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theSun
| WEDNESDAY JULY 22 2009
fashion
FASHION & BEAUTY EDITOR: Peter Yap E-MAIL: peteryap@thesundaily.com
London stages first high street fashion week
ONE of the world’s busiest shopping miles will see retailers showcase their fall collections at a public fashion week, running Sept 7-11. Organisers New West End Company, a company that promotes London’s West End as a global shopping destination, has already won over Oxford Street retailers Debenhams, John Lewis, Uniqlo and Topman to participate in the event, and the Telegraph reports that talks are underway with other brands such as Selfridges and Topshop. The UK newspaper also revealed that there will be a survey of 100,000 Oxford Street shoppers in August asking them which celebrity is their “High Street Queen.” The elected celebrity will be involved in events during the high street fashion week. Retailers have announced fashion and beauty advice workshops, late-night shopping, and discounts as part of the fashion week. Earlier this year, fashion magazine Vogue announced Fashion’s Night Out, a retail push very similar to this in several international cities (Sept 10). Both events will take place in the runup to London Fashion Week. New West End’s spokesman Jace Tyrell said: “During London Fashion Week, the West End sees a big increase in sales. This way we can commercialise it and show everyone we have the best high street and the best designers.” – AFP Relaxnews
Madame Carven, petite women’s favourite designer, turns 100
“COUTURE brought me happiness, they were the best years of my life,” Madame Carven recalls with a smile at a celebration to mark her approaching 100th birthday. Only a diminutive 1.55m (five foot one) in her stockinged feet, for half a century she was the favourite designer of petite women. In recognition of her contribution to fashion and imminent birthday on Aug 31, the French Federation of Couture threw a party for her in the gardens of the Musee Galliera at the end of the haute couture shows for next winter. “I know this place very well. This is where I always showed my collections,” she told AFP. Frustrated by the lack of clothes suitable for small women like herself, Carmen de Tommaso dropped plans to become an architect or interior designer and took the remedy into her own hands. In 1945 she opened her own house under the name Carven. Her fresh and carefree style was an immediate hit with actresses like Leslie Caron and Martine Carol and young girls around the world, including the future wife of president Valery Giscard d’Estaing, whose wedding dress she designed. “Couture brought me great happiness, the joy of creating. I did everything I could to make women beautiful,” she says, still immaculate herself in an elegant green suit, her favourite colour, with a pearl necklace. “I started out without anyone. Now you need a sponsor, eveAFPPIX
The founder of the couture house Carven, Carmen de Tommaso, known as Madame Carven.
Shoppers throng Oxford Street in central London.
Yves Saint Laurent retrospective for spring 2010 in Paris
THE eagerly awaited retrospec- his drawings, personal objects, tive of late French designer Yves films, photographs and sketches, Saint Laurent will take place in according to Elle. Paris’s Petit Palais Museum from Yves Saint Laurent passed March 11 through Aug 29, 2010, away on June 1, 2008 at the according to French fashion age of 71. He bid farewell to website Elle, and confirmed by Haute Couture in 2002 and was the organisers. replaced by Tom Ford as creative The Pierre Bergé-Yves Saint director of his eponymous fashLaurent Foundation organising ion house. – AFP Relaxnews the exhibition confirmed For more, log on: the location www.fondation-pb-ysl.net and the dates, precising that they were still susceptible to change between now and the end of the summer. The public will discover 40 years of the work of the designer who changed the face of French and international fashion during the 20th century. The collection will display 250 pieces that belonged to Saint Laurent like
rything is very expensive, very difficult.” Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand, nephew of the late Socialist president, paid tribute to her as “one of the most eminent creative forces in French and international fashion.” On a more personal note, he recalled that his mother “was always dressed by Madame Carven” and that for him she felt like “part of the family.” “She was the first to dare to do ready-to-wear, she was revolutionary,” acknowledged Federation president Didier Grumbach, who once actually worked for Carven. “I sold Carven Junior dresses and took the Carven Junior collection to the United States in
1964,” he admitted, getting a round of applause from guests, who included designers Jean-Charles de Castelbajac and Claude Montana, the chief executive of Louis Vuitton Yves Carcelle as well as many personal friends of Carven. In the immediate post-war years, marked by the return to prominence of male designers like Christian Dior and Jacques Fath, Madame Carven “was something of an exception,” according to Florence Miller, who teaches at the French Fashion Institute. “She had the intuition to appeal to young girls at a time when the couturiers mostly dressed older women.” Her style was practical, flattering, very feminine, very close to what women actually wanted, she explained. “She wasn’t into building a spectacular image for her label, like Dior, for example.” “When I was a little girl, there were two names which entranced me: Carven and Paris,” remembered Lady Nancy Chopard-Sain, a vibrant old lady wearing a turquoise coat with matching flower in her hair, who said she had been a personal friend for “a very, very long time.” Madame Carven only finally gave up designing in 1993, in her 84th year, to concentrate on her passion for old furniture and antiques. Today her house is owned by the Paris group SCM and has abandoned haute couture to focus on ready-to-wear. – AFP Relaxnews
Heidi Klum accepted into Barbie hall of fame
AS part of the Blonde Ambition series that previously included dolls of the Hollywood actresses Marilyn Monroe and Goldie Hawn, German supermodel Heidi Klum’s mini-me will hit stores in September. The doll took eight months to produce with Klum actively participating in the design process of her Barbie’s clothes and accessories but also facial features as well as eye and hair color. “It’s great to collect Barbies, to play with them and dress them over and over again,” Klum said in a press release. “I believe that’s fun not only for children but also for adults – speaking from my own experience.” Klum’s Barbie wears a dress inspired by an outfit from a Victoria’s Secret showcase – the lingerie label that made Heidi Klum famous – and a few personal accessories such as the model’s engagement ring and golden high heels and earrings. Heidi Klum turning up at the Barbie fashion show in New York in February and her presence at the birthday party in Malibu – Barbie turned 50 earlier this year – had already prompted speculation of a potential collaboration between the two pop culture icons. – AFP Relaxnews
Heidi Klum Barbie.
Heidi Klum
Escada may cease trading
THE German high-end women’s clothes label Escada, which is threatened with bankruptcy, may cease trading, the chairman of the board Bruno Saelzer said in a newspaper interview recently. “Talks have already taken place with insolvency experts,” he told the newspaper Welt am Sonntag. He said he hoped it would not come to that, but the group was in a very difficult situation. He said it had enough liquidity to last until August but not beyond. A spokesman told AFP a few days ago that Escada could “theoretically” seek financial aid from the state within weeks if it managed to restructure its debts. It has put a debt restructuring plan to its creditors which must be approved by 80% of them by a July 31 deadline. Failing that, Saelzer said it would be “inevitable” that Escada would cease trading, as “98 of the 99 possible measures” to save the company had already been taken. Escada parted company in May with its mid-market subsidiary Primera. – AFP Relaxnews
Escada flagship store in Duesseldorf.