Julia Nobis lands a Calvin Klein exclusive

calvin klein fw1011/getty via daylife


If there's one thing that trumps getting a spot in the Marc Jacobs show at New York Fashion Week, then it's landing an exclusive at Calvin Klein. Frockwriter mentioned that Priscilla's newbie Julia Nobis was a definite one to watch at New York Fashion Week, having been tipped by influential New York casting director Michelle Lee. Less than an hour ago in New York Nobis walked the second of two Calvin Klein shows - as no less than an exclusive (as confirmed by CK's Malcolm Carfrae). In modelspeak, Calvin Klein Collection is a queenmaker and if frockwriter is not mistaken, in terms of Australians, only Gemma Ward and Abbey Lee Kershaw have walked its runways before. Neither as an exclusive.

Andrej Pejic Storms London

Frockwriter predicted that 2010 could be Andrej Pejic's year. So far the androgynous Melbournite is off to a flying start. We mentioned that he was heading to London Fashion Week, which starts tomorrow. Well according to Chadwicks booker (and Model Mania scribe) Joseph Tenni, Pejic arrived in London last Wednesday, went to see agencies on Friday and at his first appointment, with Storm - the agency that famously discovered Kate Moss - he was signed on the spot. Started doing appointments on Monday, on Wednesday shot with both Dazed & Confused and Libertine Magazine. Meanwhile, here is Pejic, above, on the cover of a supplement inside the new issue of Australia's Culture magazine. And here is LFW's digital schedule, which includes 26 live streamed shows - including Friday night's sass & bide show. Stand by to see Pejic on the runway.

McQueen's shoes weren't made for walking, but that's just what they'll do on March 9

alexander mcqueen ss10/style.com

Did we or did we not say that Alexander McQueen's Fall/Winter 2010/2011 show in Paris remains locked into the (constantly updated) Paris Fashion Week schedule - suggesting that the show will definitely be going ahead? (UPDATE: since removed from schedule. UPDATE: Nevertheless since confirmed by a company spokeswoman to take place on March 9). And that the production of showpieces specifically commissioned by McQueen for the presentation before his February 11th death, continues unabated? We did. And voilà, comes word today from Gucci Group chief executive Robert Polet via WWD that a McQueen collection will definitely be presented during Paris Fashion Week. The exact format of the presentation, however, remains unclear. Frockwriter can tell you a little bit more about those showpieces currently in production. We're talking shoes. McQueen and co, we hear, were so thrilled with the publicity generated by the Armadillos (above) and Geiger-inspired footwear from Spring/Summer 2010 (even though it terrified some models) that he designed/ordered some equally extreme footwear. Too bad he won't be around to see the final results.

"No change" to Alexander McQueen's Paris show date and production

alexander mcqueen SS10/graphikaddict

Surely the biggest question on the lips of everyone in the fashion world at the moment, beyond what the future holds for the Alexander McQueen brand, is, just what is happening with the scheduled presentation of McQueen’s Fall/Winter 2010/2011 collection at 8.30pm on March 9 in Paris? In the wake of the designer’s suicide on February 11, plans would obviously have been thrown into chaos. Irrespective of what happens to the brand in the longterm however, for the time being it is still a going concern. And the collection was reportedly completed, including final fittings, in the week prior to McQueen's death. Frockwriter has just checked with the Paris shows organising body, the Chambre Syndicale, which reports there is so far "aucune modification" (no change) to the schedule. Sources close to McQueen’s atelier, moreover, tell frockwriter that in terms of the production of showpieces commissioned specifically for the presentation, there is also no change to the delivery deadline. Whether the items are destined for the show, or merely for future photographic purposes, is unclear. But why the hurry otherwise? UPDATE: MCQUEEN'S NAME REMOVED FROM SCHEDULE, BUT SHOW STILL REPORTEDLY GOING AHEAD ON THE 9TH.

Women are from Venus, Sonny Vandevelde to show at Mars

There are lots of reasons to check out the L’Oreal Melbourne Fashion Festival, which runs from March 14-21 at venues around Melbourne. Listening to Calvin Klein creative director Francisco Costa and Calvin Klein Inc's Executive Vice President of Global Communications (and Sydney expat) Malcolm Carfrae wax lyrical on helming a fashion superbrand at the Business Seminar on March 19 is one of them. As is checking in to see the sophomore exhibition of Belgralian backstage ace Sonny Vandevelde at Mars Gallery from March 13-28. Currently snapping the New York shows, the Sunster will just manage to make the opening after the FW1011 season wraps in Paris on March 10. Above is the flyer.

Christina Carey nabs Marc Jacobs

marc jacobs fw1011/style.com

Word just in from backstage at Marc Jacobs (via Sonny Vandevelde) is that Priscilla's Christina Carey is the only Australian model booked for the show (confirmed). The Marc Jacobs show, which is due to kick off at 12.00pm AEST (8.00pm EST), is one of the most prestigious modelling gigs at New York Fashion Week - if not the most prestigious. You can watch the show live stream on marcjacobs.com. Great get for Carey.

Bloggers now account for up to 40percent of some New York show guest lists

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Today WWD has yet another story about social media. Yes we all know many brands are live streaming shows and that the new media uptake is accelerating. What really caught my eye however was a handful of figures that they had managed to extract from various fashion houses delineating what percentages of either their press lists - or, according to WWD, their total guests lists - are suddenly being thrown open to bloggers. For companies that have either already shown in New York or are about to show: 10 percent of Nicole Miller's press list was reportedly comprised of bloggers. Tory Burch's guest list, 15percent. Vivienne Tam's press list, 20percent (200 bloggers). Ports 1961's guest list, 35percent. And the guest lists of both Walter and Temperley London: a whopping 40percent.

Against this backdrop, frockwriter feels the need to point out that the Paris shows organising body, the Chambre Syndicale, in all its wisdom, has just refused to accredit Melanie Hick. That's the Melbourne-based fashion editor of The Vine – Fairfax Digital's youth-skewed news website. As recounted to frockwriter, “We don’t accredit websites” was the response she was given while attempting to organise her upcoming FW1011 shows trip.

Fantastic to see that however quickly other parts of the fashion world are embracing the digital age, the French establishment continues to discriminate against even online professionals.

Of course the Chambre Syndicale has accredited a few websites in the past – style.com and Fashion Wire Daily two examples.

However as the organisation informed me back in early 2007, when I switched from being the fashion reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald to that of its online arm smh.com.au, and then again six months later, the fashion reporter for News Ltd's news.com.au, they’re not accrediting any "new" ones. Fairfax Digital and News Digital Media only operating two of the highest traffic news media websites in Australia.

Seriously, get a grip. And then go get a clue.

Luxury fail

Australian jeweller Sarina Suriano and her stonemason husband Noel Keating recently returned from a two and half year stint in London. In early December they also welcomed their first child, Stella. On December 17th, Keating went to Double Bay luxury shoe emporium Cosmopolitan Shoes to purchase a special Christmas gift for his wife: a beige pearlised patent leather YSL wallet from the Y-Mail collection. Keating reports that he was initially disappointed that the wallet was not packaged in a YSL box, as seen elsewhere (although it’s unclear if this was from YSL-owned stores). Instead, the $1,100 wallet was wrapped in what he describes as a “scruffy” YSL dust bag. On Christmas Eve, Suriano opened her gift. After her initial elation, she was disappointed to turn the wallet over and discover a small split in the leather on its back – something that Keating evidently had not spotted. After phoning Cosmopolitan Shoes to ask for a replacement, the duo returned the wallet to the store on December 30th and a replacement wallet was duly handed over. They accepted it and left the store. According to the Suriano-Keatings, the wallet remained untouched in its dust bag in their bedroom over the following three days. If only it had stayed there.

On January 3rd, over the course of a day’s shopping trip with a friend, Suriano says that she noticed the fabric banding around the zip of the wallet starting to fray. She opened the wallet to take a closer look and reports she spotted one jagged corner of the credit card holster immediately adjacent to the frayed banding, which, she surmised, had contributed to the fraying.

Exacerbating the problem: the credit card holster was, says Suriano, quite tight, making it difficult to remove cards, with cards becoming hooked in the banding as Suriano removed them. Later that day, Suriano reports that she also noticed a dark mark had appeared on the back of the wallet, which, she insists, had remained in her handbag all day. Attempts to clean the mark proved unsuccessful as it appeared to be ingrained in the leather.

All of these alleged faults have been documented in this series of photographs above and below, supplied by Suriano and Keating.

On January 7th, Suriano and Keating contacted the store again to ask for a full refund. They were told that someone would call them back. They report that noone did call them back. So on January 9th, they turned up at the store to ask for a full refund.

There was a dramatic contrast in the reception they received this time around. On this occasion, reports the duo, they were accused of scuffing and overfilling the wallet and then bringing it back for a refund.

The situation deteriorated. Over the course of the exchange, says Suriano, it was suggested that the matter might be referred to YSL parent Gucci Group, with Suriano noting that she believed Gucci Group would definitely want to know if something was not right with their product.

Suriano and Keating claim that at this point, Cosmopolitan Shoes director Rose Ghosn screamed at them in front of other customers and various staff members, calling them “pedantic, insecure, paranoid customers that pick a tiny fault in everything”, adding to Keating, “Obviously you couldn’t afford the wallet and now you want a refund.”

Undeterred, Suriano and Keating contacted YSL Paris, a representative from which instructed them (in correspondence sighted by frockwriter) that Cosmopolitan Shoes should have followed the company’s “Quality process”, with a view to initiating a “Quality examination procedure”. The rep told Suriano and Keating that he would contact Cosmopolitan Shoes.

According to YSL correspondence, the company contacted Cosmopolitan Shoes on January 18th instructing the company to provide a full refund. Over the course of the following week, YSL states that it sent “daily reminders”.

According to Suriano and Keating, Cosmopolitan Shoes failed to contact them to inform them that a refund was due. Their numerous efforts to reach Cosmopolitan Shoes director Rose Ghosn by phone were unfruitful, with messages left unanswered and on several occasions, they claim, staff hanging up on them.

On February 4th, Suriano reports, she finally did manage get through. Suriano says that there was a heated exchange with Ghosn, during the course of which - by all accounts - various unpleasanteries were exchanged on both sides. Still no offer to refund the wallet however, say Suriano and Keating, with Suriano adding that she was told the store “never gives refunds”.

On February 7th, frockwriter spoke with Rose Ghosn to get her side of the story. Ghosn said that she gave Suriano and Keating the benefit of the doubt on the first occasion and was happy to exchange the wallet.

However she declined to exchange the second wallet because, she believes, Suriano damaged the wallet herself. Ghosn suggested the most likely scenario for the scuff mark is that Suriano accidentally ran her pram over it.

“She ripped two wallets, absolutely, due to change of mind” said Ghosn. “Because she knew there was no other way to get a refund in this country. But a damaged item does”.

At one point Ghosn passed the phone to a colleague by the name of Dawn, who referred to the Suriano-Keatings as “problem customers”.

According to Ghosn the entire January 7th incident was captured on her security cameras - with the February 4th phone conversation also recorded (Suriano confirms that this was disclosed to her during the phone conversation). Ghosn added that she and her staff have been "harrassed" by Suriano and Keating.

The question that begs to be asked: why not simply give them the refund? These were, after all, YSL's instructions. The phone call was cut short by Ghosn so sadly, we did not get that far. The problems, say Suriano and Keating, initially came down to a YSL quality issue, not a reflection on Cosmopolitan Shoes.

As for the manufacturing origin of the wallet, Suriano says that there is an illegible stamp directly underneath a “YSL” stamp on one part of the wallet. Frockwriter checked a similar wallet from the same YSL collection at David Jones and found the similarly illegible small stamp under a “YSL” stamp in one part, with a “made in france” stamped in lower case letters in another (rather difficult to locate) area. Suriano reports she has so far been unable to locate the latter in her wallet.

A well-placed luxury industry source tells frockwriter that quality issues can arise within the manufacturing process at major luxury brands. The source added that a “bad batch” could be to blame.

Suriano and Keating insist that they did not damage the wallets and that Cosmopolitan Shoes has still made no offer to reimburse the wallet,

Suriano and Keating hope to have the matter resolved at the NSW Consumer Trader & Tenancy Tribunal.

Ghosn, meanwhile, told frockwriter that she is considering releasing her CCTV footage on Facebook.










All photos: supplied by Sarina Suriano and Noel Keating.

Alexander Wang channels Twilight for FW1011

alexander wang fw1011/ap via daylife

Opened and closed by veteran Natalia Vodianova, Alexander Wang's layered, Gothic-inspired show featured one Australian model, Abbey Lee Kershaw, who is already omnipresent at the FW1011 shows, which kicked off officially on Thursday. Streamed live a couple of hours ago, click here to see SHOWstudio's just-posted video.

Bloggers on the runway at New York Fashion Week?

juicystar007 (T) allthatglitrs21

Well they made it to the front row, where else is there for the fashion media’s new celebrities to go but the runway and advertising campaigns? Bryanboy is currently at New York Fashion Week and recently hinted that he just signed his first advertising campaign. No word yet on what that is. But one might easily speculate that Marc Jacobs seems an obvious (and yes, perhaps far too obvious) fit, given that over the past two years Bryanboy has become an unofficial online ambassador for the brand. Frockwriter was fascinated to just learn via The Imagist (aka models.com’s editorial director Wayne Sterling) that Marc Jacobs may be using an element of street casting for Monday’s show. Then came word from Wikifashion co-founder Madeline Veenstra, an Australian covering Chictopia10, the Fashion 2.0 conference that’s on right now in New York (by proxy), that two YouTube beauty bloggers are due to walk in an as yet unnamed New York Fashion Week show.

On closer inspection they are sisters Blair (top) and Elle Fowler. According to a video update just posted by 21 year-old Elle, the two are indeed due to walk in one show and her 16 year-old sister Blair was the youngest makeup artist to have ever worked as makeup director at a New York Fashion Week show: Minnie Mortimer. The latter being one of a score of low profile labels that show at New York Fashion Week which is yes, a leviathan event.

Bloggers who appear either on runways or in ad campaigns are unlikely to win favour with the fashion media establishment, which has accused bloggers of becoming the butt boys and girls of fashion advertisers.

The fash blogosphere’s riposte: those in graft houses shouldn’t throw stones.