With only a few months to go before CarineRoitfeld launches her new magazine, CR Fashion Book, the industry is abuzz with excitment but if recent reports from Page Six are anything to go by, you can cross the powers that be from Condé Nast off that list.
According to the column, Condé’s chairman Jonathan Newhouse 'sent word to photographers including Mario Testino, Craig McDean, David Sims and the Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott team 'remininding' them of their exclusivity with Condé Nast to shoot for its titles including Vogue, W, Glamour, Vanity Fair and Allure.' Even those without exclusivity contracts have reportedly been discouraged from working with Roitfeld on the new venture.
When Miuccia Prada sent Gary Oldman, Jamie Bell, Willem Dafoe and Garrett Hedlund down the runway at Prada's fall menswear show it became a no brainer that al four stars would appear in the brand's Fall 2012 campaign. Now the first image of the David Sims-shot campaign is out.
According to a release, the diverse line-up of actors is supposed to 'represent a cross-generational broadening of the face of Prada Menswear,' and the campaign is supposed to look like a portrait that would be hung in a modern palace. The only person missing is Adrien Brody, who also walked in the show earlier on this year.
When Miuccia Prada cast 14 year-old Hailee Steinfeld as the face, many criticised that the actress was too young evoking the whole young-models-and-stars-dominating-fashion-ads debate that never seems to go away.
But the brand decided to go in a different direction for their fall 2011 campaign by casting 34 year-old Guinevere Van Seenus. Shot by David Sims, the campaign moved away from the 40s feeling of the Bruce Weber S/S12 ad in favour of a stark look shot in a studio. Is the move surprising? Well, not really. It's no secret that older women, especially during this trying economic times, are the ones with the largest disposable income so whilst the Steinfeld campaign was beautiful, casting Van Seenus is clearly a smart business move.
As if you needed an excuse to delve into Zara's new US based e-commerce site when it launches this month, the high street retailer has just released these shots from their Fall 2011 ad campaign starring Stella Tennant and Hailey Clauson shot by David Sims.
If that doesn't get you excited, we don't know what will.
Since Emmanuelle Alt was appointed editor of Vogue Paris, we've all been wondering what direction that magazine will taker under her direction. During the couture shows, she told Hilary Alexander that the magazine will be "the same but different", while back in January, Fabien Baron (Vogue Paris' creative director until just two years ago) predicted that the publication will become more commercial and accessible than under Carine Roitfeld's reign.
The editor recently revealed more on her plans to Vogue's Mark Holgate. “I want to keep the quality, the photographers we work with — David [Sims], Mert and Marcus, Mario [Testino], and Bruce Weber," she explained. "I don’t think there should be radical changes. The magazine should still be chic and sophisticated. It’s a bit like buying an apartment: Before you move in, you have all these plans of what you are going to do, but then you get there, and you realize it is better to spend time living in it, and transforming it over time. I’d like there to be more beauty trends; there was so much of that in Vogue back in the eighties. More French girls, more French lifestyle. And I am going to keep shooting for the magazine — hopefully a story every issue."
We were all sad to see Luella Bartley's eponymous line fold last November but it seems that it wasn't a totally bad experience for the designer after all. “It’s a difficult thing, being a woman, trying to have a successful business, be creative and do the best by your family. I sold it to myself that I could do it all,” she told the Times. “You can, but not the way my business was set up. It was set up for the old me. Maybe I was moving away from that life without realising it.”
With that in mind, Bartley has since been staying full time in the Cornwall cottage that she shares with boyfriend David Sims and their three children. But despite it being 11 months on, the Luella girl hasn't disappeared she said. “My lifestyle changed, but she stayed, which is nice.”
“To anybody urban and creative, it obviously sounds like a drop-out situation,” she said. “Letting go has been the biggest lesson. I used to think that if someone wasn’t successful, it was because they were crap, but now I realise that if people aren’t successful, it’s probably because they aren’t that bothered . . . You think that everyone’s going to forget who you are. But I had a chat with Phoebe [Philo, the creative director of Céline], who I admire so much. She took three years out and made sure her kids were secure. Then, when she was ready, she got the deal she wanted. You’ve just got to know what you want. I know I’ve done the right thing. I don’t mourn anything. I loved what it was, but I’m happy to be out."
