Karl Lagerfeld Creates a Collection on the Down Low
What does Karl Lagerfeld think about the current state of fashion?
The iconic designer—who currently helms Chanel’s ready-to-wear and couture lines, designs for his own label, and co-creates Fendi’s ready-to-wear collections—recently spoke to The Business of Fashion about how he’s responding to the see now, buy now trend.
His particular strategy involves creating a system that allows direct-to-consumer offering to co-exist with holding traditional runway shows. “Chanel makes six collections per year, but I make already one—the capsule—that is not shown to the press, to nobody,” he revealed. “The day it comes out is the day the stores get a document. Now I want to do something else—perhaps it’s too early to talk about it—to make a special collection only for the [Internet]. Fifteen things, you buy them and you get them immediately.”
This under-the-radar collection at allows Lagerfeld to design more retail-friendly styles that he wouldn’t necessarily send down the catwalk. “The world is changing—not always for the best—but we have to follow the changes and the Internet, but there is a way of doing it, you know?” he said. “I can show my collections and sell them and give people the time to make their choice, to order them and to make them beautifully produced and editors can photograph them. If not, that’s the end of everything.”
