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Never expect Glenn Martens to follow the beaten path: he would much rather, as always, take the corner at full speed and let everyone else choke on his dust. In a landscape where every brand seems to beg Gen Z for attention, Martens settled that matter long ago. Under his command, Diesel has become nothing short of an amusement park for Zoomers: iridescent pop, public happenings, and winks to the 1990s and early 2000s an era this generation knows only through the filters of algorithms. Continue reading →

We finally reached the shores of Osaka, a vast hive of metal and wind, escorted by a cohort of journalists and a legion of models from America and France. The entire airport rustled like an ocean stirred by the tumult of currents licking the coasts of Japan: Parisian Haute Couture, arriving in a dazzling procession, awakened in the crowd a frenzy that made the security services nervous and almost fierce.

When suddenly, in this din of voices and lights, an improbable silhouette emerged: an old Japanese woman dressed in an ancestral kimono, advancing with the sacred slowness of two thousand years of history. She appeared like an apparition, a breath drawn from a Kurosawa film, a parenthesis of poetry slipped into the middle of human clamor.

For an instant, time suspended its heartbeat. Then it resumed, heavy, as the security agents, discovering that she belonged to no protocol, rushed in and stopped her just a few steps from my father. She shouted words in a language that vibrated like an ancient chant, words whose meaning he did not grasp.

“What is she saying?” Jacques Mouclier asked his interpreter.
“She is thanking you for her son, Mr. Mouclier.” Continue reading →

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This generation born between 1965 and 1980 aka Generation X, who really earned their name by showing both their sex and their butts, the ones who “knew life before the Internet but answer emails faster than their kids” is now at the peak of its career and earning power… and yet luxury brands still treat them like an Ikea bookcase: practical, sturdy, but, you know, something to deal with later.

To be fair, Gen X never liked being put into a box. Even back then, they didn’t care for labels neither on jam jars nor on people. Which makes them a big mystery for brands. According to CANAL-Luxe, that’s a strategic mistake roughly on par with “forgetting your suitcase when getting off a train.”

So, out of 1,150 people aged 45 to 65 financially comfortable folks in the U.S., France, the UAE, and China the report shows that everywhere except China, luxury isn’t a way of saying “look at me” but more like “leave me alone, I’m treating myself.” Basically, we’ve moved from bling to “inner peace with a silk lining.” Continue reading →

At the heart of Paris, Saint Laurent unveils its new flagship, a monumental setting that redefines the experience of contemporary luxury. More than a boutique, it is a true piece of brand architecture: a space where Anthony Vaccarello’s radical aesthetic meets the house’s timeless elegance. Continue reading →

One might have thought that the eternal darling of concepts would eventually manage to surprise us with something other than déjà vu. But no he tirelessly falls back into the same habits, and his latest bag arrives with a strong sense of déjà vu, to say the least. It’s astonishingly similar to the bag created by Maison Monnier in 2013; same silhouette, same spirit.

Fashion history is a palimpsest everyone borrows from everyone else. But there’s such a thing as a subtle homage, a discreet echo, an intelligent reference… and then there’s a copy-paste wrapped in Provençal flair, photographed at sunset as if the golden light could dissolve the similarities. Continue reading →

Failed Chanel Heist: Police Already Tracking Suspects… Teenagers With Dubious Taste. Chic panic hit Avenue Montaigne on Saturday morning: four individuals attempted to rob the Chanel boutique. Armed to the teeth rifles, an axe, and Yamaha TMax scooters repurposed as luxury battering rams, the rookie bandits charged the storefront as if they were filming Fast & Furious: Golden Triangle Edition.

Fortunately, a security guard endowed with admirable courage (and likely motivated by the proximity of his lunch break) managed to drop the metal gate just in time. Curtain down literally. Caught off guard, the four culprits immediately fled.

According to our sources, the police are now pursuing an explosive lead: the suspects may be young individuals… with particularly questionable fashion sense. Continue reading →

Hermès is adjusting the trajectory of its Fragrance and Beauty division by appointing Anne-Sarah Panhard as its new managing director. This move comes as the beauty segment considered a strategic driver of diversification and international expansion has shown a slight decline over the first nine months of the year.

Before joining Hermès, Panhard built a strong international profile, first as a Fashion Buyer at Printemps, then as UK Country Manager for Salvatore Ferragamo, and later as Country Manager for Saks Fifth Avenue. She joined Hermès in 2011, subsequently leading Hermès France first overseeing commercial activities and then the domestic market during a pivotal phase of premiumization and retail consolidation.

Since 2018, she has headed Hermès Maison, overseeing a portfolio ranging from furniture to tableware, as well as Puiforcat, formerly owned by Pochet et du Courval, prior to its integration into the Hermès group.

FM

Tonight, no mercy, says the London Moon, ruthlessly wiping out all before vanishing leaving behind only a few last glimmers to shield humanity from the dark. For the battle of the perfumes is raging not over granny’s little bottles, but over great vaults that reek of roses and gold dust. HFC Prestige International, Coty’s Swiss arm, is baring its claws and dragging Gucci and Kering into court, over there in perfidious Albion.

Indeed, on 20 October, in a tale of contracts, licences and egos scented with amber and vanilla, the sweet-smelling world of fragrance and the less fragrant world of business are now colliding in the courtroom.

Because, the day before, we learnt that Kering had got all cosy with L’Oréal for fifty years of exclusive love, because they’re worth it. An imperial alliance, half a century of creams, bottles, logos and botoxed smiles. Once the lease with Coty ends in 2028, all being well, Gucci’s perfume will be changing beds.

But beware! Kering swears, cross its heart, that it honours its contracts! That it betrays no one! That it’s as loyal as a saint in a tailored suit! Yet in the world of luxury, when one starts talking about loyalty, one feels a sudden urge to turn celibate of the brain. Continue reading →

French literature does love its ghosts especially the ones that sell. After Dumas, resurrected by Sarkozy’s sentimental marketing stunt, Adélaïde de Clermont-Tonnerre now takes it upon herself to dig up Milady de Winter and dress her in modern clothes. The result, however, is clumsy and misguided. “Je voulais vivre” promises a bold reimagining, a fresh take on one of Dumas’s most intriguing characters, but delivers only a stiff, overwrought pastiche a novel corseted by ambition it can’t possibly sustain.

In trying to compete with Dumas, Clermont-Tonnerre gets lost in her own ornate prose. What aims for brilliance feels merely heavy. Every line drips with forced literary references; every page bears the weight of self-conscious style. You can almost hear the rustle of period costumes, but there’s no energy, no wit, none of the effortless vitality that made Dumas irresistible.

And Milady? Dumas’s darkly fascinating femme fatale becomes, here, a glossy-paper heroine a kind of reheated feminist icon, somewhere between Nabilla Vergara and a luxury-brand influencer. In trying to give Milady a second life, Clermont-Tonnerre drains her of mystery, danger, and soul. Continue reading →

The collaboration between Net-a-Porter and Rabanne was celebrated in dazzling style in London, with a glittering party at the Scotch of St. James, the legendary venue of the Swinging Sixties. Transformed into the “Club Rabanne” for one night, the club welcomed celebrities and VIP clients dressed in pieces from the new capsule collection, inspired by the golden age of Miami nightlife — metallic dresses, zebra prints, and luminous silhouettes. Continue reading →

Here is the couture man the most destitute of Fashion Week and the most pathetic, armed with merely a month of study at Esmod. He is a one-man amateur lexicographer, crafting a couture born from a phlegmatic spit, slowly making its morbid descent to the ground and muttering back: “I am the black hole of the universe.” Hammering away at common sense with his needle, he stands at the very antipodes of today’s trends.

He leaves Balmain after fourteen years of reign without a throne fourteen years of sequins, selfies, and gold-shouldered jackets. Olivier Rousteing, the man who turned a couture house into an Instagram and TikTok franchise, takes his final bow. This tormented soul who imagines all the world’s misery was meant for him a lonely child first, then burned later, after the theft of a collection that, truth be told, was never going to fly that high. And when he is alone with himself, staring at the blank page, he strikes his own forehead to summon the genesis of creation yet nothing comes.

Now fashion sighs not with emotion, but with disbelief: how could a designer who couldn’t sew lead such a prestigious atelier? Balmain, once synonymous with perfect cuts and architectural tailoring, had become a temple of the “digital pout”, where the needle was replaced by a filter.

Of course, one must credit him with a certain talent: that of self-performance. Rousteing managed to make himself the most profitable product of the house. The Balmain Army that battalion of models and influencers as dazzling as a sequin curtain paraded more often on social media than on catwalks. Continue reading →

This is a(Chronicle of a Small Earthquake in the Kingdom of Fashion). In the golden heavens of haute couture, where reigns the Almighty Lord of Luxury, a strange sound was heard: “Versace sold to Prada for $1.4 billion!”

The angels of marketing lost their wings. Even the tailors of “j’aDior”, overcome with emotion, pricked their fingers on their pins. For you see, the rival Capri Holdings thought to be dozing off atop its Michael Kors and Jimmy Choo had just landed a major blow, an uppercut in Italian silk.

At the head of this little rebellion stood a certain “John Idol” a name predestined, if not divine. The man may not have multiplied margins as others multiply loaves, yet he has kept the faith:

“We performed better in the second quarter,” he declared, like a preacher in a Roman collar. “Our revenues fell by only 2.5%  praise profitability!”

Granted, the prophet of ready-to-wear has yet to turn the water of losses into champagne: a $34 million deficit still means a lot of bubbles to chase. But optimism remains the essential accessory in this world even more than handbags. Continue reading →

On Monday night, the gods of fashion gathered at New York’s Museum of Natural History where usually it’s the dinosaurs that steal the spotlight. This time, it was Ralph Lauren roaring: he took home the CFDA American Womenswear Designer of the Year Award. Ralph beat out Wes Gordon (Carolina Herrera), Rachel Scott (Diotima), Daniella Kallmeyer (Kallmeyer), and Tory Burch who’s probably starting to wonder if the jury has a personal vendetta against her.

Naomi Watts handed him the award, proving once again that she can do it all: cry in a horror movie and smile sincerely while giving a trophy to a man whose polos have taken over the planet since 1995. Continue reading →

SHEIN is this ogre a clown? This smuggled Jonah lands on the asphalt of Châtelet, by the unexpected hiccup of a Great Trabucaire Collector, pounding out the drumbeat of slander and fashion. In short, at the BHV, fast fashion is turning into religion, and Paris lights a polyester candle. Because on November 5 at exactly 1 p.m., while some in the neighborhood will be lunching on lukewarm quinoa thinking about the end of the world, others will hurry to the BHV to witness an event of historic significance: the opening of the very first physical store in the world of the Chinese brand.

Here, then, is the temple of “made-in-anywhere” settling into the beating heart of the capital, under the respectable vaults of the Bazar de l’Hôtel de Ville and across from another bazaar that of the queen mayor spends. Paris, city of couture, capital of fashion, cradle of Dior, Chanel, and Saint Laurent, now welcomes its enemy. Thanks to the “Pascal Marrants” and “flying rices” for doing nothing to prevent this brand known as “the hops”  from selling a €2.99 sweater that reeks of kerosene. Continue reading →

Gen Z and Alpha… the ones who replaced the Britney Spears poster with a bottle of niacinamide serum and who no longer wear makeup to please, but to protest. Lipstick has become a political manifesto, and every hydrating mask a statement of intent. Welcome to the wonderful world of “purpose-driven beauty,” where we save the planet one sponsored story at a time.

We’re told these young people are “changing the game.” They want authenticity, transparency, meaning. Yes meaning, but delivered within 24 hours, with free returns. They no longer just buy things; they “create movements.” Movements of the wrist, mostly while shaking their ring light for yet another “my morning skincare routine” video.

They’re not consumers anymore they’re people doing the same thing at the same time in front of a phone. Old-fashioned sleepovers are making a comeback, except now they’re “face mask workshops,” “group selfies,” “collective reels” beauty sessions where no one looks at each other, but everyone films themselves. Continue reading →

When the Chinese Communist Party Champions… Consumption. It’s an announcement that would make Karl Marx smile if he ever saw the price of a J’aDior handbag. On Tuesday, the Chinese government unveiled the broad outlines of its 15th Five-Year Plan, with one clear ambition: to boost household consumption. Yes, you read that correctly the Chinese Communist Party wants its citizens to shop more.

Presented at the close of the fourth plenum of the 20th Party Congress, this strategic plan aims to rebalance the country’s economy, still too reliant on exports and public investment, by giving more weight to domestic demand. A logic that smells distinctly of Keynesianism… with a mandarin twist.

This 15th plan does not mark an ideological revolution it continues a trend that began several years ago. But what’s new is the scale of the rhetoric around “common prosperity” and the rise of a consumer middle class, expected to become the engine of China’s future growth.

The authorities want to support purchasing power, improve social protection, and stimulate demand for high value-added goods and services. And among those goods, of course… is luxury. Continue reading →

We thought we had exhausted every form of charming ugliness the Funko Pops, or those Chucky dolls displayed like trophies of our sentimental age. And then, one morning, from a few workshops somewhere in East Asia, appeared the “Labubu”: little plush demons conceived by a certain Kasing Lung a poet with a scalpel, a taciturn genius who seems to have grown up inside a Grimm fairy tale censored by Freud.

The Labubu has the look of a modern chimera: a rabbit on amphetamines, a Gremlin who once attended a rainbow-pony boarding school, a Scandinavian troll deprived of sleep and therapy… Their carnivorous grin, hallucinated eyes, insomniac-elf ears, and tiny mutant-baby body inspire ambiguity: should we kiss them, burn them, or have them read Rimbaud?

Each new appearance of a Labubu sparks scenes of consumerist delirium worthy of the first days of a Hermès sale. Teenagers camp outside the temples of Pop Mart, servers collapse under the weight of desire, and prices soar like start-up shares before the crash. A rare Labubu can fetch sums that would make a Silicon Valley courtier proud, and rumor has it that some collectors would sell a kidney or a mother-in-law without remorse to acquire this plush Grail. Continue reading →

Under Louis XIV, the stocking (or long “sock,” but made of silk!) was not a mere accessory: it was a symbol of nobility and refinement, on par with the wig, the lace jabot, or the red heels. The stockings were made of fine silk, often imported from Italy or from Lyon, the great capital of French silk-making. They were sometimes knitted by hand, sometimes by machine, since the knitting machine (invented by William Lee at the end of the 16th century) had already begun to spread.

They reached above the knee sometimes almost to mid-thigh and were held up by garters decorated with ribbons and bows. The most fashionable even had their stockings embroidered: small patterns, gold threads, lace… Nothing was too beautiful when it came to showing off one’s legs.

The handsome calf! It was a true weapon of seduction. Courtiers, ever attentive to their figures, cultivated that shapely curve as eagerly as ladies cared for their complexions. An elegant gentleman was said to have “a well-turned calf,” and some even padded their stockings with cotton to enhance the shape if their legs were too thin. Continue reading →

The creation, production, and distribution of perfumes follow an industrial model radically different from that of fashion or leather goods. It requires global logistical infrastructures, laboratories, a massive distribution network, and marketing capabilities suited to the luxury mass market. L’Oréal, the world leader in beauty, has mastered this model to perfection, whereas Kering—historically focused on fashion does not possess such executional strength. Selling or licensing to L’Oréal means relying on a more competent player to accelerate the growth of its brands.

By selling Creed and granting its beauty licenses for €4 billion, Kering immediately recovers substantial liquidity. These funds allow it to reinvest in its fashion houses—particularly Gucci and Balenciaga, which have faced recent challenges—and to finance their creative and commercial repositioning. In other words, rather than waiting for gradual revenues from fragrance, Kering prefers to reallocate capital toward its strategic priorities. Continue reading →

The Giorgio Armani Group has a new Chief Executive Officer: Giuseppe Marsocci. He succeeds Giorgio Armani, who also served as Chairman of the group he founded fifty years ago.

With his extensive experience and deep understanding of both the industry and the company, Giuseppe Marsocci was the most natural choice to carry forward the founder’s vision. His discretion, loyalty, team spirit, and the relationship of trust he has built with Mr. Armani over the years convinced the Armani Foundation to unanimously propose his appointment.

Born in Turin on December 20, 1963, Mr. Marsocci will report to the Board of Directors chaired by Mr. Dell’Orco, while Silvana Armani will be appointed Vice Chair.

With over thirty-five years of international experience in the fashion and luxury industryincluding twenty-three within the Armani Group Giuseppe Marsocci has served since 2019 as Deputy Managing Director and Global Commercial Director.

FM