Marc Jacobs - Designer

[Melancholybaby]

When you hear the fire alarm instead of people singing happy birthday. Hope everyone is safe and sound!

 

[jeanclaude]

The fumes from nail polish have officially affected his brain.

 

[Deleted member 116957]

US Vogue February 2000
"Paris Match"
Photographers: Steven Meisel, Arthur Elgort
Fashion Editor: Tonne Goodman
Hair: Garren
Makeup: Pat McGrath
Featuring: Gisele Bündchen, Marc Jacobs





Vogue via justaguy

 

[alwaysademo]

nice haircut @blueorchid

 

[THD96]

https://www.wsj.com/business/retail/lvmh-in-talks-to-sell-marc-jacobs-7f23a83a

Reebok??? It doesn't look too bright for Marc Jacobs now.

 

[GivenchyAddict]

Well. This is what happens when you do clownish collections. 😬

 

[LadyJunon]

LVMH is in working with J.P. Morgan to sell Marc Jacobs for $1B. While the brand has been doing well in recent years, Arnault is looking to focus entirely on European luxury brands. Potential buyer include Authentic Brands Group (Reebok, Juicy Couture, Forever 21, Brooks Brothers), WHP Global (Vera Wang, Rag & Bone, Issac Mizrahi) and Bluestar Alliance (Off-White, Palm Angels). Under American leadership, the core entity will focus on IP management and marketing, while making licensing deals for actual product production.

Not by WSJ, but WWD says pretty much the same thing:

Marc Jacobs on the Block as LVMH Looks for $1B
Sources said the luxury powerhouse is in talks with licensing specialists Authentic, WHP and Bluestar.

By Evan Clark
July 25, 2025, 6:37pm

The Marc Jacobs brand might be coming back to America.

Twenty-eight years after Bernard Arnault stepped in to first help support the designer’s brand, LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton is said to be working with investment bankers at J.P. Morgan to find a buyer willing to pony up $1 billion for the business.

WWD had heard in January that the brand was quietly being shopped, but high-level sources at LVMH denied at that time that there was a process under way.

The process ultimately drummed up a good deal of interest from the licensing experts. Multiple sources said Authentic Brands Group, WHP Global and Bluestar Alliance are all said to be interested and involved in the talks.

Of the three, Jamie Salter’s Authentic is the largest and has a joint venture with Saks Global to develop luxury brands using its licensing chops.

But Salter is by no means the only IP specialist angling for luxury brands. WHP bought Vera Wang earlier this year and Bluestar bought the late Virgil Abloh’s Off-White from LVMH last year.

LVMH, J.P. Morgan, Authentic and WHP all declined to comment. Bluestar could not be reached. The talks for Marc Jacobs were earlier reported by The Wall Street Journal.

The potential sale of such a well-known and respected designer brand shines a bright light on big changes in luxury on both sides of the Atlantic.

LVMH is the undisputed powerhouse in the sector, but is also in the midst of a kind of evolution.

Arnault, who built the company through decades of hard-nosed dealmaking and absolute fidelity to brand, has been positioning his children in key positions throughout the company, with one of them expected to step up eventually.

Meanwhile, the luxury market is down, Jonathan Anderson has stepped up as creative head at the company’s Dior brand and even the powerhouse Louis Vuitton, which Jacobs once designed, has not been immune to a more sluggish consumer.

LVMH’s track record for buying and developing U.S. fashion brands is not its strongest suit. Arnault, who is known for buying and holding, also once owned Donna Karan, but sold the business after several difficult years to G-III Apparel Group, which has been building the brand with U.S. retailers.

Marc Jacobs itself has gone through its share of ups and downs under LVMH’s ownership. With Jacobs at the creative helm and his business partner Robert Duffy overseeing operations, the brand had a strong run in both fashion and accessories, especially with its Marc by Marc line (since discontinued) and there was even talk of floating the company separately on the stock exchange.

But Duffy exited a decade ago and the brand has seen a series of different strategies ever since. The most recent under chief executive officer Eric Marechalle has Jacobs, who remains one of the most exciting and creative designers in fashion, focusing on fantastical collections for the fashion connoisseur and a separate team creating the more commercial products that take only some inspiration from what Jacobs shows. The brand has been performing at retail, sources say, and its fragrances remain strong performers.

If having Marc Jacobs on the sales block speaks to a new focus at the big European luxury houses, having companies like Authentic, WHP and Bluestar jockeying for position on the other side of the transaction illustrates where the American market is.

The onetime consolidators of the industry — including PVH Corp., VF and any number of private equity players — have ceded much of the acquisition market to the licensing houses as they push through their own transformations. (The private equity companies are still involved indirectly, they’ve just shifted to backing the IP players).

But the intellectual property model that takes ownership of a brand and focuses on marketing, while cutting licensing deals for production to partners, is not as well tested in luxury, which delicately balances image and product quality.

Marc Jacobs would be a big test of the budding luxury IP model.

— With contributions from Jean E. Palmieri

 

[TomBlanksFullFatMiuMiu]

Tapestry (Coach) would make more sense

 

[TomBlanksFullFatMiuMiu]

I bet Marc's dream would be part of Prada Group though

 

[Lola701]

I wonder who was the initiator behind turning Marc Jacobs into such a big operation in the first place.
I think I was as surprised by the meteoric rise of MJ as I was of MK.

Because it feels like a trap because the commercial success has had a negative impact on the Cachet of the brand.

And tbh, Marc seems to have totally gave up on his house and seems to be only focused on his shows.

I think that JW Anderson and Phoebe Philo took the clever approach with their own brand. Keep it small enough to not be overwhelm by hyper-commercialsm.

They sold Thomas Pink, they are selling Marc Jacobs. They needs to have a vision for Moynat again and maybe really concentrate on Kenzo.
They have a fragrance business there and a once-great fashion business. Kenzo can exist with the right team.

 

[rowjellies]

I bet Marc's dream would be part of Prada Group though

The Bertellis ain’t buying that…Now let’s be for real now

 

[Olaffo]

They sold Thomas Pink, they are selling Marc Jacobs. They needs to have a vision for Moynat again and maybe really concentrate on Kenzo.

I've heard Kenzo is the next one in line. MJ is not profitable enough to keep it and LVMH is clearly bracing for thin years and succession giving all the consolidation and changes. Also I've heard that if Alexander won't save alcohol vertical that will be sold too and instead invested into luxury hotels.

 

[Avonlea]

I always got the impression that LVMH didn't even try with Marc's brand. The disconnect between runway and stores, the lack of staple products, and the hideous bags, nothing made sense. I don't see it ending well for him. A wake up call should have happened 10 years ago. He will just keep rotting in his labubu filled ivory tower.
It's a pity because his 2000s collections were great.

 

[LadyJunon]

labubu filled ivory tower

You're going to hell for this.

 

[jeanclaude]

And tbh, Marc seems to have totally gave up on his house and seems to be only focused on his shows.

Correction:

And tbh, Marc seems to have totally gave up on his house and seems to be only focused on his shows nails.

 

[Lola701]

I've heard Kenzo is the next one in line. MJ is not profitable enough to keep it and LVMH is clearly bracing for thin years and succession giving all the consolidation and changes. Also I've heard that if Alexander won't save alcohol vertical that will be sold too and instead invested into luxury hotels.

Tbh, I think it would a mistake to sell Kenzo. For me the problem at Kenzo has always been creative because the contemporary price point in terms of strategy was great from the Opening Ceremony guys.
The casting of designers for Kenzo has been dreadful!

I would even prefer to have the Moschino guy do Kenzo. At that price point, push fashion. Not logos! And there are examples of that. You can’t sell with Kenzo so, do fashion!

I’m not sure about the hospitality because I have heard that it’s a complementary activity but in terms profits, it’s very limited compared to the possibilities they have with wines and accessories.
However I have some ideas that I have discussed with some people but won’t share here in terms of development for wines and spirits. Alexandre’s first job will probably be marketing.
How do you recreate a desire for Champagne with flagship brands like Moet & Chandon or Veuve Clicquot or even Ruinart which seems to have been diluted in this mass market approach…Even more with prices that seems less and less justifiable? Are brands like Mercier clearly exploited? That will be his challenge.
I don’t think they have issues selling KRUG, Dom Perpignon or others grands crus millésimés…

They won’t sell the most prestigious brands in their portfolio. And I doubt that they could sell brands (in W&S) at the highest price.

 

[Monsieur Cristobal]

CEOs, shares and that kind of stuff bores me to death, so I cannot provide a sharp analysis on the situation, but from my ignorance there seem to be a couple of issues that are specific to LVMH:
- Fashion and Luxury: not caring for brands other than Vuitton, Dior, Celine, Fendi and Loewe.
-Alcohols: having a bunch of indistinguishable brands, equally positioned.
-Jewells: Purchasing Tiffany&Co looks in retrospect more a matter of pride than a savvy decision. They expected maybe to have the equivalent of Cartier and it is not happening.
-Perfumes and cosmetics: nothing to declare. Guerlain, Dior, Loewe seem to be doing well.

They are lucky to have Kering as direct competitor, because their unprofessionalism makes LVMH look like business geniuses who do no wrong.

 

[oioioi]

If Kenzo weren't to continue to go in an urban, 'pop eye-catching' contemporary level image, I wonder if they could go a bit Dries, closer to the origins.
The image and narrative could tie in closer with their parfums, and LVMH fashion portfolio is already almost logo centric, iconographique brands. Same time it might not be a strong enough visual impact, they need a silhouette and image to tie to..then again it hasn't made profit since Humberto and Carol days as you guys mentioned.
It is really sinking and apparently Nigo is never there.

 

[Lola701]

CEOs, shares and that kind of stuff bores me to death, so I cannot provide a sharp analysis on the situation, but from my ignorance there seem to be a couple of issues that are specific to LVMH:
- Fashion and Luxury: not caring for brands other than Vuitton, Dior, Celine, Fendi and Loewe.
-Alcohols: having a bunch of indistinguishable brands, equally positioned.
-Jewells: Purchasing Tiffany&Co looks in retrospect more a matter of pride than a savvy decision. They expected maybe to have the equivalent of Cartier and it is not happening.
-Perfumes and cosmetics: nothing to declare. Guerlain, Dior, Loewe seem to be doing well.

They are lucky to have Kering as direct competitor, because their unprofessionalism makes LVMH look like business geniuses who do no wrong.

Hmm… Not really. It’s not that black and white.

In alcohol, they have very distinguished brands but the issue is that they are not pushed equally let’s say, particularly for their 3 main mass brands like Mercier, M&C and Ruinart when it comes to Champagne. I think for the other brands they are all quite easy to distinguish.
There’s also a reality where alcohol are less consumed by young people. There are more alternative for alcohol free drinks. When you market Champagne as a celebration drink, when people don’t have nothing to celebrate, they don’t consume and doing a collaboration with Pharrell won’t change it.
While the market is declining, I think it has also matured in the western world.


In retrospect (it’s an ever evolving opinion for me), I don’t know if the issue was that they bought Tiffany or that they tried to turn Tiffany into something it is not.

Because LVMH has it Cartier. It’s Bulgari. Both are equally credible in their shared activities in a way that Tiffany won’t ever be.
Silverwear and homewear should have been the focus of Tiffany.

In fashion, they seems to lack vision unfortunately. You have the top CEOs and strategist paired with the best or influential talents for the top brands. And then, you have lost children like Kenzo, Patou where there’s a clear lack of vision. And when the creative side is that lacking, difficult to push the business side.

For me their biggest mistake was what they did to Moynat. It’s really sad.
They had with Moynat their opportunity to build a Hermes + Goyard type of brand. Now looking at what they are doing, I almost wonder what was the point of buying it.

 

[tricotineacetat]

If Kenzo weren't to continue to go in an urban, 'pop eye-catching' contemporary level image, I wonder if they could go a bit Dries, closer to the origins.
The image and narrative could tie in closer with their parfums, and LVMH fashion portfolio is already almost logo centric, iconographique brands. Same time it might not be a strong enough visual impact, they need a silhouette and image to tie to..then again it hasn't made profit since Humberto and Carol days as you guys mentioned.
It is really sinking and apparently Nigo is never there.

I mean, that was what Kenzo looked like wayyy back with Gilles Rosier and also Antonio Marras - I wouldn’t mind if they returned to that kind of esprit, perhaps with Sander Lak or Christian Wijnants at the helm? Either one would make for a good fit.