Manolo Blahnik: The Shoe Sculptor
As a kickoff to the coming celebrations, Lane Crawford at the IFC Mall in Hong Kong has opened a pop-up store that includes unexpected items like bags, scarves, stationery and luggage, done in collaboration with well-known brands, including Fortnum Mason for picnic hampers.
A mix of personal objects, inspiration pieces and shoes from the archive collection are displayed in a dedicated space in the store’s atrium. Ten vintage styles have even been remade, showing the originality and longevity of black patent ankle-tie sandals, mesh lace-up stiletto booties and designs inspired by artists like Piet Mondrian and Alexander Calder.
The original Manolo Blahnik store, in the Chelsea neighborhood of London, takes Mr. Blahnik back to his beginnings and to characters who marked his career.
“You know, I’m not nostalgic but when you mention Ossie Clark, I get moved and emotional because it was a period that I have fantasized in my head for so long,” the designer says. “I was like a fish in my element because I adored it.”
From the start, Mr. Blahnik had a vision of shoes and how women’s feet should look — an idea that ran against the flow of the hefty platform shoes of the 1970s that have recently returned.
“My theme was so light that it was completely against the grain of what was going on,” he says. “I still do that type of vision. I still do the same type of shoes.”
Taking up the colorful pens that sit in boxes on his desk, the designer draws with clear strokes his latest idea: heels made up of a line of round beads, inspired by the shape of a necklace.
Like other shoes with a tongue of raffia fringe or black and white zigzags, there are echoes of the Africa that lay across the water from his childhood home. He also would absorb North African music on the radio owned by his disciplined Czech-born father.
“I started to discover Radio Casablanca — this music, fantasy music — all the songs of an Arab culture of music — and I was hooked to that,” he says.
How are the decorative drawings, meticulously done and delicately colored, transformed into three-dimensional shoes framing the foot?
“Ah! This is a very painful process — sometimes, to get what you want, it’s going to be months,” says the designer. “I do the little sketch, which is easy. Sometimes it’s very successful, sometimes I flop so I have to change it a million times. The same thing for the heel; it has to be really perfect also.
“I do it all myself. First I do the last, maybe using the same one as last year and changing a thing or two.
“I do the thing in wood, filing the board. Then it has to be done in plastic. Now they do it horribly with computers and things — but I don’t work that way.”
How much does his vision of shoes come from inside himself or from childhood, watching his mother with her shoes?
“I always try to analyze this, to know if I was genetically born like that, whether it was something creative in me that happened to be shoes,” says Mr. Blahnik, recalling his mother’s elegance and his father’s rigidity, demanding tidy clothes and clean nails to sit down at the table.
The first attachment to feet and shoes came from a visit to a Madrid museum, examining sculptures of human feet and animal paws.
“I always like the pose of the animals, much better than the faces,” he says. “I don’t know why, don’t ask me. This is nothing to do with fetishes or sensuality. I love the expression of the feet.”
The person who put him on his career path was the redoubtable Vreeland, whose American magazine career included encouraging young talent and whose image is framed on his office walls.
He recalls his first trip to New York, when he made his presentation of fashion drawings “obviously in a state of panic and terror and anguish when I got to see her.”
“I went in with a huge pile of imaginary designs for theater, because I wanted to be a theater designer, film designer. I was derailed by Mrs. Vreeland and I was very happy that it happened.”
Why the adoration of high heels?
“You walk differently in high heels — and with a shoe that is uncomfortable you walk badly,” he says. “So the shoe has to be light, beautifully centered, the heel balanced, perfection. And this is what attracts me to somebody who knows how to walk in high heels.”
What other countries have been a source of inspiration? He thinks of Spain, his mother’s native country and songs sung by the maids.
Then there is Russia.
“Once I went to the Kremlin 10 years ago and I was completely possessed by Catherine the Great, her lovers, her dresses, her colors. I was totally mesmerized by these things.”
And there is the cinema, the fascination of early Italian movie actresses like Anna Magnani. And, of course, there’s Sarah Jessica Parker, whose character in “Sex and the City” made his name across America.
If a history of Manolo Blahnik is written, the writer will know where to look: in the designer’s home in Bath, in the western part of England, where he keeps 19,000 pairs of his shoes.
Designers save a few fashion surprises for Oscars
LOS ANGELES |
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Big films. Big stars. Big Fashion. When the red carpet rolls out for the Oscars Sunday night, it won’t only be the biggest night in Hollywood, it will be a major night for celebrity designers.
The long parade of women in glamorous gowns and expensive jewelry that starts in January at the Critics Choice, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild awards finally ends with the Oscars. The best looks, experts say, have been saved for last.
Colorful gowns that show some skin and classical looks from Hollywood’s Golden Age will again be de rigueur, with perhaps a white dress or two. Recent fashion shows in New York and Paris will bring out fresh looks, and while eyes will be on Angelina Jolie, as always, new fashions are in town with names like Rooney Mara and Viola Davis.
“The Oscars are the biggest fashion show on the planet,” said designer Marc Bouwer.
His is no understatement. Unlike catwalks in New York and Paris, Oscar’s red carpet walk-up to the world’s top movie honors is televised live and seen by tens of millions of people around the world. Photographs and videos of the celebrities appear in newspapers, magazines, the Web and are sent on mobile phones to fans and friends. One slip up, and it’s curtains for the stars.
“If you’re wearing bright colors, you’ll pop more and that’s important in a photograph,” said designer David Meister. “This is the night where the cosmetic and jewelry companies are looking for their next women, their next big contracts. You want to look beautiful, pretty and sexy.”
While some gowns this year on Hollywood red carpets have featured long, luxurious sleeves, actresses need to exhibit sex appeal, too, and show a touch of skin, “a bare back or plunging neckline,” he said.
Bouwer sees more white, ivory and silver.
At last month’s Golden Globes, Angelina Jolie showed up in a white satin Versace dress with a slash of red for color, and it made a splash with fashions everywhere.
“It sort of shocked everybody into realizing that white can look so well on the red carpet if it’s done right,” said Bouwer.
FRESH OFF THE RUNWAY
Old Hollywood glamour has been showcased this season, but In Style Magazine’s Hal Rubenstein said designs at Paris’ couture shows in January and New York’s recent Fashion Week could creep onto the carpet because they have not yet shown up elsewhere.
And the right dress can certainly make all the difference.
“A dress can make the celebrity, but the celebrity cannot make the dress,” said fashion designer Allen B. Schwartz. “An ugly dress will be ugly on anyone. A gorgeous dress will make that actress look that much more exciting.”
The normally stylish Gwyneth Paltrow learned her lesson in 2002 in an embarrassingly sheer black Alexander McQueen gown. On the other side, risk taker Cate Blanchett will always be remembered for her 1999 Oscar Jean Paul Gaultier sheath dress whose back was embroidered with flowers and a hummingbird.
While Angelina Jolie has been flawless on the carpet all season, Rooney Mara has been turning heads, too, with an often dark look that seems fitting for her Oscar-nominated role as Lisbeth Salander in “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.” Bouwer is a fan of Mara, calling her “major fashion player” this season.
But Mara is not the only one who has been a standout this season. Rubenstein says the “The Help” stars Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer – nominated in the best actress and best supporting actress categories, respectively – have emerged as unexpected fashion plates.
“You don’t normally think of Viola and Octavia as fashion girls,” Rubenstein said. “But Viola has both an extraordinary fashion presence on and off the screen. She radiates womanliness and power. And Octavia proved beauty is not about being a size 2, it’s about looking your best and she’s been looking her best for every single red carpet occasion.”
(Reporting By Zorianna Kit; Editing by Bob Tourtellotte)
Spring fashions reflect costumes from Oscar-nominated movies
And the Oscar goes to … Ralph Lauren?
Sunday’s Academy Awards will celebrate the best in film, including costumes that are dead ringers for spring fashions by Lauren, Gucci, Etro and other star designers offering 1920s flappers, 1960s floral dresses, wicked goth and movie-star bombshell glam. Their doppelgänger designs seem to be straight from The Artist, The Help, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and My Week With Marilyn
“It’s a great juxtaposition to see how the clothes worn in movies are clothes women will be wearing very soon,” said Nick Verreos, spokesman for the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandise. For the past 20 years the Los Angeles school has displayed costumes from Academy Award-nominated films. Nearly two dozen films are represented in this year’s free exhibit that will be up through April.
“The shape of those fitted, late 1950s and early 1960s dresses from The Help are very in now,” said Verreos, a former Project Runway contestant and designer of his own evening gown label, Nikolaki. “Then you look at The Artist and see that old Hollywood glamour with the fur wrap, the cloche hat and all those sequins, also in. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is all about a dark, moody couture punk look that also will appeal to other women.”
Are these looks coincidental or planned?
“Everything has been done, so it’s about re-creating and reinventing a look and making it relevant once more,” he said. “That’s the genius of top designers – and costumers as well.”
Sophia Banks-Coloma, a film costumer who just wrapped the movie, Syrup, based on Max Barry’s cult novel about a slacker with a million-dollar idea, says designers look to art, books and most of all, film, for inspiration.
“I remember living in New York when the Jackie Kennedy exhibition happened, and right after that, Marc Jacobs came out with his 1960s collection that featured big buttons and portrait jackets,” she said from Hollywood, where she is working on her next movie, I Lucifer
She says film is a major reference point for designers today. “They hear about them in advance or pick up on it in the zeitgeist, like a trend, something that is in the air.”
Roseanne Morrison, fashion director at New York’s Doneger Group, a trend forecasting firm that works with designers, fashion investors and major department stores, agrees that films are influential to style.
“It’s a confluence of events where you see designers pick up on something and then the media, in this case, movies, are on the same wavelength. It’s the influences swirling around and it’s especially nice when all this comes together in a nice way for fashion,” Morrison said.
The “dark, moody clothing” worn by Rooney Mara as computer hacker Lisbeth Salander in Dragon Tattoo reminds her of the Alexander McQueen exhibit, Savage Beauty, at the Metropolitan Museum last year.
“This interest in darkness is a distinctive shift for a generation that has been expecting a happy ending,” she wrote in a recent report for clients about the trend and the fashion message that “plays on fear, death and destruction.”
On a lighter note, the appeal of the 1920s will continue strong beyond this spring.
“We recently did a feature for our clients on the 1920s look for spring: a soft-colored palette that is very important, the drop waist and bugle beading,” she said of the trend that evokes The Artist meets W.E. meets Downton Abbey
Of the latter, Morrison and others agree that the fashions seen on the PBS Masterpiece Classic series set in the 1910s are primed to be the next big thing for men and women.
It will do to fashion what Mad Men did with the whole ’60s revival, she said.
Still to come this December is The Great Gatsby, yet another 1920s period movie that will have heroine Daisy Buchanan in drop-dead drop-torso dresses, languid trousers, brocade jackets and more flapper fringe – from the silver screen to your closet, perhaps.
mquintanilla@express-news.net
The Hips Have It
The collection the designer sent out on Monday had nonstop focus on padded pockets, below a waist that itself was outlined with a belt tied in a bow.
Even when the pockets disappeared, there were peplums, say on a soft, autumnal flowered dress, ensuring that the least favorite part of most women’s anatomy was in focus.
Most women do not love their hips unless they jut out, greyhound style, from a concave stomach. But the only greyhounds in this show were the fanged dogs that served as the fancy handles of umbrellas. They went with other country creatures: gilded fox heads as clasps on handbags; or owls, with their baleful eyes drawn on a T-shirt.
Could umbrellas be the new handbags? It looked that way when the finale lineup was live-streamed — not just with the company’s digitalized effects but also with water showering down the clear tent while the models walked under those fancy umbrellas.
The story of the show was of town and field — roughly translated as city-style studded gloves holding the bags with animal decorations.
There were things to love: tailored coats, those foxy ladies in flared riding skirts or slim dresses (minus the pockets) for the evening. The best of the show was streamlined and with a fine attention to detail. And it was played out in soft autumnal colors from owl feather brown, through petrol blue, blueberry and moss green.
But the hips had it. And surely even the gorgeous Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, a Burberry mascot, would prefer some other part of her perfect body to be in focus.
Fashion Week audience sports some statement heels
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It’s a blustery day — February tends to be that way in New York — and Marian Kihogo, a fashion stylist and blogger from London, is dashing from one runway show to another, from the tents at Lincoln Center to studios and galleries scattered around Manhattan.
As she strides by on her “architectural heels” by Nicholas Kirkwood for Peter Pilotto, the heels hollowed out for artistic effect, this reporter dares to suggest she might be more comfortable in running shoes. She laughs. “Running shoes! That would be fashion suicide. I think the fashion powers-that-be would stone me!”
An exaggeration? Maybe just a bit. Kihogo is merely giving a colorful rendition of an unspoken rule at Fashion Week, which recently wrapped up, and, really, about all fashion-forward events: It’s all about the shoes. And we’re not talking about the models. We’re talking about the audience.
Never mind the snow, rain or sleet. Never mind the subway steps or those dashes for a cab. Never mind the long hours on one’s feet. Most Fashion Week regulars wouldn’t be caught dead without a pair of statement heels.
Now, we don’t mean to exaggerate. Sometimes you can find a pair of sneakers in the front row. Usually they’re studded, perhaps part of an overall grunge look belonging to some handsome and hip young man, or to a woman on crutches. Although, at a fashion show last year, one woman limped in an orthopedic boot, while her other foot was clad in … wait for it … a stiletto.
“Wow,” says an admiring Pamela Pekerman, who’s covering fashion for AfterBuzz TV, hearing the anecdote. “That’s going for it.”
Pekerman thinks she’s found a happy medium — a pair of Brian Atwood heels in lavender that she bought on sale at Saks Fifth Avenue and swears are comfortable. “I could run for you right now, I really could,” she says. We’ll take her word for it.
“I’ve seen a lot of crazy shoes here that belong in the circus,” Pekerman says. “People are wobbling around. But some girls, they just want to stick out.” As she speaks, one such woman teeters behind her, stepping rhythmically but gingerly across Lincoln Center Plaza and over to 65th Street, where we pray the traffic light gives her enough time to cross.
Bright prints and grunge look rock London Fashion
LONDON |
LONDON (Reuters) – Vibrant Asian-inspired prints, chiffon dresses with appliquéd velvet and a revived grunge look hit the catwalks Monday as designers Peter Pilotto, Christopher Kane and Mark Fast offered up their autumn/winter 2012 collections at London Fashion Week.
Christopher Kane, whose runway was carpeted in plush violet and lit with two huge spotlights, showcased a mixture of leather jackets, animal print separates and chiffon dresses with velvet detailing.
Dresses in bright red, violet, dark blue flowed down the runway on models with gel-slick hair, wearing minimal make-up and chunky black heels.
Model and TV presenter Alexa Chung, a British Fashion Council Young Ambassador, attended the show alongside U.S. Vogue Editor Anna Wintour and Samantha Cameron, the wife of Britain’s Prime Minister.
“I love everything about Christopher Kane. I like that he has a quite dark side, that he likes to explore, always produces very wearable, beautiful clothes,” Chung told Reuters.
Pilotto and partner Christopher De Vos offered up a collection of figure-hugging dresses with Asian-inspired prints, sexy cut-out details and multi-colored furry scarves.
Sleek stretched dresses featuring mesh panels, cut out bodices and yellow, blue and green prints set on a black background also featured in the collection.
“We find it very exciting to unite the future and the past in this way,” Pilotto said.
Graduated shades of blue punctuated designer Mark Fast’s show with cerulean, azure and dark blue greys dominating a grunge theme that reaches back to the heady days of an emerging rock scene in 1990s Seattle led by the lead singer of Nirvana, Kurt Cobain.
Many of the pieces featured shaggy threads and tattered looks to give a sense of decay and edginess, Fast told Reuters.
“(It’s a) Kurt Cobainish take on a cardigan with an injection of lycra,” Fast said. “From seeing what I was wearing, what other people around me were wearing, came this grungy feeling.”
Musician Kanye West, celebrity Peaches Geldof and TV personality Grace Woodward attended the show.
Sophie Hulme, whose presentation included a giant golden dinosaur, sent her models out in colorful sweaters and tailored coats with quirky twists, told Reuters her collection was based on toy dinosaurs and fishermen’s sweaters.
The designer, who was wearing a cream shirt with lace in the shape of dinosaurs, said she looked toward menswear for inspiration and how their clothes were put together.
“They’re very realistic clothes you can wear which I think is a really good evolution that seems to be happening at the moment,” she said. “So I’m excited to be part of that.”
(Additional reporting by Ethan Bilby and Michelle Martin, editing by Paul Casciato)
New generation of fashion designers comes into its own with fall looks that …
NEW YORK With mid-priced collections as upscale-looking and lavishly detailed as those on the New York runways for fall, who needs to pay top dollar for fashion?/pp So much of the excitement during the New York Fashion Week shows that wrapped up on Thursday was about the so-called advanced contemporary category of labels that cost less than high-end designer collections without sacrificing style. Among those creating a buzz: Rag Bone, Tory Burch, Alexander Wang, 3.1 Phillip Lim, Helmut Lang, Theyskens Theory and even the J. Crew Collection. (The entry price for advanced contemporary collections is about $295, and the most expensive pieces are around $1,000, which is closer to the entry price for high-end designer collections.)/pp “These are the designers of the future,” says Stephanie Solomon, fashion director of Bloomingdale’s. “When you think of the old guard, of Karl Lagerfeld, Giorgio Armani and Ralph Lauren, as much as I respect them, they are not spring chickens anymore. These designers are going to usurp them. And they are making clothes with beautiful quality, innovative fabrics and silhouettes. In the future, I envision an entire level of our store based on these up-and-coming, talented designers.”/pp These more affordable, accessible lines offer head-to-toe dressing, with accessories and outerwear. And they hit on all of the trends seen during the week, including sleek, minimalist tailoring; Asian influences; black-and-white graphic schemes; and bright color-blocking. Key pieces for a fall wardrobe? A pair of statement pants in a colorful jacquard or print and with a tapered silhouette, worn over a pair of pumps (Manolo Blahnik for J. Crew perhaps?); a shift dress or a pencil skirt that hits below the knee; and a fun swing coat or fur accessory in an eye-catching texture and hue./pp We saw the return of the suit (albeit a nontraditional sort of suit), including the camel and cream color-blocked karate jacket belted over trousers at 3.1 Phillip Lim, the wrap-front blazer and black jeans at Helmut Lang, and the pink schoolboy blazer and pants at J. Crew. In addition, sweater dresses made a comeback at Kimberly Ovitz and the Rachel Zoe Collection./pp The J. Crew Collection, which is slightly more expensive than the basic J. Crew offerings, is the chain store’s version of advanced contemporary. And it is looking darn good./pp Creative director Jenna Lyons and head woman’s designer Tom Mora have ratcheted up the sophistication level, offering more tailored looks in edgier fabrics. Nordic sweaters topped tinsel tweed, python or pleated-leather skirts, and pants in metallic jacquards or scarf-print silks were paired with the pointy-toed Manolo Blahniks. Color-blocked clutches and totes trimmed in curly lamb fur rounded out the picture./pp Burch’s collection was more polished than ever, full of ladylike, embroidered tweed jackets and skirts, tulle and chiffon dresses with organza flower appliques, crinkled leather jackets and structured frame bags with plastic paillette and tortoise details./pp There was a lot of eye candy – rows of pearls on the collar and cuffs of a cardigan jacket and matching pencil skirt with organza eyelet hem, jeweled flower buttons on a gold lame coat and sequins dusting a houndstooth plaid skirt./pp Rag Bone designers Marcus Wainwright and David Neville are also proving to be a formidable force on the New York fashion scene. Their fall collection was English countryside-meets-the-Raj, with layers upon layers of rich-looking pieces, including motorcycle jacket-tailcoat hybrids, jersey dhoti pants, tweed wrap skirts and coppery Lurex knit sweaters, plus all the must-have accessories (such as herringbone platform riding boots) that keep fans coming back to the brand./pp Stylist-turned-designer Rachel Zoe was inspired by the London rock ‘n’ roll scene of the late 1960s, and her collection was a balance of the glam and the wearable, with all the Hollywood entrance-making maxi dresses and shaggy faux furs that fans have come to expect from Zoe, alongside flared trouser suits and velvet tuxedos, gaucho jeans and melange sweater dresses./pp Zoe’s line is barely a year old, but is well on its way to being a success. Come fall, it will be in 300 stores. Another advanced contemporary star is born./pp (Contact the writer: booth.moore@latimes.com)
Westwood tells austerity UK to buy fewer, better clothes
LONDON |
LONDON (Reuters) – Fashion lovers should take advantage of today’s cash-strapped times and use their limited resources to buy fewer, better clothes, Britain’s grande dame of design Vivienne Westwood said after wowing London Fashion Week’s Autumn/Winter show on Sunday.
“People have never looked so ugly as they do today. We just consume far too much … I’m talking about all this disposable crap,” said Westwood, whose tailored collection inspired by tribal prints was one of the highlights of the event.
“What I’m saying is buy less – choose well. Don’t just suck up stuff so everybody looks like clones,” she told reporters, when asked how austerity had influenced her work.
“Don’t just eat McDonald’s, get something a bit better. Eat a salad. That’s what fashion is. It’s something that is a bit better.”
Models strode down Westwood’s long looping catwalk adorned with tribal tattoos and baggy jodhpur-like trousers.
Westwood, who came to fame during Britain’s Punk revolution in the 1970s, said her clothes had been inspired by Britons’ ability to confront harsh economic times with imagination and devil-may-care daring.
“Britishness is just a way of putting things together and a certain don’t care attitude about clothes. You don’t care, you just do it and it looks great. What we do always looks British even if we’re inspired by Africa or the North Pole or whatever.”
The “war mentality” of the past year had influenced her use of bright oranges, military camouflage greens and yellows, she added.
Celebrities including Duran Duran’s Nick Rhodes, British chef Heston Blumenthal and American television personality Janice Dickinson looked on.
“I can’t live without her clothes. I’ve been shopping at Vivienne Westwood and wearing her at Vogue from 30 years ago until this day,” said Dickinson, who has appeared on many Vogue magazine covers.
Lustrous metallic colours also featured strongly this season, not only in Westwood’s collection but also at motorcycle-inspired Belstaff, which had a strong womenswear line.
One of the most striking jackets featured a shiny purple material made up of more than 10 different silken fibres, a mixture CEO Harry Slatkin called a “secret sauce”.
The collection also featured tightly tailored leather jackets with armour type panelling.
Slatkin said savvy buyers knew how to make their money go further by buying good quality clothing that would last.
“The customer relates to that. There’s no fooling the customer and there never is,” he said.
Throughout the week, designers said there would always be a market for haute couture, even though some luxury buyers had trimmed back purchases.
Vogue’s Anna Wintour quickly nipped backstage and emerged pleased by the results.
“I loved it,” she told Reuters. “I always love being in London.”
(Editing by Andrew Heavens)
Men Step Out of the Recession, Bag on Hip, Bracelet on Wrist
The male shopper, who pretty much was missing at the onset of the recession, is buying again. And to the delight of retailers, he is not just stocking up on suits and dress shirts, but also doing something women have been doing for years: binging on accessories.
Bracelets. Bags. Hats. Umbrellas. Men are buying so many accessories that some forecasters predict sales growth for men’s clothing and accessories during the first three months of this year will set a 20-year high.
“That guy had been away for a while during the tougher times,” said David Witman, general merchandise manager of Nordstrom’s men’s division.
To get traditional women’s accessories to appeal to men, some designers are giving them manly names and styles. That’s not really a bracelet; it’s wristwear. And that’s not a purse, nor the dreaded murse, but a holdall.
“It doesn’t look like you borrowed it from your girlfriend,” Nicolas Travis, 24, a business school student who runs the blog Style Flavors, said of the manned-up styles he prefers. “A little bit more bling, and you run the risk of it looking a bit more feminine.”
The return of the male shopper could have broad consequences for the economy. Retail sales plummeted during the recession, with men’s apparel sales dropping almost twice as fast as women’s in 2009, according to an I.B.M. Global Business Services analysis of retail data.
Women started buying again, and that helped push the recovery along. But men held off on buying apparel and accessories until last year, when estimated men’s sales rose more than 8 percent, outpacing the growth in women’s sales.
Spending on accessories is driving the men’s category: those sales grew 14 percent in the last half of 2011, to about $6 billion, according to the market research firm NPD Group.
“Men were the last to start spending coming out of the recession,” said Eric Jennings, fashion director for men’s wear at Saks Fifth Avenue. “If they learned one thing through the recession, it’s that looking schlumpy is not going to help you keep your job, get promoted or get a new job. I think they’re taking their appearance more seriously.”
The rebound in shopping may also reflect an improved jobs picture for men, who were hit disproportionately over the recession. The gap between men’s and women’s employment rates was about as high as it had ever been as the recovery started in June 2009. Only last month did the men’s and women’s unemployment rates reach the same level.
The male models walking the runway at New York Fashion Week shows this month wore, among other adornments, scarves that could double as blankets; belts, pocket squares and fur neckwear; caps and handbags; feather necklaces; and metal cuffs.
Jewelry designers and fashion executives say the trend comes largely from Italy and Japan, where men throw on silky scarves or pile on bracelets and berets with nonchalance. Given the proliferation of street-style blogs, young men, in particular, can quickly adopt trends from overseas. Mr. Jennings, of Saks, also points to TV shows like “Boardwalk Empire,” where the cool characters dress with panache, as a big influence.
“Where before wearing a leather jacket and jeans was a way to rebel,” he said, “now you see guys on the fringe, edgier characters, wearing suits and pocket squares and tie bars.”
He added, “Men are feeling more confident to experiment and realizing that they do have more options, and it’s showing in the numbers — it’s showing in sales.”
At Burberry stores, for instance, men’s accessory sales increased about 50 percent in the six months through September 2011 compared with the same period a year ago. Coach, which makes items like briefcases and tote bags for men, says global sales of men’s goods doubled, to $200 million, for the fiscal year ending in June 2011, and it expects sales to double again, to $400 million, for its current fiscal year.
The bracelet is perhaps the most striking example of the accessory craze.
It is hard to imagine the archetypal businessmen of recent decades — the power-suited broker of the 1980s, the khakis-and-blue-oxford-shirt-wearer of the ’90s, or the hoodie-clad tech titans of the 2000s — selecting a piece of jewelry each morning as they dressed for work. But now, fashion executives say, sales of men’s bracelets, especially thin versions in leather or metal, are increasing at a rapid pace.
“Bracelets are on fire right now,” said Tim Bess, who analyzes men’s fashions for the Doneger Group, a trend forecaster. “I’d say it’s the No. 1 look for the young man.”
Tateossian, a London-based jewelry designer, says sales of its men’s bracelets rose 30 percent in 2011.
Crazy heels required
Pekerman thinks she’s found a happy medium – a pair of Brian Atwood heels in lavender that she bought on sale at Saks Fifth Avenue and swears are comfortable. “I could run for you right now, I really could,” she says. We’ll take her word for it.
“I’ve seen a lot of crazy shoes here that belong in the circus,” Pekerman says. “People are wobbling around. But some girls, they just want to stick out.” As she speaks, one such woman teeters behind her, stepping rhythmically but gingerly across Lincoln Center Plaza and over to 65th Street, where we pray the traffic light gives her enough time to cross.
Pekerman does have one little secret – foot petals, basically soft pads you sneak into your shoes to provide a little cushioning. But some women, says one fashion insider, have another, darker secret.
“I know from experience that there are plenty of flats tucked away in tote bags,” says Ken Downing, fashion director for Neiman Marcus, with a wink. “And sitting in the back seats of sedans.”
Downing scans the front row of the Cushnie et Ochs runway show, where we’re sitting. There’s barely a flat in sight
But, Downing says, there’s a good reason for all this. After all, the fashionistas who form most of the audience at runway shows – buyers, stylists, major clients and of course celebrities – have rather a duty to, well, take one for the team. (Easy for him to say.)
“Listen,” Downing says, “footwear is a true indicator of style, and where fashion is, and where it’s going. We’re an industry of image. So it’s important that we do our part.”
At a packed Fashion Week party a few nights earlier, Clement Z., as this stylist from Shanghai calls himself, is chatting with friends. Your eyes gravitate down to his feet. How can they not? They’re brilliantly jeweled. He’s wearing what he calls his Aladdin shoes.
“Shoes are the most important part of the whole outfit,” he says.
“The wrong shoes can make the most expensive dress look cheap, and the right shoes can make the cheapest dress look expensive.”