Dries Van Noten and the CEO of Thom Browne: an exclusive interview
Well before the coronavirus was officially declared a pandemic, there were already cracks in the global fashion system that were expanding, and too large to ignore. If it is true that safeguarding public health during an emergency was fundamental, many industry leaders believe that it would be foolish to re-emerge from the crisis without making any changes.
Through an online poster, Open Letter to the Fashion Industry, published on May 12, a consortium of luxury sector retailers and stylists have addressed the problem of timing of collections and discounts deliveries, which implies that probably the autumn winter season should be distributed in winter (from late August to January ) and spring summer in summer (from February to the end of July). Led by Dries Van Noten and developed through a series of three video forums, Craig Green, Erdem Moralıoğlu, Gabriela Hearst, Marine Serre, Thom Browne and Tory Burch are among the first to sign the initiative, alongside retailers such as Bergdorf Goodman, Lane Crawford, Nordstrom and Selfridges.
"We have been forced to take a step back, we have been forced to examine everything we are doing, and decide if it still makes sense," Van Noten told Fashion about his initiative, which also aims to reduce the impact of the fashion industry on the environment and to reconsider the classic format of the show. Here is a designer who in 25 years of career has managed to circumvent the mainstream in fashion and at the same time to excel from a commercial point of view: a stylist who refused to "throw out" pre-collections and who launched his first perfume in 2013, in collaboration with the perfumier Frédéric Malle.
Only time will tell us what the fashion industry of the future will be like, but a good starting point is certainly to talk about it with those who are at the forefront of those who build it. On Zoom we talked to Van Noten and Rodrigo Bazan, the CEO of Thom Browne, about sustainability, the importance of the seasons and the future of the fashion shows.
The open letter to the fashion industry is the result of a series of conversations between leading figures in the fashion industry who share the same vision. How did these conversations come about?Dries Van Noten (DVN): "For the first time in a long time the world was locked in the house thinking about the future. The forum kicked off with Andrew Keith (president of Lane Crawford Editor's note) talking about the problems the industry is facing. From there, we contacted designers and retailers and the group grew organically. We were particularly concerned about the delivery of the autumn winter 2020 collections which was postponed to August and until October due to the pandemic, with the closing of the end of season sales already on the day of Black Friday (November 27, Editor's note), but then there it occurred to us that delivery on these dates would simplify our work, while satisfying customer needs ".
Rodrigo Bazan (RB): "For Thom and me, selling in the right season is a common sense choice. What Dries created in this case completely changes the rules of the game, because you see the creatives, the CEOs, the buyers all together who openly confront each other on video. These things don't happen when everything goes great, these things happen when you face a crisis. "
If the calendar is not so functional, why have we continued to follow it for so long?DVN: "One of the main reasons is respect. Fashion has become frivolous, and customers no longer respect it. A month or two after a collection arrives in the store, it is put on sale: discounts are applied before a customer can start wearing the winter coat he purchased in the summer. This dependence on discounts is absurd.
"Before the crisis, people said that the pressure to produce more collections and to launch others even in the previous months no longer made sense, creativity needs time to mature. I think we needed this moment to stop, take a step back and reflect on everything we've done. "
RB: "When we talked to retailers, the interesting thing was that they told us that we are suggesting ending a season as we had done before the 2008 financial crisis, when there had been many anticipated price cuts. But this is a global pandemic, it is a very different crisis. Again the initial reaction was to reduce prices, but why do it when you know that the products will be delivered late? What we offer is a much healthier rhythm, to give more time to the products to be sold ".
Like many of the designers who signed the letter, both Dries Van Noten and Thom Browne sell to a global clientele: is there still a need to respect the seasons?DVN: "Even if you have clients in Australia, Los Angeles or Paris, the seasons are important. To give value to a collection, because it is not just a product, you have to tell its story. Obviously, we include lighter items in the winter collections and heavier items in the summer ones, but the story must be complete and make sense.
"And then the seasons are changing because of climate change. Today more than ever it is very important to think about the essence of design: what value does this garment have? And will it still have value in the coming years? Can it be worn on many different occasions "?
RB: "Thom believes in the seasons, and in offering the customer cashmere in the colder months of the year, and fresher fabrics in the warmer months. There is a precise formula in the way he puts together a collection, and there is a certain degree of repetitiveness in his creative process. "
DVN: "As a creative, fashion shows are very important because they mark the conclusion of a collection before moving on to the next. It is a magical moment when all the elements are put together in one moment: the collections, the models, the hairstyles, the make-up, the lights, the music, the scenography. A moment you share with 400 other people.
"We're going to do a digital presentation next season, and it's great to use technology, to make it part of the process. We have to find ways to make the fashion shows more sustainable, perhaps some stylist will decide that they can do without it, but for me it would be as if a theater company continually rehearsed without ever performing ".
RB: "Fashion weeks are very effective, because there are buyers, the press and so on, all together in the same place, for designers it is the maximum visibility. In our conversations on Zoom, buyers explained that they can only buy small quantities online, but that for large budgets they absolutely need to see the products in person. Until we can do the fashion shows again, we will find interesting alternatives, of course, but when it is possible to show again, I think it will remain the most effective way of communicating creativity ".
With good reason, the sustainability requirements of the fashion industry are increasingly under scrutiny. How do you hope to reduce your impact on the environment?DVN: "As much as you have the right mindset, everything falls into place. These are small gestures, but also great ideas, from reducing the use of the copier to rethinking the way you ship products. For example, last season all the polyester we used was made from recycled plastic bottles; we started shipping blazers by superimposing them on shirts instead of packaging them individually, we halved the quantity of materials used for packaging. During one of our meetings on the forum, Andrew Keith proposed not to produce hangers with the brand name anymore, so they won't have to be changed when they move from the designer to the store. "
"Unfortunately, fashion will never be completely sustainable, but if everyone does their best it will already be a big step forward. A garment can be made of organic cotton, but then how is it shipped, by what means of transport? Talking to my team, we thought if we should give customers more information than they usually read on e-commerce sites. That is, they want to know exactly where that garment is produced? Want to know how it's made? They want to know everything about fabrics "?
RB: "I link to one thing Dries said earlier: respect. When Thom designs a garment, he imagines it in a vintage shop in twenty years: it is made to last. By designing clothes that are as far as possible detached from the seasons, as classic as possible; managing the quantities that are produced and expanding this swirling cycle of three months, people's wardrobes would be timeless. Furthermore, being more aware of the way in which we, as a fashion industry, transport collections and find materials, would already be an important step in the right direction ".
How do you hope your forum will be useful to your brands and to the sector in general?DVN: "We don't want to become a" fashion police ". Each brand will find its own creative solutions. I've never done pre-collections, but for the designers who make them, is there a way to insert them in one of the four great fashion weeks? I like doing separate fashion shows for men and women, because I don't want my menswear to become just a womenswear accessory, but some designers will choose to do co-ed fashion shows. I have always told the story of my collections, not everyone likes it, but that was never my purpose. Have I always done everything perfectly? No. Our collections are too large and since they are delivered three months after the fashion show, we have to pre-order the fabrics, and often large quantities are left over.
"The only thing we ask is to have the courage to keep the same timing that the coronavirus crisis forced us to follow."
RB: "The most important thing in the forum is the fast exchange of great ideas. Until now, everyone has followed the same roadmap for someone else. The beautiful thing that the forum has highlighted is that it does not work for brands, nor for retailers. Now creativity has the opportunity to breathe.
"Dries and Thom have had a very similar path. Both are great creatives who have built their businesses steadily over the years and, interestingly, have recently had investments from family-owned companies (the Spanish group Puig acquired the majority stake of Dries Van Noten in June 2018 , Ermenegildo Zegna acquired 85% of the shares of the Thom Browne brand also in 2018, Editor's note). They are both thriving businesses because they have done things consciously, but I hope we will get out of this crisis even better than before. "
