Comings and goings

While the economy may still be shaky, there are still some interesting new names on the London restaurant scene:

In Mayfair, Michelin-starred restaurant Benares in Berkeley Square has just opened following refurbishment caused by fire. New features include a chef’s table, wine theatre and cellar and private dining areas.

On Endell Street in Covent Garden Tom Dixon has created the interior for Circus, combining minimalist chic with sparkling glamour. Adding entertainment to proceedings, the restaurant stages an interactive show each night featuring burlesque, arialists and drag artists.

Going off the beaten track a little, Portuguese chef Nuno Mendes – who has formerly worked with Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Ferran Adria and Wolfgang Puck – is to open a new restaurant in Bethnal Green in March 2010. Viajante will be part of the pioneering Town Hall luxury hotel project that is taking place in the former municipal building.

Recent closures include St Alban, the Lower Regent Street restaurant of Rex Restaurants, owned by Chris Corbin and Jeremy King who have said that they intend to concentrate on other projects. These include a new restaurant on top of the Bishopgate Tower in the City, due to open in 2012. It is said that the St Alban property will continue to be run as a restaurant but with a completely different concept.

Pay per view

A storm has blown up in the fashion blogging community following an article about bloggers at the shows that appeared in The Independent newspaper. As if often the case, the smartest analysis of the current situation probably comes from Imran Amed at The Business of Fashion who has presented a balanced and sensible response to the article.

Anything I might say would be largely a reiteration of his points. What I would highlight is that at a time when many glossy magazines are refusing to include editorial/product shots not relating to advertisers it seems unbelievable that editors have the audacity to suggest that it is the bloggers who are in some way in the pockets of the fashion PRs. At least most bloggers are not under pressure from a Publisher standing over them, telling them what to feature.

It is this cynical approach and the increasing number of publications that now represent one large, glorified advertorial that have turned fashion-lovers against the mags and driven them to the blogs – many of which are run by hard working writers with a genuine love and understanding of fashion rather a socialite who complains about having to produce one features page of advertiser-driven content each month.

Thinking big

As a follow up to last year's Brandchameleon post Expanding Your Audience, check out the new issue of V magazine - The Size Issue. Well done to all the brands who produced non-sample sized items for the shoots.

V Magazine - The Size Issue

The models were shot by Terry Richardson and look great in the clothes featured. Added fuel to the argument that while conventionally thin models may be convenient for brands to use as they represent a standard size and image, there are alternatives.

At the Luxury Briefing Conference: Smart Ideas for Challenging Times held in London in November 2009, Dr Concetta Lanciaux, advisor to Bernard Arnault at LVMH, talked about how Mark Fast's London Fashion Week presentation which included different sizes of model (Luxury Briefing Conference Report). While Fast's show personally left me cold – use big models, fine, but nobody should trot down a catwalk in diaphanous or crochet dresses with badly-fitting underwear – Lanciaux pointed out that by innovating in this way, Fast had opened his brand up to scores of women who might otherwise have thought that the brand was for them, while while attracting global publicity.

Back in black = back in the black?

In recent interviews chiefs of specialty stores and fashion retailers across the US have indicated that sales for November and December were strong, with some ripples of optimism evident. However it would be wrong to assume that this heralds the arrival of a new, shining dawn for the retail industry. Instead, the heads bobbing above the water on the retail sea can mostly be attributed to reduced inventories, play-safe options and the perceived necessity of Christmas shopping bringing bearish consumers out of their caves to make a festive appearance.

New York stores including Brooks Brothers, Saks Fifth Avenue and Bloomingdales, to name but a few, have publicly talked about keeping inventory tight and either sticking to safe classics – polo shirts, cashmere jumpers, silk ties et al – or trying to emulate the fast-fashion model that has worked so well for some of the high street stores, with quick turnaround of a limited number of each item in an attempt to generate a buy-it-now-or-lose-it-forever hysteria.

Across the pond in the UK a trip to a number of branches of Harvey Nichols indicates that this formerly interesting retailer is also playing it safe. While people may no longer be partying like it is 1999, or any other time of celebration come to that, there was a distinct lack of joie de vivre about the Harvey Nichols pre-Christmas offering, with black to the fore in many of its stores and play-safe shift dresses providing the colour options. In the Edinburgh store there was little eveningwear in evidence at all bar that from Amanda Wakeley – a brand that has been largely overlooked in the now-fading boom years as the popularity of young upstart designers overrode Wakeley's more classical approach.

For too long stores employed the approach of sticking a label and a high pricetag on an item and sitting back in a do-this-and-they-will-buy state of complacency. While consumers are no longer willing to buy into this, neither do they wish to be confined in their purchasing by what retail buyers and business-savvy designers feel to be safe options. At the FT Business of Luxury Conference in 2009 Joshua Shulman, CEO of Jimmy Choo observed that its best-sellers for Spring 2009 had been its lower-end items but that a high-ticket, beaded sandal design had also been flying out of the shops.

And it would seem that therein lies a story... yes, shoppers want beautiful basics that they feel are an investment and give a sense of quality that they just can't achieve by picking up a similar item in Topshop. But they need also need to be offered something exquisite, an item that they can't refuse on the grounds that it will make them feel happy, beautiful, and momentarily forget that they are supposed to be employing a life-mode of frugality and austerity.

Back catalogue

As the fashion world – and it's acolytes – chatter and cheep about The September Issue, the new docu-film on US Vogue, it would seem that the very content matter exemplifies the reason for the recent decline of the world of glossy magazines. The September Issue focuses on the making of the September 2007 issue of the US fashion monthly – screening in September 2009. And as glossy magazines are 'put to bed' at least three months prior to their issue date – August for the September issues – this would indicate that much of the footage in the film would have been shot in early 2007. A time when the world was a different place.

While the Anna Wintour-directed magazine can in no way be considered responsible for the release date of the film, a parallel can be drawn between the disparity between the timing of the launch of the film and the time lapse between the compilation of material for the glossy publications and their arrival on the news stands – raising similar questions over the relevance of both.

In today's world of "fast fashion" how can these magazines stay ahead of the game when publishing so far in advance, particularly when dealing with the notoriously unpredictable whims of designers – and, in recent years, also those of consumers who now demand an increasingly fast stock turn-around. Prada, Gucci, Comme des Garçons, to name but a few, have now all launched pop-up stores, the here-today-gone-tomorrow concept that is often announced weeks before it arrives and gone by the time any of the glossies can 'hold the front' page, should they even feel the urge.

Other fashion names such as Templerley London and Matches in the UK have launched limited-edition collections with runs of items often restricted to ten or less. With the power of fashion blogs and viral marketing this means that the items sell out before readers of the monthly magazines can so much as sniff the items. The same goes for the temporary shops that appear in influential retailers like Colette in Paris, Dover Street Market in London and Opening Ceremony in New York. Often these innovative collaborations are overlooked by monthly magazines as it just doesn't fit with their agenda.

Some PRs will at this point be flaring nostrils and pointing out that it is possible to be organised about letting the glossies know about even temporary and limited-edition collections well in advance. But they probably haven't worked in fashion – or if they have, have been lucky. For the most part, the industry just doesn't work like that. While things are becoming more professional as fashion becomes more corporate, most fashion publicists – particularly outside the US – spend much of their time desperately chasing images, details and, often justifiably, lamenting the coverage they could have got if only they were informed a newsworthy nugget more than a week before the launch date.

The question also remains, at a time of uncertainty such as this, how can Editors get a feel for what is right when working so far in advance? Some would say that it is they who dictate fashion – published and be damned. They are not amongst the huge number of magazine staffers who have been laid off or had their budgets slashed as advertising revenue plummets and the Internet becomes increasingly potent in the world of fashion. It is this sort of arrogance that lead to the downfall of the financial sector and may also have dire consequences for the fashion-led glossy magazine sector.

Splashback: Some of the world's best swimming pools

As hotels increasingly look to make their spa and pool areas an integral part of their offering the pool has come along way from the lap pools that once sufficed for many. Here are a few inspirational spots around the world to go for a paddle...

La Bandita, Tuscany, Italy










Feel as if you're going to fall of the edge of a mountain in this stunning infinity pool on a Tuscan hillside. The surrounding countryside is dappled with vines and fruit groves and marked out as an UNESCO area of outstanding natural beauty, only adding to the experience. Accommodation is provided in a traditional Tuscan farmhouse that has been rebuilt by former Sony executive John Voightman in a thoroughly contemporary fashion – with a bit of help from architects and exhibition designers from some of Florence's top galleries.

http://www.la-bandita.com/index.php?id=home


The Peninsula, New York, USA














Swim amongst the skyscrapers at one of New York's favourite rooftop pool. Then gaze down through the glass walls on the mayhem of Manhattan from a lounger, or from the hotel's sun deck. An added bonus is the stunning Espa spa that has recently opened at the hotel.


The Conrad Hotel, Tokyo, Japan







The top-floor pool at the state-of-the art Conrad Tokyo offers vistas across the Tokyo sky towards the neon of Ginza. The glass skyscrapers of the surrounding business and media district give a space-age feel to the experience. After your swim reward yourself with a massage in the Conrad's impressive Mizuki spa or a meal in China Blue, the hotel's Michelin-starred Chinese restaurant, or Gordon Ramsay's Tokyo flagship, which are also located at Conrad Tokyo.

http://conradhotels1.hilton.com/en/ch/hotels/index.do?ctyhocn=TYOCICI

Expanding your audience

For years high-end women's fashion brands have been notable for downsizing their sizes - only the thinnest and most beautiful may apply. Illustrating the extreme that this has been carried to, Alex Schulman, Editor of UK Vogue, has complained that the sample sizes sent by designers are so small that only unhealthily thin models will fit them. However at this straitened time for the fashion industry as a whole, why is luxury not taking a leaf from the book of the high street and opening itself up to the idea of creating a broader appeal.

It is notable that the star items over the recent retail boom years have been shoes and handbags, with every fashion label with a pulse racing to capitalise on its brand appeal through diversification into accessories and leathergoods. Why then, can the same savvy brands not understand that the reason that these items hold so much appeal is because their appeal is not subject to size? Many a woman who has had a wretched day where NOTHING fits will splash a little more than they meant to on that must-have bag or pair of shoes to take away from the ignominy of their perceived changing-room hell.

Designers and retailers can come up with a slew of arguments for not 'going-large', ranging from protests that the styles are not suitable for certain body shapes to claims that larger sizes are left on the rails at the start of the season. While there is credence in the former, the natural riposte to the latter is to ask why brands can cater for the smaller end of the sizing spectrum but not the larger. It is notable that many of the prime items sold in discount sales and through Net-a-Porter's Outnet online discount outlet are often in the tinier editions – might there be space for a few at the larger end of the scale as well... or might these even be snapped up.

From a purely commercial point of view the biggest argument in favour of sizing up is the consideration that the biggest buyers of luxury are those 'me generation' baby boomers. While the current economic crisis is hitting this demographic they still have money and want to buy. And in case those surrounded by the young and slender hadn't noticed, as the Boomers have increased in years and wealth, it has been known for their waistlines to also augment. It is unrealistic to think that every size can be catered for, but not unreasonable to assume that sizing could be extended to above a US size eight or 10 – the size where many of the more expensive clothing brands draw a line. Also notable is the way that many luxury brands make their garments smaller than standard sizing. Armani and Paul Smith are but two of the retailers where shoppers are advised to go up a size to achieve the correct size. Why? And how short sighted of brands that could have such appeal for the silver market to alienate potentially valuable customers in this way.

In purely demographic terms it is notable that there are considerably more US size 12s in the world than size zeros. Many luxury brands would claim that these people are not their target market, do not fit with their brand image and are of no interest. While this approach may work for some, it is this arrogance that has lead to the fall of many a talented designer or innovative fashion label during difficult times. Fashion is not usually about being sensible or practical but it should be put to some designers that it may just hurt a little less to see the less-than-physically-perfect squeezed into one of their creations than it would be to dim the lights on their brand forever.