Never not looking for a new pair of white jeans. Looks like something good is coming from Studio Nicholson…
WORDS: Disneyrollergirl/Navaz Batliwalla
IMAGE: Nick Wakeman/Studio Nicholson
NOTE: Most images are digitally enhanced. Some posts use affiliate links and PR samples. Please read my privacy and cookies policy here
CLICK HERE to get Disneyrollergirl blog posts straight to your inbox once a week
CLICK HERE to buy my book The New Garconne: How to be a Modern Gentlewoman
While it’s doom and gloom in the world of retail (Selfridges is letting 450 staff go), I can’t help believing that there’s still life in the physical retail model. And now is the perfect time for some fresh thinking.
Nike has just built its new Paris flagship, a ‘House of Innovation’ (below) serving as a temple for its most loyal worshippers. As it moves away from the wholesale model to focus on selling directly to these loyalists from its own stores, its goal is to focus on full price products that die-hards don’t mind paying for.
Sounds like a good move. Despite being decidedly unsporty, NikeTown has always been one of my favourite retail destinations. Cathy Sparks, global vice president and general manager of Nike Direct stores hinted that Oxford Street’s NikeTown store will be next for the House of Innovation treatment.
In other retail news, what happened to curation? A Continuous Lean has this deep dive into how to make J Crew great again, reminiscing about its game-changing days of perfectly chosen brand collabs. Unfortunately, too many competitors leapt onto this playbook bandwagon and J Crew failed to maintain its pace ahead of that curve. Now that retailers are dropping like flies, it would be a good time to see some truly selective buying to help stores stand out in the market. Maybe it’s time for buyers to trust their instincts and not just what’s trending on Instagram.
And another reason online isn’t the be all and end all: bots. Vogue Business reports on the nightmare scenario for accessible luxury brand, Telfar. No sooner had it restocked its signature $150 bags online, than a swarm of bots bought them all and instantly ‘flipped’ them at twice the price, crashing the Telfar site in the process. Not luxe!
WORDS: Disneyrollergirl/Navaz Batliwalla
IMAGES: Nike by Geordie Wood for Vogue Paris; Nike House of Innovation Paris
NOTE: Most images are digitally enhanced. Some posts use affiliate links and PR samples. Please read my privacy and cookies policy here
CLICK HERE to get Disneyrollergirl blog posts straight to your inbox once a week
CLICK HERE to buy my book The New Garconne: How to be a Modern Gentlewoman
R.I.P the Japanese designer Kansai Yamamoto, who passed away after suffering from leukemia. He was brilliant, and his flamboyant style influenced other fashion designers throughout his career.
He himself was working until the end; in 2017, Nicolas Ghesquiere enlisted him to create new graphics for a Louis Vuitton Cruise show in Kyoto. An antidote to the sombre wabi-sabi style we usually think of as ‘Japanese’, his colourful basara aesthetic epitomises the escapism of 70s glam rock. As Alex Fury noted in 2017 (pay wall), that style movement was a welcome distraction from economic strife and political unrest. I wonder if we might see elements of basara come through post-COVID-19…?
My friend Graham Cassie, of the vintage showroom Cassie Mercantile shared this great Kansai Yamamoto story on his Instagram today…
“I had the pleasure of meeting him about 15 years ago in Tokyo at an event given by United Arrows to promote our exhibition in their flagship store. A homage to the 1980’s Buffalo movement in London. Kansai said to me “this exhibition is amazing, you must visit me at my studio tomorrow.” The next day we were met at the studio door by two guys dressed in black polo necks and taken up to his studio which overlooked the Imperial Palace. We spent the rest of Sunday watching films of Kansai’s exhibitions and studying clothing he had made for John Lennon and David Bowie. The first concert I attended age 13 was David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust at the Greens Playhouse in Glasgow which made a huge impression on me, so the whole afternoon was surreal and very memorable.”
WORDS: Disneyrollergirl/Navaz Batliwalla
IMAGE: David Bowie with Kansai Yamamoto 1973
NOTE: Most images are digitally enhanced. Some posts use affiliate links and PR samples. Please read my privacy and cookies policy here
CLICK HERE to get Disneyrollergirl blog posts straight to your inbox once a week
CLICK HERE to buy my book The New Garconne: How to be a Modern Gentlewoman
I used a tote bag for the first time in months last week. Like practically everyone else, I’ve not commuted since March, so I’ve been getting by with pockets for my daily walkabout, or a compact J&M Davidson camera bag if I’m going further than the coffee shop at the end of my road.
But last week I went to meet up with a friend and needed a bigger bag for the mask-brolly-sweater gubbins I had to carry with me. And a leather tote was too heavy for the 90 minute round trip (I’m still not doing public transport). So out came my trusty canvas tote; lightweight, a decent size, and automatically imbued with a summer city-break vibe.
I put the canvas tote in the same bracket as straw totes for summer. They always signify a kind of Jane Birkin barefoot energy, especially with accompanying sunnies and stripy Mariniere. Canvas and straw bags also happen to chime with an overarching movement towards non-leather bags. Or minimal leather at least. Every luxury bag label of note seems to have a variation of a leather-trimmed canvas cross-body bag, for example, while the best totes I’ve seen are mostly canvas with a leather patch detail or pocket, or a pair of handsome handles made of tan leather.
Saint Laurent definitely got the cross-body bag* memo, while Valextra* and Loewe* tick the tote boxes. And Rue de Verneuil (above) is my latest canvas tote obsession, with dozens of varieties in style and size.
NOW CLICK BELOW TO SHOP THE POST. (I MAY EARN A COMMISSION ON THE BASKET VALUE OF ITEMS BOUGHT*)…
WORDS: Disneyrollergirl/Navaz Batliwalla
IMAGE: Rue de Verneuil
NOTE: Most images are digitally enhanced. Some posts use affiliate links* and PR samples. Please read my privacy and cookies policy here
CLICK HERE to get Disneyrollergirl blog posts straight to your inbox once a week
CLICK HERE to buy my book The New Garconne: How to be a Modern Gentlewoman
