A Jones, Jacobs Reunion? Plus Vuitton’s Saint-Tropez Eats, Nautica Links With Shark Week
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POWER OF TWO: Could Kim Jones and Marc Jacobs, who worked together for several years at Louis Vuitton, reunite for a design project?
According to market sources, the British and American designers are discussing a collaboration at the Fendi brand, where Jones is artistic director of haute couture, ready-to-wear and fur collections for women.
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It could be unveiled as soon as one of the international fashion weeks this September, possibly New York, these sources said.
Reached on Tuesday, Fendi had no comment, while a spokesman for Jacobs didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Since arriving at Fendi in September 2020, Jones wasted little time in pursuing collaborations and in September 2021 unveiled a full-scale brand swap with Versace.
During a surprise fashion show at the end of that Milan Fashion Week, Donatella Versace paraded a Fendi collection and Jones a Versace lineup, both for the pre-fall 2022 season and already in stores. Some accessories come emblazoned with “Fendace” — a hybrid of the two Italian luxury brands.
Jones followed up late last year with a collaboration between Fendi and Kim Kardashian’s Skims shapewear that was inspired inspired by a 1979 Fendi collection designed by the late Karl Lagerfeld.
Fendi and Marc Jacobs are both controlled by French luxury giant LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton.
Jones is also artistic director of men’s collections at Dior in Paris, where he has collaborated with a wide range of fine artists, including Kaws, Daniel Arsham, Peter Doig and Amoako Boafo, and more recently the designer Eli Russell Linnetz of ERL.
During his acclaimed 16-year tenure at the creative helm of women’s at Louis Vuitton, Jacobs pioneered the concept of the fashion-art runway collaboration, first with Stephen Sprouse and later with several artists including Takashi Murakami and Richard Prince. The bags he designed with Sprouse and Murakami became global phenomena.
Jones was men’s artistic director at Vuitton from 2011 to 2018. In an Instagram post marking his departure, Jones wrote: “I am grateful to @themarcjacobs for giving me the opportunity to be here in the first place!”
Collaborations have proliferated across all levels of the industry — and in some surprising configurations, including among brands within the same luxury group.
Also making headlines last year was a “hacker project” between Gucci and Balenciaga for the spring 2022 season in which creative directors Alessandro Michele and Demna, respectively, created their own logo-bearing takes on each designer brand’s signature motifs. Gucci and Balenciaga are controlled by French group Kering. — MILES SOCHA
BON APPETIT: Louis Vuitton, long synonymous with its famous monogram, may soon be thought of for mouthwatering meals, too.
Venturing further into the hospitality business, the French luxury giant is opening a summer restaurant in Saint-Tropez at the White 1921 Hotel on the Place des Lices, WWD has learned.
The 40-seat outdoor restaurant, slated to open June 17 for the summer, is not attached to a Louis Vuitton store, although there is one close by.
The eatery is called Mory Sacko at Louis Vuitton, named after the up-and-coming chef at the MoSuke restaurant in Paris, which boasts one Michelin star.
According to Vuitton, the vegetable-heavy menu will feature “globe-trotting recipes where African and Japanese influences meet the know-how of French cuisine.” For lunch, Sacko plans to offer gourmet versions of the Japanese lunch box known as “ekiben,” here featuring glass containers on a bespoke wooden tray.
Sacko also contributed to the decor, which boasts ship-deck wooden flooring, rattan chairs and hanging lamps, plus a verdant wall studded with sculpted monogram emblems.
The French luxury giant opened its first Vuitton café and restaurant in 2020 at its flagship boutique in Osaka, Japan, and followed up last year with an LV Café and chocolate shop at its new seven-story Ginza Namiki flagship in Tokyo.
In addition, last month the brand debuted a pop-up restaurant at its flagship in Seoul’s Gangnam district, that Louis Vuitton Café will be overseen by Korean-born French chef Pierre Sang Boyer, who runs several restaurants in Paris.
Michael Burke, chairman and chief executive officer of Vuitton, has hinted that eateries and even hotels could be a future expansion avenue for the megabrand. — M.S.
OPEN WIDE: Nautica is not afraid of an ocean predator.
In honor of World Oceans Day on June 8, the brand is partnering with the Discovery Channel on a capsule collection tied to its popular Shark Week franchise. Shark Week is scheduled to premiere on the cable channel this July but the apparel collection is launching immediately.
The Nautica x Shark Week collection features polos, woven shirts, swim shorts and accessories with shark-inspired patterns and bright graphics. The line will retail for $34.50 to $98 and will be sold in select Nautica and Macy’s stores as well as online at the Nautica and Macy’s e-commerce site. Through Aug. 31, 5 percent of the purchase price of the items sold on the Nautica site will be donated to Oceana, a longtime partner of Nautica.
The limited-edition collection will also serve to amplify the message of the nonprofit organization whose mission is to protect the world’s oceans. A digital and broadcast campaign that has been created for this launch is intended to focus on protecting sharks, raising awareness of how important they are to the ocean ecosystem, and the fight to end the domestic shark fin trade in the U.S.
To further amplify the message, Nautica and Discovery have tapped Andre Musgrove, underwater cinematographer and photographer, freediver and shark diving expert, to create a PSA video that will run across both brands’ platforms.
Shark Week is an annual broadcast event designed to uncover the secrets of the ocean creature. It airs in 220 countries and territories around the world. — JEAN E. PALMIERI
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