Designer Clothes Help Parents Turn Their Toddlers Into Real-Life American Girl Dolls [Fashion]

As our economy slowly emerges from its torpor, affluent citizens are starting to become less abashed about spending exorbitant sums of money on anything from diamond-studded rollerblades, to cows fed with gold-plated blades of grass, to designer outfits for their toddlers. Marquee fashion designers like Oscar de la Renta and Gucci are turning their attention to the affluent toddler demographic, which is really just a way of saying that designers are targeting parents who want to dress their children up like little American Girl dolls and send them out into the world, exclaiming, "It's my very own miniature status symbol!"

According to CBS News, sales for luxury children's clothes still make up only a fraction (about 3 percent) of the $34 billion fashion industry, though that fraction is growing as economic conditions improve and the more affluent come out of their caves, sniffing around for places to spend lots of money. The research firm NPD Group reports that children's wear sales rose a total of 4 percent between May 2011 and May 2012, with the upscale children's clothing component rising nearly 7 percent. All of this, meanwhile, is happening amidst a 3 percent rise in the overall clothing market.

Designers are mostly targeting households with a total income of $350,000 or higher, appealing to parents who want their young children, in lieu of practicing math, perhaps, to sharpen their fashion sense because a kid falls behind real fast in the asshole arms race if he or she doesn't know at least twenty major designers by puberty. New York-based fashion consultant Robert Burke explains the trend in terms of the "mini-me phenomenon," adding that, for parents splurging on expensive clothes for themselves, "It [buying something for their kids] feels good. It's like one for me and one for you."

That kind of consumer palliative, however, can get to be pretty expensive, with boys shirts from Dolce & Gabbana running in the $190 range, and girls dresses starting at about $500. Stifle your gasps — I mean, you don't want your kid to look like some kind of poor, do you? Shuffling around the Upper East Side of Manhattan in a, gulp, J. Crew ensemble, smelling vaguely of syrup. And not maple syrup either, but corn syrup, like that Log Cabin of lies. Disgusting.

Anyway, parents spending serious coin on their kids' wardrobes (one New York mother planned on spending in excess of $10,000 on her 3-year-old daughter's fall wardrobe), don't care if their kids grow out of clothes in like three days or if they're instilling some nefarious streak of superficiality that will blossom (fester) in their kids until they're 22 and decide to rebel by doing Americorps for like, a month — these parents just want their kids to look good and receive positive reinforcement about looking good. "I really believe," says one fashion-forward mother about her 3-year-old's self-esteem, "when she dresses like this, she feels better about herself." That's probably true, considering that every time the 3-year-old girl gets stuffed into a Burberry jacket, her mother beams at her and says something she doesn't even realize is screwing with her daughter's value system, something like, "Mommy loves you when you dress pretty." Sad face.

Rich toddlers draw fashion designers' eyes [CBS News]

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Unretouched Photos of Victoria's Secret Angel Doutzen Kroes Reveal How Much Photoshop Happens [Fashion]

Aug 9, 2012 6:20 PM   Some apparently unretouched photographs from a Victoria's Secret catalog have surfaced online under mysterious circumstances. The shots, featuring VS angel Doutzen Kroes, are stunning — Kroes, of course, looks amazing in all of them. But what's really interesting is what they reveal about Victoria's Secret's Photoshop standards.

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Anna Piaggi, Legendary Lady of Fashion, Dead at 81 [Video]

Fashion writer and longtime contributor to Vogue Italia Anna Piaggi has died. She was 81. Piaggi was known for her elaborate dress, fondness for tiny hats, sky blue hair, and theatrical makeup. Piaggi's wardrobe was showcased in a 2006 exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. She was a muse to milliner Stephen Jones, a friend of Karl Lagerfeld, and she claimed never to have publicly worn the same outfit twice:

"I have always liked to mix my look. Every dress tells a story. I am very careful about how I look. I never appear anywhere without make-up on. In fact, I never even go out of my bedroom without make-up. I never wear the same thing twice in public. I love hats and I love little canes and binoculars. It looks like everything is just put together in a haphazard way — but no, it is very carefully thought out. Karl Lagerfeld once held a ball and the theme was Venetian and everyone was dressing as Doges but I decided to go as a fishwife. I balanced a wicker basket on my head filled with seaweed and crabs and I hung two pigeons I'd bought from the butcher round my neck but at midnight they started to bleed so I had to leave like Cinderella!"

[WWD]
Franca Sozzani Tweeted, "23 years of working together, thousands of D.P. carried out together. I will always remember you, Anna." ("D.P." or doppie pagine is Italian for double-page spread, the feature for which Piaggi was best known.) [@FrancaSozzani]
Dita Von Teese Tweeted, "So sad to hear that Anna Piaggi, one of my last icons of beauty & fashion has passed. She was the height of glamorous eccentricity." [@DitaVonTeese]

Solange Knowles is the new face of Madewell, the J. Crew brand. [YouTube] Pink is now a face of CoverGirl. [TLF] This video from the '80s shows Patricia Field's old store, back when it was in the East Village instead of its current location on the Bowery. The clip features James St. James, Tangella, and Lisa E. [Back in the Gays] Here is a sneak preview of Carine Roitfeld's forthcoming magazine, CR Fashion Book. The model is Marie Piovesan. It's not the first time baby dolls have appeared in Roitfeld's work. [Fashion Copious] It's dark times for ladymags. Marie Claire and Harper's Bazaar both had essentially flat year-on-year newsstand sales during the first six months of this year, but W (-2.2%), Vogue (-16.5%), Lucky (-15.5%), Allure (-19%), Elle (-20%), Glamour (-6.8%), and InStyle (-4.5%) all posted big declines. [WWD]Cathy Horyn recalls observing fashion publicist Eleanor Lambert compiling her International Best-Dressed List (which Vanity Fair has taken over since Lambert's death) and asks, on the occasion of this year's list, why the publisher and Ebony Fashion Fair founder Eunice Johnson never made the list:

That afternoon in Ms. Lambert's faded living room the discussion was quite polite, if pointed. (I sensed that some socialites would never meet the entry standards, which were vague to me, and that their names were dropped into the ring basically so they could be swatted away.) I'm tempted to say that the committee members accepted their duties in the same lighthearted spirit of the list.

After all, they were not handing out Nobel Prizes. But in fact most of the debate was dead serious. [...]

Ms. Johnson was far ahead of her time in recognizing that fashion should be beautiful but not elitist. I was surprised, then, to discover that she never made the Best Dressed List. Not in any year. Even if she had more substantial accolades during her lifetime, surely her activities and personal taste merited this small attention.

[On The Runway]

In today's news of where and how the majority of our clothing is made, Thailand is concerned that its apparel manufacturing industry is being threatened by neighbors like Myanmar and Cambodia, which have lower labor costs. The daily minimum wage in Bangkok and six Thai provinces was raised to $9.41 in May, over the objections of companies. [WWD]
Model Ali Stephens got married this weekend. Her maid of honor was fellow model Toni Garrn. [Fashion Copious]Betsey Johnson the clothing company is bankrupt and gone — but the brand will, as planned, live on through licensing. A line of Betsey Johnson branded "solid and printed sexy, flowing dresses" will be shown at New York fashion week and sold via department stores for $99-$249. [WWD]Free People, the Urban Outfitters-owned brand, is coming to the U.K. In the fall it will launch a dedicated e-commerce site there (its U.S. site already ships to the U.K.) and sell via department stores. [WWD]Meanwhile, French brand the Kooples is coming to the U.S. via Bloomingdale's. [WWD]

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Birds Are the Latest in Awkward Gewgaw Fashion [Snap Judgment]

Aug 1, 2012 9:45 PM  

Actors Tippi Hedren, left, and Toby Jones appear onstage during HBO's TCA panel for "The Girl" at the Beverly Hilton hotel on Wednesday, Aug. 1, 2012, in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Photo by John Shearer/Invision/AP)

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Ryan Lochte Gives Womankind Questionable Fashion Advice [Ryan Lochte]

It's been a busy week for your boyfriend US swimmer Ryan Lochte. First, he moistened America's vaginas by undulating suggestively through the water whilst wearing a Speedo, then he dried them back up again when he tried to wear that stupid America grill on the medal stand after winning gold. But even in the midst of his exhausting schedule of winking at cameras, making that fist clenching and shaking them over opposite shoulders "I WIN! I AM A WINNER" gesture, and having sex with you in your imagination, he's found time to share his thoughts on The Ladies — what's confusing about them, what clothes look good on them. And, Ryan — bless his aquatic, superhuman heart — should probably stick to swimming.

Women's Health chatted briefly with Lochte at the Games and asked him some gravely important questions about how he feels about women. They're confusing, but also interesting, he offers. He likes to have sex with the lights on and he rarely wears clothes, he adds. And if he could have one super power in the world, it would be the power to read women's thoughts (here's the point in the interview that no one had the heart to tell him that if he could tell what women are thinking, it's that they wonder how Ryan Lochte's penis looks) like how Mel Gibson reads women's thoughts in What Women Want. Oh, Ryan.

But the best bit of the interview is when they ask him what clothes look most fetching on a woman. Thankfully, Lochte didn't say "nothing," which is a thing that guys who will give you crabs say; instead, he said they look good one of his long sleeved button down shirts "and that's all," or in white jeans.

White jeans. Ryan Lochte's dream girl is a YM Trauma Rama anecdote waiting to happen.

[Women's Health]

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The Strange Story Of Nelson Mandela's Clothing Line [Fashion]

A controversy is brewing in South Africa over Nelson Mandela's reported involvement in a clothing line.

When news broke earlier this month that the former South African leader had launched a line of branded apparel, portions of the proceeds from which would support one of his charities, the media covered it as a curiosity: a Nelson Mandela clothing line?

And Nelson Mandela's involvement was, at least according to the media who covered the line's launch, a given. "Nelson Mandela's Clothing Line '46664' Debuts In The U.S. (PHOTOS)" went the Huffington Post headline. Trade publication Women's Wear Daily, which had been reporting on the clothing line since 2011, wrote that the Nelson Mandela Foundation "oversees" the clothing brand in question, which it said in another story was "founded by Nelson Mandela." Styleite was just one of many news sources to refer to the brand, known as 466/64 after Mandela's Robben Island prisoner ID number, as "Nelson Mandela's Fashion Line." (It helpfully noted that the brand name was "pronounced 'four, double six, six four.'") After the North American launch, the Daily Beast wrote in its lede:

New York Fashion Week, held semi-annually in September and February, features collections from the likes of Ralph Lauren, Michael Kors, and Diane von Furstenberg.

But next season will feature an unusual addition to that lineup: Nelson Mandela.

But now, a spokesperson for the Nelson Mandela Foundation says that 466/64 has no affiliation with Mandela and is misleading the public by claiming an association with the former president and humanitarian hero. Says the organization in a statement:

"466/64 Fashion is making false claims that it is tied to Nelson Mandela — it is not, nor does it benefit him or his foundations. They are deliberately misleading people in the fashion industry — the name ‘Nelson Mandela' is not to be used in conjunction with any commercial products. They cleverly use his quotes in their advertising, but this is not his line of clothing; he did not launch it, nor is he associated with it."

This is interesting because the clothing brand and the Mandela Foundation appeared to enjoy a much cozier relationship until recently. As late as September of 2011, Tokyo Sexwale — who is the South African Minister of Human Settlements, a former political prisoner held at Robben Island, and a Nelson Mandela Foundation board member — was telling the press nice, positive things about 466/64 and its relationship with Mandela and his legacy. "466/64 Apparel is not just another brand," said Sexwale, "but a way of giving back to an organization that is intimately connected with the legacy of this country's greatest leader."

For its part, 466/64 maintains that it is the official, licensed apparel brand of a charity associated with Mandela — just not of the Mandela Foundation:

A spokeswoman for 466/64 Fashion explained that the 46664 trademark (which takes its name from the prison number given to Mandela when he was incarcerated for life on Robben Island, South Africa) is managed by 46664 South Africa, a not-for-profit organization founded in 2002 to promote Nelson Mandela's humanitarian legacy. "46664 South Africa has its own board of directors and is a separate entity to the Nelson Mandela Foundation," said the statement. "46664 South Africa has officially licensed 466/64 Fashion. 466/64 Fashion's mandate from 46664 South Africa is to establish a global fashion brand that can create a sustainable income stream in order to fund various humanitarian projects. 46664 South Africa's ethos is not to use Mr. Mandela's name and image commercially. 466/64 Fashion is therefore not Mr. Mandela's clothing brand or line and should not be reported as such."

That may be what the brand says now, but until recently it certainly has played up its association with Mandela. Images distributed to the press featured quotes from Mandela, it launched in the U.S. at the South African consulate on Nelson Mandela International Day — which was also Nelson Mandela's 94th birthday — and the reason so many publications (including us) have reported that 466/64 South Africa was associated with Nelson Mandela is because that's what the 466/64 press materials said.

466/64 recently updated its Web site to remove both an FAQ section and the entire company "About" page (which now just redirects to the homepage). Cached versions of those pages reveal only a little more about the 466/64 business model, and nothing about whatever disagreement or controversy seems to have led the Mandela Foundation to disavow the brand. 466/64 apparel seems to be the product of a licensing deal between the 46664 South Africa foundation and a South African company called Brand ID, which 46664 authorized to sell apparel bearing the 466/64 brand.

According to 466/64's old FAQ, the deal was a typical flat fee + points licensing arrangement — Brand ID guaranteed 46664 a minimum annual fee plus a percentage of annual sales. The fee was not disclosed, but 466/64 said the guaranteed minimum "assists 46664 with long-term planning, through a sustainable income stream." The percentage of annual sales to be given to the charity was 7%-9% — which might not sound like a lot, but given the margins on apparel is actually considered quite substantial. (Most celebrities, by contrast, get "points" of only 1-5% on their licensed apparel deals, although the numbers may be higher if the points are on net sales as opposed to gross.) Still, it must be said that buying clothing and accessories is a notably inefficient means of contributing to any charity.

466/64 also said that it would be producing at least 60% of its wares in South Africa to support the local textile and apparel manufacturing industry. And while it certainly made a lot of its purported connection to Mandela, it also said, "An important aspect of the license agreement 46664 is the protection of Mr Mandela's Intellectual Property. This guards against the commercialisation of Mr Mandela's name and image and other elements related to him within the terms of the license agreement."

Controversy Over South African Label 466/64 [WWD]

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