Hilfiger drops Lagerfeld's line

[Lena]

to be honest this comes as a surprise..

Hilfiger Cuts Lagerfeld Contemporary Line, Staff
By Lisa Lockwood

So much for the love affair between Tommy and Karl.
After a much ballyhooed launch, Tommy Hilfiger Corp., which acquired Lagerfeld's business in January 2005, pulled the plug on Lagerfeld's New York operation on Thursday.
Hilfiger, which was bought for $1.6 billion by Apax Partners last month, said it plans to consolidate the Lagerfeld operations into a sole Paris headquarters. As a result, the highly anticipated Karl Lagerfeld women's and men's contemporary collection, based here, will be discontinued following its fall 2006 retail debut. The Paris headquarters will continue to design, produce and sell the Lagerfeld Collection designer line (formerly called Lagerfeld Gallery).
The abrupt closure of the Karl Lagerfeld line, which was headquartered at 601 West 26th Street, will result in the elimination of 25 jobs, including that of Ann Acierno, president of new business development at Hilfiger, who oversaw the Lagerfeld business. Melanie Ward, who served as creative director of the Lagerfeld contemporary line, was a consultant, and her role may be ending along with the collection.
All global licensing will continue to be managed from New York by Hilfiger's established licensing organization. Lagerfeld will remain a wholly owned subsidiary of Hilfiger.
The designer's arrival in New York was heralded by a major fall runway show in February at the close of fashion week. Karl Lagerfeld offered a limited-edition capsule group this spring exclusively to Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman, consisting of about 28 women's and 23 men's styles, with denim as a key component. The Neiman's and Bergdorf's line was created to build excitement for the larger fall launch.
Hilfiger and Lagerfeld originally had high hopes for the Karl Lagerfeld line, which was expected to be a big-volume business. "I'm very much into large distribution," said Lagerfeld last year. "With haute couture, I proved that I can design the most expensive things, and with H&M, I can do the less expensive things. This will be in the middle of all that."
Fred Gehring, chief executive officer of Hilfiger, couldn't be reached for comment Thursday, but said in a statement: "We believe strongly in the enormous potential of the Karl Lagerfeld brand. Karl is one of the great design icons of our time. However, the management of dual headquarters in both Paris and New York is complex and specifically at odds with the company's core mission following the acquisition by Apax Partners to focus resources on our core activity of further developing the Tommy Hilfiger brand
....

this report is a part of a (long) wwd article

 

[Diorling]

Im really SHOCKED, why would they do this? It hasn't been out long enough to be proven a flop (or a hit)...

Granted the clothes were really crappy, but who's Tommy to judge? Hm...wierd

 

[Lena]

it must have flopped major time in the showroom..

Melanie Ward wont be celebrating..

 

[new_dawn_fades]

so long karla!... but this is interesting nevertheless... i never realy liked any of it..it all seemed like they were trying way too hard.... but i must say i never really disliked melanie ward..i like her as a stylist...

 

[Meg]

I find the whole lagerfeld situation to be confusing in general. Are there two lines or one? Why change the name from lagerfeld gallery? how does everything piece together? Good riddance i say.

 

[tuomas]

Karl really is cursed when it comes to his fashion ventures outside Chanel & Fendi...I bet Melanie isn't going to stay unemployed for long, she's a brilliant stylist and even managed to make that Lagerfeld crap look semi-decent.

 

[Scott]

Too bad for Melanie. First Helmut now this. Now all she has at the moment is her work at Bazaar which is becoming a bit redundant these days. She needs another strong styling job.

Aside from that,I completely agree with Meg. I never understood this relationship...seemed ever so strange to me as well. What did they(the labels) ever have in common in the first place anyhow? Maybe it's for the best....

 

[GalleriaResident]

DAMN! Two Seasons an it gets the AX I guess Lagerfeld cant stand on his own yet he is a great designer but his own name doesnt have the cache imo unlike Tom Ford. But Tommy Hilfiger got more attention from apex? For what Hilfigher is pure garbage its a joke to wear trailer trash doesnt even wear hilfiger. They should just shut Tommy down keep H by Hilfiger an keep moving his line is a waste of money.

 

[Diorling]

Does that mean it'll go on sale...like a serious liquidation? If so I wouldn't mind getting a couple of those Love Karl tshirts, only if they're dirt cheap.

Strange, he's not on NeimanMarcus.com anymore...It couldnt have sold out, Ive literally seen nobody wearing it, not even a Love Karl tshirt which were supposed to be the "flagship" piece...

 

[spottie]

I thought the capsule collection was waaay too fugly for the money. (Except the lbd was pretty cute.) The fall looks are much more promising though. Surprised that it got axed so quickly--it must have really bombed at the retail level.

 

[Hye Park Lover]

Surprised by such a quick ending to Karl's ventures in New York, I quite liked Melanie Ward's influence on the collection. Overall it was of a higher standard than the normal Lagerfeld gallery stuff... Unlucky for Melanie

 

[kimair]

i liked his f/w presentation quite a bit...
sad to see this venture coming to an end, despite how odd it was to begin with...

 

[Pastry]

^ i know, i grew to like it..i actually think it's good. like Lena said, they must have sold nothing in the showroom..there's got to be a reason for this abrupt stop..very strange..

but then if it didn't sell at all, why would they still produce the line for a debut? what's the point?! something fishy is going on

 

[ultramarine]

Hum ... well... I dunno .. it does come as a surprise .. but ... oh, well!

 

[juzuxel]

That was quick... I mean it wasn't good but was it that bad. I mean it would be like eating in a restaurant and you get the food you have one bite and they take it away... It had to flunk really really (really) badly. But life goes on...

 

[justinleaddict]

^ indeed. The last collection wasn't too bad either..

 

[mishahoi]

the last collection didnt seem bad at all... this is quite a surprise, yes!!

 

[Lena]

wasnt a terrible collection but it wasn't Lagerfeld 'material' at all..
if one wanted something that looked so much like AnnD. / Yohji styles, one go and buy the original collection.

i never thought this 'indie' style could apply to the Lagerfeld client

 

[amor]

Does this mean we are expecting a show in Paris for Spring 2007?

 

[Lena]

no, i dont think so, not until the company changes hands again