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Rejecting the traditional high-pressure cycle of creating and delivering fashion collections brings benefits to a myriad of designers doing it their own way.

Photography by Sohrab Golsorkhi-AinslieText by Caroline Issa

Pre-pandemic, there was a lot of talk about (and evidence of) designers having meltdowns. Despite the cocooning aimed at keeping reality at arm’s length from these creative directors, they were cracking under the pressure of too many expectations and opinions, the gruelling commercial imperative to create, produce and release. They were being squeezed dry. Then one, two, three and more lauded designers fell spectacularly from their gilded cages, and the debate began about mental health, the weight of expectation and sensitivity, waste from too many collections, and an unsustainable schedule for an industry being egged on by fast-fashion’s turnaround of copies.

Then, in 2020, we paused, not by choice but by circumstance, and the question became how the fashion industry was going to react to this potential reset button. Could it finally, truly reckon with how much it made, how much it wasted and how much we all really needed? Could this jolt actually pivot brands towards new ways of working? Could it now break free from its shackles to create and connect in new and profitable ways?

The Godfather of doing it my way, or the highway

Azzedine Alaïa is the forebear of designers who made their own schedules and rules. A master and a designer who could sculpt the most decadent, technical and heavyweight of fabrics into dresses that would mould bodies into sculpture or transform them into instant totems of chic. He was neither hurried nor given to ceding to the commercial pressures of retailers that wanted designers to churn out collections to keep the economic wheels spinning as the luxury industry exploded in the 2000s. Alaïa was considered famously eccentric not to show on the usual Paris Fashion Week schedule, but instead to stage his shows when he wanted, usually a few weeks or even months after the world media had finished its four-week fashion-show schedule. He didn’t care, those who did show up were the devoted, the curious and those that really mattered, mostly a mix of the VIP customers and buyers who made up his loyal clientele. In fact, for a long period his intimate and personal shows were only staged in his label’s headquarters. When he died in 2017, he left his brand with a treasure trove of an archive, full of unique designs that meant the house could offer classic Alaïa pieces at its own pace even without the visionary founder.

Maison Alaïa recently started a new calendar, showing Autumn/Winter in January and Spring/Summer in July, joining other brands that are cutting their traditional collection presentations from four to two a year, while making multiple, smaller product drops between shows rather than add-on capsule collections.

Alaïa has also recently launched an Editions collection of archive pieces remade using the exact same fabric and pattern. These Editions pieces are in its stores all year, like the a truly classic white shirt or the 1988 Edition, Fringe Bustier in cotton gabardine (see previous page).

I’ll deliver when it’s ready – the deadstock drops

Another designer who has quickly established her own signature silhouette and brand DNA is Cecilie Bahnsen. Launched in spring 2016, her eponymous label’s approach was led by her experience at other designer brands in London and Paris, apprenticeships that honed her own vision. She decided to set up shop in her hometown of Copenhagen and show during Copenhagen Fashion Week with a two collections a year rhythm. Her light, puff sleeve confectionary dresses now drop for the correct season, delivering on a show-now-buy-now schedule.

For spring 2021, Bahnsen is introducing the Essentialism collection, a group of staple pieces that express her identifiable silhouette. “Essentialism pieces are the physical expression of our longevity concept,” Bahnsen writes in an email. “Our universe will always be relevant, outside of the trend system; our products are made to last, to be taken care of, to be passed on.” For these pieces, Bahnsen is partnering with TrueTwins, a digital passport for products that uses Blockchain technology to document the environmental impact of each piece, enabling end consumers to discover their garments’ from start to finish. “TrueTwins tracks the journey of each garment from conception to completion, every place and person the garment encounters,” writes Bahnsen. “Each piece in the collection will have a QR code that you can scan and see the journey. This transparency in our supply chain is very important to us.”

This comes on the heels of another initiative, Encore, which strives to reduce waste and challenge the fashion industry’s overproduction problem by using dead stock from the two main collections for smaller – four- to six-piece – bi-monthly drops. “The Encore collection is very dear to me,” Bahnsen reveals. “Our fabrics are so precious to me; they need to be used. We have never thrown anything away; we have it all here in the studio in Copenhagen, every last scrap. There are so many advantages to making these small collections. It gives the fabric a second life and reduces waste. And the pieces themselves feel even more precious as we are making so few of them.”

Other brands, such as Marine Serre – since she arrived on the scene – and Miu Miu – a re-worked vintage collection unexpectedly dropped in early December 2020 – have also been investigating upcycling and they, as well as Banhsen’s Essentialism and Encore collections, point to a desire to make more responsibly, and on a different schedule. This will in turn surely unleash more demand from customers who want these considered collections from their favourite designers. It also provokes the question as to what on Earth a fashion “season” is today. Given the global nature of sales, how do you serve customers who might be in sweltering summer heat in Australia or -25ºC degrees in Montreal? Why work to season when instead you can drop pieces throughout the year when you are ready, out of materials that already exist?

Break, evolve and re-imagine

What if you’ve paid your dues and worked for large, corporate luxury brands – be it in fashion or advertising – and participated and witnessed the grinding cycle of doing it the same way as everyone else? In the case of Berlin-based label Gembalies, run by designer Frauke Gembalies and her business partner Ekatharina Iliadis, stints at Lanvin and Akris in the sales, marketing and design departments, resulted in spotting an opportunity for a more personal, more considered way of making and selling clothes through private trunk shows. No wholesaling, just direct to customers the old fashioned way. “For small businesses,” Gembalies says, “it’s a great way to expand slowly and steadily, to build up a serious and loyal clientele. When we decided to create Gembalies and sell it through trunk shows, we had a clear vision about our product. The clients loved it, its exclusivity, attention to detail and the idea that we only produce what we sell. From the beginning, our clients have been loyal and we’ve been able to grow healthily from season to season.”

Choosing just a few cities in Europe in which to stage their trunk shows for each new collection, presented on a timetable they choose, Gembalies and Iliadas’ label has gained a cult following for its luxurious textiles and embellished details. “In the beginning, we never thought that this business model could become a model for a new way of selling,” says Gembalies. “It can be challenging at times to produce every season perfectly, but we are proud to have been working with the same manufacturers since we started in 2012 and we’ve a built up a strong relationship with all our suppliers. In fact, in 2020, we had to change nothing, neither the way of selling, nor the style of the collection. For Gembalies, it was business as usual – minus the travelling for trunk shows – and that gives us a positive outlook for the future.”

On the other side of the Atlantic, Juan Carlos Obando had made a signature out of his slinky, draped outfits that showed his talent for colour and texture, but had taken “an editorial break”, as he likes to call it, from his own label to consult for other brands. Then during lockdown in 2020, he launched his new vision, ©OBANDO, with a website-only, direct-to-consumer proposition.

“We are an independent studio with a global reach, and creating a constant offering of new products every three months [on the traditional schedule] did not seem like a realistic way for us to have a long-term business model that endorsed a sustainable creative goal,” says Obando. “We took a break in order to focus on certain styles, define their perceived value and allow them to become hero products. When a young brand defines the product it stands for and backs it up with a consistent vision, then all of the editorial and communications efforts will have a unified intention, creatively and commercially. Tommy Hilfiger gave me the best advice when I asked for his counsel on a distribution strategy: he suggested we focus on the territories that were easier for us to educate, maintain and reinforce the brand versus far-flung stockists that seemed seductive but were not necessarily logical for our business infrastructure. So, we partnered with selected retailers and influential hosts and in the course of 18 months, we held over 110 trunk shows in North and South America. Being based in Los Angeles, we started with the western part of the US, then Mexico, after that we moved towards the east and south of the US and worked our way down to Latin America to Colombia and Peru. The exercise gave us a defined vision of the client and their relationship with the brand, the products and how they want to both consume and be part of my narrative, while becoming the foundation data for the UX and UI of our e-commerce strategy.”

And what a UX it is. In a landscape of similar e-commerce websites, Obando has launched a product-first, audiovisual overload for the senses. Want to hear the designer talk you through the history of a garment, the memories that inspired its shape? Hit the little sound-on button and you’ll get audio tales and sartorial odes. Obando augments the whole e-commerce experience with the senses, critical given his website is exclusively where you can get your hands on his clothes.

By stepping out of his previous cage, Obando’s vision has unfurled his wings, unfettered by retail buyers’ algorithms and Excel spreadsheets. “Creatively, I am having the time to flex ideas and see their potential in a long-term way, and really create products that are responsible all the way from inception to consumption,” says Obando. “For me, that’s a truly sustainable ethos.”

Obando shares Cecilie Bahnsen’s goal for bringing together creative freedom and integrity. “Coming from the advertising world,” says Obando, “I have always seen fashion from a different perspective, particularly from a communication standpoint. Timing, frequency and the message of my contribution to the conversation is key for me. We built a business model that accommodates such ideals. I like the idea of ©OBANDO being what I call a “brand in progress”, one that can quickly adapt, evolve and recalibrate itself to mirror my own evolution as a creative and most importantly, as a human being.”

Find your customer where they spend their time

What if you’ve never sold in a store or delivered “collections” on a timetable your customer is expecting? What if you’ve just made what you’ve loved, put it out there and connected to customers who didn’t know they wanted your clothes until they saw them on social media? There have been so many fascinating brand launches that have shot into fashion’s consciousness thanks to Instagram – but not many continue to thrive, so it is fascinating to follow how those that do whip up a loyal community of customers around the world.

Take the Tweed Project, for example, a brand about passion rather than commercial ambition. Founded by costume designer Triona Lillis and restaurateur Aoibheann McNamara, it reveals a shared aesthetic and a desire to celebrate and elevate Irish craft, textiles and know-how. Both women have forged an impressive and authentic community of makers creating Galway knitted sweaters, Irish linen cushions, and tweed blankets that would make even the strictest of modernists salivate over their handmade, rustic beauty. “We became friends because we had a mutual admiration for each other’s aesthetics,” Lillis recalls. “Aoibheann has a beautiful restaurant in Galway called Ard Bia and works with local potters and artists; it has a shop aspect. When I met her, I had a little vintage shop called Astór selling high-end designer vintage clothing and furniture that I ran part time, as well as doing my costume-design work. We felt that no one was using tweed in a way that we wanted to wear it, and that conversation lead to a small collection. We were somewhat naive about how the industry worked. We realised there was some kind of system with seasons and trade shows, but we just couldn’t see ourselves working like that; it didn’t fit with our lifestyle in the west of Ireland. So we just continued as we started making one-off pieces, occasionally making collections if we felt like it, and being inspired by moments in life rather than predicting the future. We did dabble a little with selling to shops and doing a few trade shows, but it just confirmed to us we could never work in that way.”

There is something special about finding the duo’s Instagram shop full of handmade knits, photographed on their family and friends (and themselves), and such a clear line of transparency about their materials. “Aoibheann is from Ardagh, County Donegal, the home of Donegal tweed so we naturally try to work with the weavers there,” says Triona. “We have an ongoing relationship with Molloy & Sons, with almost all our woollen and tweed fabrics coming from their workshop; they are exceptional weavers with five generations of experience. Our linen is woven in Wexford by Emblem Weavers. More recently, we have started to get fabric from Magee and Kerry Woollen Mills. It’s important to spread the love because as much as we are about nice clothes, we are also trying to support our indigenous industries.”

Perhaps on the other end of the spectrum of a new direct-to-consumer fashion brand is sharp, urban Wardrobe.NYC. The brainchild of designer Josh Goot and stylist Christine Centenera, it was set up for the discerning, fashion-loving customer with little time and a desire to have a curated wardrobe. Choose a Wardrobe box (from the categories Tailored, Sport or Street) of four or eight pre-selected items and voilà, you’re sorted. Initially only available in black and white – the perfect white oversized blouse, the single-button tailored coat, blazer and a stretch legging – full “looks” now might include baby blue trench coats and mini skirts.

Breaking free

Whether it’s designers with decades of experience rejecting the system to show their vision without corporate shackles – Stefano Pilati, Marco Zanini and Julie de Libran, to name just a few – or a relative newcomer who knows nothing other than atypical business models, there is no doubt that designers who have forged their own way emanate elation, breathlessness and joy about their decisions. For Cecilie Bahnsen, the restrictions imposed by her Encore collections are also an opportunity. “It can sometimes be difficult to change certain ways of working and particularly hard to adapt to material restrictions,” she says, “but I think that is part of the beauty of fashion: it is constantly evolving and being developed in new and different ways and always requires creativity.”

The Tweed Project’s Triona Lillis echoes Bahnsen: “We don’t have many challenges to our business model as we have designed a way of working that suits us. We don’t have pressures or deadlines; we just ask our customers to be patient as everything is made as it’s ordered. It takes time, but everything we do takes time. That’s our ethos, and we have loyal customers who come for the quality knowing it will last them a lifetime.”

And what of the speed and the pressure that traditional models were putting on the system pre-pandemic? Juan Carlos Obando has a theory: “More than a customer or retailer, fashion has transitioned into its own segment of the entertainment industry. I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing as a whole; it has made fashion relevant to a broader audience and has inspired many people who saw fashion as something alien or niche to feel welcome and participate. It has allowed fashion to be more inclusive, diverse and a reflection of the real customer instead of an artificial muse. But inexperience in the digital arena created a spiral effect, where everyone was a live trial-by-error experiment. Creation became reactive not proactive. Instead of core products educating the customer about brand value, it became about cluttering the market with new stuff that was supposed to do the branding work. It has worked for some and not for others. Hard to really say what the behaviour post-Covid will be, but we now have a level of awareness due to technology that will allow for a new form of customer to emerge, one who will demand a new pace from fashion. But no matter what, we must be bold; design must be bold in its virtue and its messaging right now. Less stuff, more thought, emotion and intention.”

Can these business models be scaled up? Do they need to? As Frauke Gembalies points out: “Our goal was not really about numbers; it was more about developing a consistent style we both love and really wear. We have total creative freedom and a wonderful clientele who give us amazing feedback. That does not mean that a small business cannot grow; on the contrary, we have numerous requests from retailers. Yet we prefer to stick to our original model – it is not about making less; it is about getting it right.” ◉