international tourists-and the reasons they travel overseas are evolving. According to a recent survey of 2,000 Chinese travelers by Oliver Wyman, Chinese tourists made 140 million outbound trips in 2018-a 13.5 percent increase over 2017.

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Aim for this week was:

Create a shop floorplan

Create an exhibition floorplan

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Aim for this week was:

Create a marketing strategy for the release of the collection and the opening of the exhibition.

Collection Release:

Valentino Instagram

Valentino website

Fashion Magazine adverts

Exhibition opening:

RA Instagram

RA website

RA banners

London guide magazines

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Digital advertising is unlikely to gain a reaction from the customer identified using Acorn, print advertising is therefore important to target these consumers, magazines such as Vogue have a readership number of 920,000.

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Times Out readers visit galleries 2.7 times a year so it is crucial to advertise the exhibition opening in this magazine.

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The Time Out audience is unique

We enable brands to connect with a hard-to reach, active, affluent and engaged audience at a global, local and hyper-local level - we call them Time Outers.

If you want to engage with the hard-to-reach influential Millennials, the best way to find them is on Time Out, whether that's through advertising, partnerships, premium listings, promoted offers, bespoke events, branded content, APIs, and proprietary data franchising.

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We enable brands to connect with a hard-to reach, active, affluent and engaged audience at a global, local and hyper-local level - we call them Time Outers. If you want to engage with the hard-to-reach influential Millennials, the best way to find them is on Time Out, whether that's through advertising, partnerships, premium listings, promoted offers, bespoke events, branded content, APIs, and proprietary data franchising.

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Times Out has over 1.1million people reading a copy per month, advertising the launch of the exhibition here will increase exposure of the event.

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About Time Out

Founded in 1968 by Tony Elliot. Time Out is the iconic #1 trusted choice for consumers seeking inspiration and information relating to arts, entertainment and culture. Time Out magazine went free in September 2012.

Time Out London magazine has more than 1 million readers every month, and since becoming a free publication, Time Out has become London's most read free magazine.

Stats

Time Out London is London's most popular magazine with over 1.1m people per month reading a copy. (NRS PADD Jan-Jun 2017)

Time Out has a circulation of 309,030 copies per week. (ABC Jan - Jun 2017)

Time Out is much more likely to be read for longer, taken home, and acted upon, compared to London's free press. (NRS PADD Jan-Jun 2017)

Get in Touch

To find out more about advertising opportunities with Time Out London magazine, please contact us.

For branding and display advertising please contact:

Daniel Sinclair

Senior Sales Exec, EMEA

Artwork sizes (HEIGHT x WIDTH, mm)

ADSTREAM /ADSEND Advertisement Delivery System

Adstream and Adsend give you the ability to create advertisements that are pre and post flight-checked to ensure they pass through extensive PostScript checks.

When the file passes through the checks and is correct to Time Out specs, it is released and Time Out receives the file via Adstream or Adsend VPN.

With these checks, you are assured that any file sent this way will meet the full mechanical specifications of Time Out before the file leaves your production department.

If you are interested in either Adstream or Adsend please see www.adstream.com or www.adsend.com

Email and Disc delivery

File Types: High res PDF to Pass4Press standard, EPS

Fonts: All fonts & images embedded and layers flattened

Colour: Colour images CMYK at minimum 300 dpi

Email address: adproduction@timeout.com

Artwork Design

In certain cases we can make up artwork from copy supplied. No liability can be accepted for these advertisements as to layout or reproduction from material supplied. Extra charges for this may be incurred and we suggest that where possible advertisers use the services of an outside company to provide artwork to their exact requirements.

If ads are supplied in editable file formats, such as Quark Xpress, open files, the client may be liable for charges incurred in converting the file for production and Time Out may insist on client approval of a proof before publication.

Deadline for advertisement delivery is Wednesday prior to publication, unless otherwise informed (i.e. bank holidays, special printing, etc).

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Founded in 1968 by Tony Elliot. Time Out is the iconic #1 trusted choice for consumers seeking inspiration and information relating to arts, entertainment and culture. Time Out magazine went free in September 2012. Time Out London magazine has more than 1 million readers every month, and since becoming a free publication, Time Out has become London's most read free magazine.

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London Planner has a readership of more than 245,00 a month, the magazine is also distributed across 46 global markets aimed at visitors weeks ahead of their arrival to London - advertising here would make the exhibition a destination.

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Visit Britain's official monthly guide to London

This handy pocket-sized guide has the largest distribution of any London visitor publication. Since 1984 London Planner has been the official monthly guide of Visit Britain - the UK's national tourism agency that markets Britain worldwide - and London & Partners - the Mayor's official promotional organisation for the city. London Planner's circulation of 100,000 a month, with a readership of more than 245,000 a month, is thanks to the magazine's distribution across 46 global markets, timed to target visitors weeks ahead of their arrival in the city.

London Planner is packed with information on things to do, see and eat in London, with a particular emphasis on family attractions. It combines authoritative recommendations with an informal, easily accessible editorial style.

29,300 copies distributed on inbound routes to London; 24,500 distributed across the UK; 22,000 across Tourist Information Centres in the UK and on key rail routes; and 48,700 distributed in London at Tourist Information Centres and Travel Points and a range of the city's three- and four-star hotels.

Each issue is also available to download worldwide through two of Britain's biggest visitor information websites, visitlondon.com with two million users each month, and visitbritain.com with 450,000 users each month.

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LONDON PLANNER MAGAZINE - MORRIS VISITOR PUBLICATIONS

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This handy pocket-sized guide has the largest distribution of any London visitor publication. Since 1984 London Planner has been the official monthly guide of Visit Britain - the UK's national tourism agency that markets Britain worldwide - and London & Partners - the Mayor's official promotional organisation for the city.

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A study has revealed that 85% of millennials have purchased a product after watching a video, this has influenced my decision on how I would advertise the launch of the exhibition to millennials.

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Dive Brief:

Seventy-six percent of consumers and 85% of millennials, defined as people age 18-34, say they've purchased a product or service after watching a video, according to Brightcove's "2018 Video Marketing Survey." The September survey of more than 4,000 adults was done with market research firm YouGov.

Video was the most memorable form of content for 21% of consumers and 29% of millennials. Video ranked higher than display ads at 13%, email marketing at 9%, case studies at 4% and text ads at 2%. Forty-five percent of all consumers and 56% of millennials find video more engaging than other formats. Video is the preferred form of brand and marketing communication for 36% of consumers overall and 46% of millennials.

Other findings include 53% of consumers and 66% of millennials say they've engaged with a brand after watching a video on social media, with 20% saying they visited a brand's website and 20% conducting more research. Fifty-six percent of consumers enjoy seeing videos for personal electronics, 52% for household appliances, 48% for tools, 47% for software, 35% for clothing and makeup, and 27% for personal care.

Dive Insight:

Brightcove's new research offers some insights for marketers looking to engage consumers with video content and sheds some light on how consumers, especially millannials, interact with and are influenced by video. The latest research aligns with other studies affirming that video is the preferred format for engaging with brands. A HubSpot Research study found that 72% of consumers prefer video to text for receiving marketing information,

Marketers continue to experiment with different video formats and lengths to find the right mix to engage with consumers and drive sales. As many are working on future video strategies, marketers should note the Brightcove findings that 45% of consumers overall and 57% of millennials say it's helpful when videos have a call to action so that they can engage directly with brands. Also, 35% of consumers and 41% of millennials say they'd like for videos to include links for them to access more brand information.

Online video viewers are projected to exceed 200 million in 2018, according to Forrester research. Video ad spending is expected to grow from $91 billion in 2018 to $103 billion by 2023, with the total share of video ad spending increasing from 21% this year to 34% in 2023. Younger consumers are spending more time on their smartphones than older generations and consumer more video content. They are also not as ad averse as older age groups and don't mind watching video ads from their favorite brands.

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Study: 85% of millennials have purchased a product after watching a video

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Seventy-six percent of consumers and 85% of millennials, defined as people age 18-34, say they've purchased a product or service after watching a video, according to Brightcove's "2018 Video Marketing Survey." The September survey of more than 4,000 adults was done with market research firm YouGov.

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The art movement that inspires Flora emerged in the early 18th century, characterised by soft colours and curvy lines, depicting scenes of love, nature and youth.

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Rococo painting, which originated in early 18th century Paris, is characterized by soft colors and curvy lines, and depicts scenes of love, nature, amorous encounters, light-hearted entertainment, and youth. The word "rococo" derives from rocaille, which is French for rubble or rock. Rocaille refers to the shell-work in garden grottoes and is used as a descriptive word for the serpentine patterns seen in the Decorative Arts of the Rococo period.

After the death of Louis XIV, the French court moved from Versailles back to their old Parisian mansions, redecorating their homes using softer designs and more modest materials than that of the King's grand baroque style. Instead of surrounding themselves with precious metals and rich colors, the French aristocracy now lived in intimate interiors made with stucco adornments, boiserie, and mirrored glass. This new style is characterized by its asymmetry, graceful curves, elegance, and the delightful new paintings of daily life and courtly love, which decorated the walls within these spaces.

The father of Rococo painting was Jean Antoine Watteau (French, 1684-1721), who invented a new genre called fêtes galantes, which were scenes of courtship parties. Born close to the Flemish border, Watteau was influenced by genre scenes of everyday life that were quite popular in Flanders and the Netherlands. He is best known for his depictions of elegantly dressed figures gathered in outdoor spaces, exchanging pleasantries and enjoying music.

Though educated thought was cultivated throughout the 18th century, a new kind of intellectual exchange began to develop, which became known as the Enlightenment. Out of this new cultural movement, ideas about art changed, and Rococo ideals of frivolity and elegant eroticism became less and less relevant. Art critics like Diderot sought for a "nobler art," and enlightened philosophers like Voltaire criticized its triviality. While some Rococo artists continued to paint in their own provocative style, others developed a new kind of art, known as Neoclassicism, which appealed to the art critics of the time.

Jean Honoré Fragonard (French, 1732-1806) was one such painter who attempted to adapt his style to the artistic changes of the period; unlike Watteau, Fragonard's skill wasn't recognized until well after his death. Today, Fragonard is best known for his Rococo-style paintings like La coquette fixée (The Fascinated Coquette), which depicts an amorous encounter between a female and two males. The lustful male gazes establish the female figure as the focal point of the painting. As a work of light-hearted entertainment, there is no complex meaning or story behind the piece. It is a bright, cheerful scene meant for amusement and delight.

Erica Trapasso is a senior editor for the artnet Price Database.

Want to stay ahead of the art world? Subscribe to our newsletter to get the breaking news, eye-opening interviews, and incisive critical takes that drive the conversation forward.

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A Brief History of Rococo Art | Artnet News

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A short introduction to Rococo art, including history leading up to the movement and key figures in painting

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The population of HNWIs in the U.K. declined by 3.3% to reach 556,160. The decline of wealth could impact luxury spending.

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HNWI Population: 556,160 HNWI Wealth: US$ 2.0 trillion The population of HNWIs in the U.K. declined by 3.3% to reach 556,160. U.K. HNWI wealth also declined by 6.0% to US$2.0 trillion.

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Consumers want fashion to be more sustainable with reduced packaging, fair pay for workers and recyclable materials.

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The fashion industry seems to be slowly moving towards a cleaner, more ethical future but are shoppers aware of what retailers are doing when it comes to sustainability?

According to a new survey released by e-commerce personalisation platform Nosto, 45% of consumers in the UK and US think it is difficult to know which fashion brands are really committed to sustainability.

In fact, just 23% of the 2,000 consumers included in the survey said they had a good idea about what it means when a fashion brand is "committed to sustainability".

Interestingly, over half of consumers (52%) want to see the fashion industry become more sustainable, so it seems brands could be doing more to inform their customers about their initiatives.

The survey also shed light on the top five ways consumers want fashion to become more sustainable, with calls for reduced packaging (75%) and fair pay for workers (74%) among their top demands.

They also want to see brand use renewable and recyclable materials (73%), make clothes that are designed to last longer (71%) and use fewer resources e.g. power/water/materials (64%).

GREATER VISIBILITY

Given the large number of consumers who find it difficult to make eco-friendly purchases it should come as no surprise that 74% of those surveyed would like retailers to clearly label clothes that are made in sustainable ways.

Those in favour of greater sustainability also suggested retailers to offer discounts on clothing ranges that are more sustainable (62%), do more to advertise and promote clothing that is made in sustainable ways (62%), and allow online shoppers to trade-in their used clothes for discounts on new items (54%). 43% recommended brands to automatically show people more sustainable alternatives to the items they are viewing online.

"Retailers are an important part of solving the sustainability challenge. They can support the industry by making it easier and simpler for shoppers to make sustainable choices," Jim Lofgren, CEO of Nosto, said.

"Although brands are aware that consumers are increasingly concerned about sustainability in the fashion industry, they need to be more transparent and get better at communicating how they're addressing it. For example, only 23% of consumers we questioned agreed that they generally have a good idea what fashion brands mean when they say they are committed to sustainability".

Copyright © 2019 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved.

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Less packaging and fair working conditions key for eco-conscious consumers

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The fashion industry seems to be slowly moving towards a cleaner, more ethical future but are shoppers aware of what retailers are doing when it comes to sustainability? According to a new survey released by e-commerce personalisation platform Nosto, 45% of consumers in the UK and US think it is difficult to know which fashion brands are really committed to sustainability.

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The pound sterling is its lowest meaning less favourable exchange rates.

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Having visited this fashion exhibition previous to stating my project, it was important to look through the photos that I have taken to help research how clothing is typically displayed at an exhibition.

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In an interview, Valentino explains the reasoning behind why the colour red is so important to him.

"When i was young, I went to see the opera Carmen In Barcelona and the whole set was red - the flowers, the costumes — and l said to
myself, “I want to keep this colour in my life." So I mixed a shade with the people who make fabrics — it contains a certain amount of orange — and Valentino Red became an official Pantone colour."

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Visionary Valentino

On the eve of a new exhibition "Master of Couture" at Somerset House, Valentino Garavani talks Jess Wood through the key themes and ideas behind his legendary creations.

On the eve of a new exhiibition "Master of Couture" at Somerset House, Valentino Garavani talks Jess Wood through the key themes and ideas behind his legendary creations.

RED HAUTE

a colour that is not shy" Valentino says of the colour forever Iinked in his designs.

When i was young, I went to see the opera Carmen In Barcelona and the whole set was red - the flowers, the costumes - and l said to
myself, "I want to keep this colour in my life." So I mixed a shade with the people who make fabrics - it contains a certain amount of orange - and Valentino Red became an official Pantone colour."

This shot from 2007 shows Garavani with some of his most famous creations in red, plus his ﬁve beloved pugs.

is a time to show the legs and to show the cleavage, but it's about the cut," Garavani, shown here with Naomi Campbell and other models from his s/s 1997 show, explains. "Clothes should not ridicule a woman; should not make them a fashion victim," he says. 'What happens too much in fashion today is that designers design for themselves. I always designed for women."

A LIFE IN PICTURES

bition at London's Somerset House also contains pictures fram Garavani's own personal archive, like this one at his house in Rome, taken in I980. "They found old pictures that I didn't even remember being taken that related to my beginning, my private life, me with my dogs..." he s ays.Giammetti - Valentino's business and life partner
"They were mainly the work of Giancarlo

Having studied ln Paris, Garavani founded his own maison de couture couture in Rome in 1959, becoming the most famous Italian on the scene.

"Fashion has become so mass market, with copies in every department store - maybe that's why there's an interest In something that is unique and dlﬂlcult to get," he says.

This elaborate design is from his 1959 collection.

VALENTINO A-LIST

"Jackie was the one who put m e on the American map when she decided to dress all in Valentino after the death of the President," he remembers.
"This dress wasn't actually a wedding dress - it was a short beige lace dress bought from my couture collection six months earlier. I had no idea that she would wear it tor her wedding to Aristotle Onassis, right . The press were following her everywhere and they saw her buying some beige ribbon for her hair. They went through my recent designs and discovered this dress. The day before [the wedding], Women's Wear Daily even put a drawing of her in it on the cover." Garavani's other all-time favourite A-lister was Elizabeth Taylor. "I made her a white chiffon dress with a big ostrich hem for the 1961 premiere of Spartacus in Rome," he recalls. "It was the ﬁrst dress l did for a superstar and the ﬁrst dress to have a kind of publicity return."

When I decided to retire in 2007, I had done enough," he says. "l didn't want to be part of a system that is not so much about designing but about managing the co mpanies, about money, about conglomerates. Why did I need to go through that? I had everything in my life. Valentino was something so personal, with two people, Giancarlo and me, and we wanted to keep it like that."

"Valentino: Muster of Couture" opens at Somerset House, London, on 29 November and runs until 3 March 2013.

For more information, visit somersethouse.org.uk

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Visionary Valentino - Press - Valentino Garavani Museum

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On the eve of a new exhibition "Master of Couture" at Somerset House, Valentino Garavani talks Jess Wood through the key themes and ideas behind his legendary creations. On the eve of a new exhiibition "Master of Couture" at Somerset House, Valentino Garavani talks Jess Wood through the key themes and ideas behind his legendary creations.

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Using ACORN I identified Valentino's customer as a Type A2 - metropolitan money.

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Spending is Increasing Amongst American Shoppers

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Spending is Increasing Amongst American Shoppers

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UK retail sales to US shoppers increased by 27% in May year-on-year due to currency fluctuations.

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The ongoing strength of the American economy is helping retailers in the UK, particularly those at the higher end of the market, as US tourists spend more in Britain.

American vistors increased their shopping at UK luxury stores last month

VAT refunds specialist Planet said on Monday that UK retail sales to US shoppers rocketed by 27% in May year-on-year as American consumer confidence hit a six-month high. The extent of the American boom can be seen from the fact that overall UK sales to international shoppers rose by 'only' 3%, although given the weak state of the domestic retail scene at present, 3% seems like a good result.

And given that the 3% came along with a 12% increase in average purchase value (the second highest among Europe's key destination markets) it was further good news.

Looking at that 27% transatlantic spending spree, the boost in sales marked the ninth consecutive month of double-digit sales increases to American visitors. And the average spend by US shoppers in the UK also rose, to €474, in May. That's a hefty €110 higher than the €364 recorded a year ago.

Why are they spending so much more? Well, currency fluctuations will have had a big impact with the US dollar strengthening against the pound by 4.9% from May 2018 to May 2019 and by 5.5% against the euro in the same period. That makes it so much cheaper to travel both to the UK and mainland Europe.

Planet also said UK sales to international shoppers in general have now grown in four of the last five months and visitors from other countries also seem to be increasing their individual spend.

The UK has typically seen lower average transaction values (ATV) among international shoppers than other major destinations such as Italy and France. But looking at the average spend per purchase by international shoppers, UK retailers enjoyed 12% growth by this measure in May. And the ATV of the UK's top-five source markets reached a 29-month high in May of €555 - the largest figure since January 2017.

It all underlines the fact that international visitors aren't only coming to the UK for its cultural and heritage offer any more and that shopping is now as much of a focus. And of course, shopping for many of those visitors means fashion and luxury, with high-end stores in particular very dependent on spending by international tourists.

David Perrotta, UK Country Manager at Planet, said the higher average transaction value "could indicate a bigger volume of high-value luxury goods being bought." He added: "We expect this growth in sales to international shoppers to continue in the coming months as we head into the summer holidays. Major events such as Eid al-Adha and the Cricket World Cup promise to bring shoppers from across the GCC nations and India to Europe and the UK - so it looks like UK retailers are set for a strong end to the second quarter."

Copyright © 2019 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved.

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UK sales to American tourists surged in May, luxury benefited

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The ongoing strength of the American economy is helping retailers in the UK, particularly those at the higher end of the market, as US tourists spend more in Britain. VAT refunds specialist Planet said on Monday that UK retail sales to US shoppers rocketed by 27% in May year-on-year as American consumer confidence hit a six-month high.

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Solastalgia: Existential Distress Caused by Environmental Change 

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Solastalgia: Existential Distress Caused by Environmental Change 

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The 2018 Nielsen data showed sales growth increasing when claims of sustainability are made, jeopardizing fashion brands that are not conforming to new sustainability attitudes.

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New currencies are constantly developing, from Bitcoin to Sweden’s E-krona – retailers need to be aware of what’s gaining popularity especially amongst international customers

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An app has been developed to recognise fake designer handbags to help counterattack counterfeiting.

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It's difficult to remember a time when Ebay and brick-and-mortar stores were the only places you could buy designer handbags secondhand, before now-huge marketplaces like The RealReal and Rebag launched to disrupt the whole process. Aside from convenience and navigability, the biggest advantage these modern retailers offer (or claim to) is authenticity. They boast of their highly trained authentication experts; but with the proliferation of "superfakes" - counterfeit bags so high in quality that they look real even to professionals - it's increasingly possible for knockoffs to slip through the cracks. Shoppers have reported as much, and Chanel even sued The RealReal, claiming only the brand itself could confirm the authenticity of its products. It's even possible for an authentic bag to be deemed inauthentic, and for customers to unwittingly purchase fakes from even the most seemingly trustworthy sources.

This is where the founders of Entrupy saw an opportunity - to remove human error from the equation, and accommodate a wide range of businesses - by automating authentication through machine learning and AI. The company started in 2012 and spent its first four years just collecting data from all over the world, which largely involved buying a lot of luxury designer handbags - both real and fake. "We spent a substantial amount of money on the best counterfeits and then also buying from the brands," explains Deanna Thompson, Entrupy's director of business. Today, the company has over 100,000 real and fake bags, total. The more data it collected, the smarter the algorithms became; in 2016 Entrupy devices were made available to secondhand retailers across the country. It has over 400 online and brick-and-mortar retailers on board in addition to other clients that include law enforcement and customs agents. "Now, we don't have to really go out and seek the data. It's coming to us because every time somebody uses the device, the algorithms get smarter," says Thompson.

The device is literally an iPod or iPhone set up with the Entrupy app and held inside a Mophie-like gadget. The app walks you through the authentication process, which involves taking a few photos of the inside and outside of the item, and results are given in real time once the algorithms analyze the materials in the photos. The company claims the technology can achieve results with a 99.1% accuracy.
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Entrupy has intentionally flown relatively under the radar, and doesn't disclose most of the retailers it works with, with the exception of Goodwill, with which it has a nationwide partnership, and one other which we'll get into below. But Thompson is confident it will grow quickly, simply because of the convenience and confidence it offers retailers. "This is a game changer," she says. "Not only is it freeing up your time, but it's also removing the liability from the store owner and it's standing behind you and it's creating trust within the marketplace."

On Thursday, Entrupy released a State of the Fake report, analyzing data from all of the authentications it performed last year - $50 million of merchandise, to be exact. It shows that the majority of fakes (or "unidentified" items, as the company calls them) Entrupy identified were "very good" to "super-fake" quality, and that the the percentage of items deemed authentic grew from 85% to 90% between 2017 and 2018. It points to potential reasons for that, including sellers being more careful and vigilant about verification, and more afraid of getting caught as authentication efforts advance.

It also sheds a light on what drives trends in the counterfeit handbag world: Louis Vuitton is among the most-faked brands because its styles, materials and monogram don't change as frequently as others. Because Chloé bags are so difficult to authenticate by eye, an alternative solution like Entrupy is more desirable. Higher demand for certain bags often translates into higher quantities of counterfeits, too: Hermès and Goyard had the highest percentages of "unidentified" bags because they're highly desired and deliberately produced in limited quantities. Gucci fakes have grown increasingly popular simply due to the popularity of the brand. Resale value can also have an impact on the popularity of counterfeiting certain styles.
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Counterfeit bags don't only enter the supply chain through secondhand retailers, either. They can come through illegitimate websites where customers may believe they're getting a good deal on the real thing, only to be sent a fake. They can also come in the form of fraudulent returns at full-price stores. Entrupy's next goal is to move into the primary market with a new product called Fingerprinting: Basically, a brand or retailer photographs part of a new bag at any point in the supply chain before it's merchandised and sold to a customer. Then, if a customer returns that bag, they take the same photo to ensure it's a match to a bag the retailer sold.

Last month, Entrupy unveiled a partnership with UK department store chain Selfridges, which recently found that people were purchasing authentic goods and then returning fake versions for full refunds. For a retailer of Selfridges's scale, employing an easy-to-use device is more realistic than training every sales associate in the nuances of luxury authentication, and makes the process quicker for the customer, who may be making a legitimate return. A verdict on whether it is the same item can come through in just seconds. During a trial, the device found 11 out of 109 returns to be potentially fraudulent.

As evidenced by its State of the Fake report, Entrupy is on a mission to shed more light on the world's counterfeiting problem - from the thousands to millions of dollars it can cost brands and retailers, to the social, environmental and health risks (and perhaps make a bigger name for itself in the process).

"There's no regulation, so when you think about who's making them, it's horrifying; you've got kids chained to tables, women locked in factories. The chemicals that are used in [producing these items] - there's no data as to what they can do to you," says Thompson.

Indeed, a recent Better Business Bureau report on counterfeiting, which covered not just fake handbags but a slew of other products from sneakers to toys to makeup, found that international organized crime groups are involved heavily in counterfeiting, and that at least some of the proceeds from counterfeits may be used to fund terrorist groups. It also cites a consumer guide issued by the International Trade Administration that estimated in 2016 that counterfeiting and piracy cost the U.S. economy, annually, between $200 billion and $250 billion, and 750,000 jobs.

"People think it's a victimless crime," Thompson adds. "It's just a lack of education."

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Can Technology Keep Fake Handbags Out of the Marketplace?

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It's difficult to remember a time when Ebay and brick-and-mortar stores were the only places you could buy designer handbags secondhand, before now-huge marketplaces like The RealReal and Rebag launched to disrupt the whole process. Aside from convenience and navigability, the biggest advantage these modern retailers offer (or claim to) is authenticity.

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Visionary Look into the Future of Garment Selling 

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Visionary Look into the Future of Garment Selling 

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The 2018 Pulse of Fashion Industry report has produced a visionary look into the future of garment selling, commenting on the potential development of smart fashion.