Veronique Branquinho F/W '09
Since last Fall, dire headlines have dominated WWD and other industry trade papers, as profits at fashion houses plunged across the board, layoffs were implemented and expansion plans shelved for the near-future. Now, the other shoe appears to be dropping, as big name after name begin to fold their businesses, citing an economic environment in which they simply can't compete. Just last week brought news of niche designers Veronique Branquinho and Emma Cook closing shop, and an announcement that Christian Lacroix might be headed for bankruptcy. These designers aren't exactly newcomers - they've been on the scene for many years - and though their businesses have remained relatively small-scaled, they've been able to deliver a consistent financial performance, while earning critical acclaim... well except for Lacroix, which has managed to stay afloat without ever turning a profit.
Christian Lacroix Couture S/S '09
One has to wonder how long it will be before bigger companies start to buckle as well. Sure, the Vuittons and Chanels of the world don't have to worry - Gucci Group, in fact, posted a 5% increase in sales to $1.1 billion in the first quarter of 2009 - but for the majority of mid-size fashion brands lean consumer spending poses a real challenge. The consulting firm of Bain and Associates, for instance, forecasts a 20% decline in luxury spending for the first half of 2009, and this decrease can only further damage already-ailing brands.
Emma Cook S/S '09
The coming year promises to bring more closures of iconic brands, most likely just in advance of the fall shows, or alternately as 2nd quarter corporate results are reported, and one gets the sense that, at many companies, the situation is much more dire than they are publicly letting on. Assuming that one believes that these bankruptcies will occur, then the question becomes 'how will the fashion world handle this reconfiguration?'. I'm guessing that things will move in one of two directions. On the one hand, designers (and their backers) will take fewer risks, and this might translate into more 'wearable' (read salable) collections, but on the other hand, there will likely be a resurgence of raw creativity among emerging designers who sense that the moment is ripe for reinvention. Unlike the past decade, when money drove almost all of the design world's evolution - even the most creative designers were coopted into a fashion system that prized lucrative mega-brand design contracts, rapid expansion and a surfeit of hype - the failure of this approach to sustain itself has an unexpected upside: without easy access to venture capital, and its attendant perils, designers will operate in a less manic, more grounded atmosphere, one that hopefully affords them the time and space to nurture a unique vision while refining their design skills, without sacrificing their idealism or imagination to a voracious corporate retail and media machine that is unable to provide them with the genuine support they need to fully actualize themselves.
Will this work? We'll see. Maybe it's unrealistically optimistic. Still, considering that the alternative is the end of creativity in fashion, I'd prefer to believe that this time of economic hardship will spur a new generation of genius, instead of solely using them as grist for the capitalist mill.
