Daily EDition january 3, 2017

Fashion. Beauty. Business.

● The Trump Effect on Trade● Asia and Europe at Turning Points

● Beauty M&A A-go-go● Will the Social Swans Fly Under Trump?

● Retail, Tech Talk and More

Forecast 2017

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january 3, 2017 3

Gwen Stefani on Fashion, Beauty, Love and Her Latest Deal with Revlon ● Stefani has signed on as a Revlon global ambassador.

● Model Anna Cleveland Faces $350,000 Lawsuit

● White Gloves Only at The 62nd International Debutante Ball

● Anna Wintour, Anya Hindmarch, Victoria Beckham Recognized in Queen’s New Year Honor’s List

● Nike Signs on Golfing Champion Jason Day

Top 5TRenDinGON WWD.COM

NEWSMAKERSThis Week’s Most Talked About Names In Our Industry

Gwen Stefani

Anna Wintour

Donald Trump

Anya Hindmarch

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● Penske Media Corporation has invested in the guide to the luxury lifestyle.

By Kara Bloomgarden-SmoKe

Penske Media Corporation is part-nering with Rockbridge Growth Equity on the Robb Report, the companies revealed today. With this deal, PMC will add a stake in the authority on luxury lifestyle for the ultra-affluent consumer to a stable of titles that includes WWD, Variety, Hollywood Life and Deadline.

“Over the past four decades Robb Report has cemented its position as the world’s leading brand for luxury lifestyle,” PMC chairman and chief executive officer Jay Penske said. “To bring the Robb Report onto the PMC digital platform is a remarkable opportunity to further propel this pioneering media brand.”

Robb Report, which was founded in

1976, provides advice and recommenda-tions in superluxe categories such as avi-ation, boating, automobiles and watches. The brand has steadily expanded its global footprint in the last couple of years. It was acquired in 2014 by the Detroit-based Rockbridge Growth.

The deal between PMC and Rock-bridge is scheduled to close in early January and will provide an opportunity for both companies to expand on the current strengths of the Robb Report’s consumer reach while growing its reach and building up its digital platform.

“The partnership with PMC is a strong strategic fit and joining forces will accel-erate and drive Robb Report’s future growth,” said Brian Hermelin, managing partner for Rockbridge Growth Equity. “The joint venture and PMC’s investment allows us to focus our combined energies on expanding Robb Report’s digital capa-bilities as well as continuing to improve its print distribution channels and event

activation to deliver optimal consumer and advertiser experiences.”

Robb Report will continue to exist as an independent brand, but its New York and Los Angeles locations will join the PMC offices on either coast. Finan-cial details of the partnership were not disclosed.

PMC is a leading digital media and information services company. Its owned and operated brands reach more than 179 million visitors monthly, according to comScore, and Penske Media was recently named one of the Top 100 Pri-vate Companies in the United States and North America. PMC is one of the largest digital media companies in the world, publishing more than 20 digital media brands, including its India.com joint venture with ZEE TV in India. PMC addi-tionally owns and produces more than 80 annual events, summits, award shows and conferences while housing a dynamic research and emerging data business.

● Of that total, 50 percent spent an average of 90 minutes per day on the platform.

By CaSey Hall

SHANGHAI — WeChat, China’s largest and most pervasive social media plat-form, saw its number of active users this year grow 35 percent to 768 million. Of that total, 50 percent spent an average of 90 minutes per day on the platform.

Unsurprisingly for a smart-phone-based social media platform, the user base skews young, with 14 percent of monthly active users between the ages of 17 and 21, with only one percent of monthly active users over the age of 55. WeChat, owned by Tencent, released the data at a press conference in Guangzhou

on Thursday.Also on the increase in 2016 was the

amount of communication between WeChat users. The number of messages exchanged on WeChat rose 67 percent year-on-year, while the number of voice

and video calls — a newer function on WeChat — grew 180 percent to 100 million this year, WeChat said.

As well as its own embedded payment platform, WeChat Pay, WeChat also features the “Lucky Money” feature, which allows users to send virtual “red envelopes” traditionally given in China on special occasions and festivals.

Users in 2016 sent an average of 514 yuan, or $74 at current exchange, per month in Lucky Money envelopes to friends and connections, which extrapo-lates out to more than 4.6 trillion yuan, or $644 billion, in Lucky Money being sent over the platform this year.

As reported, WeChat has become a significant part of retailers’ strategy for China. Most recently, Coach decided to shutter its store on Alibaba’s Tmall in favor of selling through WeChat.

business

PMC, Rockbridge in Robb Report Joint Venture

business

WeChat Sees User Numbers Grow 35% in 2016

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● The musician and “Voice” judge has signed on as a global ambassador for the beauty brand.

By alliSon CollinS

It’s pretty obvious from her signature red lipstick that Gwen Stefani is big on beauty — but now, she’s making it official.

The singer-actress-designer is the latest global ambassador for Revlon. It’s a long way from the Borghese counter at The Broadway in Anaheim, Calif., where she spent some of her younger years testing out her makeup artistry skills on shoppers.

“I was a makeup artist when I was in my early twenties at the mall, they never trained me,” Stefani said. “I worked behind the counter there for Borghese, which nobody bought because it was expensive, and Ultima II, which I think is actually owned by Revlon.” (It is.)

Her target was the shopper who was intimated by the other salespeople (“they purposely make you feel horrible,” Stefani contends).

“I’d be like, ‘Let me put some makeup on you, let me show you what you could look like,’” she said. “I just remember making people feel so much joy and so inspired and so full of confidence, and that’s what makeup can do.”

But Stefani wasn’t chosen for the Revlon gig for her makeup application skills, advanced as they may be.

“Gwen will clearly appeal to makeup enthusiasts,” said Benjamin Karsch, Revlon’s chief marketing officer. “She’s known far and wide for her red lips, so that’s definitely part of the attractiveness as a brand ambassador for Revlon, but that’s really combined with who she is as a person and also her love story.”

Karsch is referring to Stefani’s blossom-ing romance with Blake Shelton, one of her fellow mentors on NBC’s “The Voice,” following a public split from ex-husband Gavin Rossdale. She joins the ranks of Ciara, Halle Berry, Olivia Wilde and Alejandra Espinoza, who are also Revlon ambassadors.

“They have this Choose Love campaign, which is full of choice and positivity and dreams and truth and I feel like that’s aligning exactly with where I’m at in my personal life in the last couple of years and how I’ve had to kind of choose love, choose truth, choose to be positive and work my way back to a place of using my gift and sharing my love with people,” Stefani said.

“From the very beginning of her career she inspired fans by sharing openly about her own love story and the importance of love in her life,” Karsch continued. “She’s been a model of female empowerment for many fans across the spectrum, and the way she shares her personal story fits very well with our brand positioning around Choose Love.”

Stefani agreed wholeheartedly that she’s the right fit for the movement.

“They’re so smart to pick me,” she said. “This campaign…is really where my heart is at. Not to mention my obsession with makeup for my whole life.”

The job also had her playing with an entirely new set of products. “For me, I get stuck in a routine,” she said. “Like, OK, this is what’s safe and this is how fast I can put this on before I’ve got to go on the school run.”

These days, brows are a primary focus. “It’s so youthful to have a heavier brow, it makes it look so clean and so retro,” Ste-fani said, adding she’s been using a Revlon

brow pencil. “If you’re using just powders and things like that you get home and half your eyebrow’s gone and you’re like, ‘Oh well, that’s embarrassing.’”

Stefani’s makeup fascination took hold at a young age, when she watched her mom and grandma get ready. “They had a look,” she said. “My mom didn’t play — she put it together — she looked incredible. It was always a bright pink cheek and bright pink lip, that was like, my first inspiration of color on lip.”

She also watched the girls in her class, she said. “I grew up in Anaheim, Calif., super heavy Hispanic [population] you know — a lot of girls, like Chola girls, that had unbelievable makeup…I would daydream and watch them in class putting their makeup on, as people do when they’re in class, and just be like, mes-merized,” Stefani said. “That had a huge influence on me.”

After perfecting her cat eye — which she donned with a frosted pink lip — her

paternal grandmother gifted her a lipstick set. “I just remember being in my car…and trying on this burgundy lipstick and think-ing to myself, ‘Wow, that’s it. This is never going to not be on my lips again.’”

And that deep lip has stuck with her from the days of braces and No Doubt through to solo albums, ready-to-wear, accessories, cartoons (she has one called “Kuu Kuu Harajuku” on Nickelodeon) and the breakup that prompted her latest album, “This Is What the Truth Feels Like,” released in March.

“When I went through all my personal tragedies in the past…music was the thing that was like my savior,” Stefani said. “Being on ‘The Voice’ also was a thing that helped turn back on my light, I had lost a lot of confidence…Playing a different role in being a coach, and sitting there and watching everybody work so hard and make so much progress in such a short amount of time and having to think back to my own career and think of all the music I

wrote, like, how did I do that?”So she went back in the studio, writing

most of her latest album in eight weeks and then embarking on a tour. “Being on tour is like, a real exchange of love,” Stefani said. “You literally are giving all of yourself every night…everybody there was clearly connected to my story…it was just an incredible healing, amazing, mind-blowing experience.”

But despite the positivity generated from her most recent tour, Stefani hesitated when asked about potential new music. “I don’t know if I’m going to do new music, I’m definitely at the end of a chapter,” she said. “I did the tour, I know I’m doing ‘The Voice,’ we already started filming…I’m doing the stuff in my fashion, but I have some dreams inside me and I know that I have some stuff brewing so we’ll see.”

On the fashion scene, Stefani seems to have her finger on the pause button of her rtw collection and is focusing instead on products in more accessible price points, collaborating with Burton a handful of times for winter gear and debuting an optical collection in 2016. “Rtw doesn’t reach everyone, whereas when I do things through my brand that are accessories or now with the eyewear, it’s so fun to be able to reach everyone,” Stefani said. “It feels so good to not exclude people.”

That being said, a future RTW collection isn’t out of the question, she hinted. “I definitely am working on a potential rtw collaboration, but it’s a little early to be talking about it.”

beauty

Gwen Stefani on Her Latest Deal With Revlon

“[The] Choose Love campaign...is full of choice and positivity and dreams and truth and I feel like that’s aligning exactly with where I’m at in my personal life.”

Gwen Stefani at 102.7 KIIS FM’S Wango Tango in 2016.

Attending the MTV Music Awards at the Metropolitan Opera House in 2001.

Stefani at the 33rd Annual Kennedy

Center Honors in 2010.

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Special Report: Forecast 2017While 2016 was a year full of surprises, the uncertainty ahead puts a spotlight on

challenges facing all corners of the industry.

WASHINGTON — It’s the beginning of a new political era in the nation’s capital and trade enforcement and tax reform are expected to be atop the agenda as President-elect Donald Trump takes office and Congressional Republicans open a new session in control of the House and the Senate.

There appears to be common ground between Trump and Congress in many areas that could yield opportunities for fashion executives, ranging from lower corporate tax rates to a rollback of more burdensome Obama administration regulations.

But a slowdown in market-opening trade agreements and the potential repeal of climate and environmental rules and com-mitments has many concerned. The judicial branch will also come into play early this year as the Supreme Court deliberates and issues a decision in an apparel copyright protection case that has implications for the fashion industry. The High Court will be further in the spotlight since one of Trump's early moves is expected to be the nomina-tion of a justice to fill the seat left empty following the death of Antonin Scalia.

Expectations are high for more trade enforcement actions against countries identified as using unfair trade practices that put U.S. companies at a competitive disadvantage, especially China. But there is less certainty over trade liberalization.

Trump has tapped billionaire Wilbur Ross as his Commerce Secretary, a trade skeptic who is also seen as a pragmatic businessman with past ties to the textile industry who could serve as a counter-weight to Trump’s more protectionist trade proposals. Trump has indicated that Ross will take the leading role in shaping his trade agenda. Ross will face Senate confirmations hearings early this year.

But Trump has not yet announced his choice for U.S. Trade Representative, who traditionally takes the lead in trade negoti-ations and helps shape the administration’s enforcement actions at the World Trade Organization. Among the top contenders for USTR are Jovita Carranza, founder and chief executive officer of the business con-sulting firm JCR Group and a former Small Business Administration executive, and Dan DiMicco, former ceo of Nucor Steel, who is leading Trump’s “landing team” at the USTR office and has been a critic of free-trade policies in the U.S.

Trump is also establishing a new White House National Trade Council to help advise him on global trade and U.S. manu-facturing and has tapped Peter Navarro, a Harvard-trained economist and professor at the University of California, Irvine to head it. Navarro is a vocal critic of China and the author of "Death by China" and "The Coming China Wars."

Trump has already vowed to pull the U.S. out of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership deal on the first day of his administration and he has also pledged to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement, label China a currency manipulator and impose a 35 percent tariff on imports of U.S. companies that manu-facture offshore.

“I do think trade enforcement is some-thing the administration will look at and

it is something that Congress has talked about in the past,” said Jennifer Safavian, executive vice president of government affairs at the Retail Industry Leaders Association.

Safavian said there is the potential for smaller, bilateral trade deals down the road, but stressed that the Trump admin-istration will be focused on enforcing existing trade laws out of the gate.

Congressional Republicans, particu-larly in the House, are eager to advance tax reform legislation, which could align with Trump’s own tax plan. At the center of both proposals is an attempt to create more incentives for U.S. corporations to stay at home by lowering the corporate tax rate from the current 35 percent. Trump’s plan calls for lowering it to 15 percent while House Republicans call for cutting it to 20 percent.

"There is an issue [a proposed bor-der adjustability tax on the full value of imports ] that needs to be resolved but overall tax reform is an overdue step and something that would be constructive to grow the U.S. economy and, if it is done

right, would be a big win for retailer as well,” said David French, senior vice president for government relations at the National Retail Federation.

Copyright protection for designs is pend-ing at the Supreme Court early next year. The justices are expected to issue a ruling in Star Athletica LLC vs. Varsity Brands Inc.,which could have far-reaching implica-tions for the fashion world seeking clarity on design copyright rules.Cheerleader uniforms are at the center of the case but fashion legal experts said the issue is about so much more than the uniforms.

“This case challenges copyrights issued for five color-blocked patterns on cheer-leader uniforms, and by extension, poten-tially calls into question the copyrightabil-ity of any other surface pattern that a judge might deem ‘functional,’” said Susan Scafidi, director of Fordham University’s Fashion Law Institute, who led a group of fashion designers in filing an amicus curiae brief in support of Varsity brands, fighting for design protection. “The fashion indus-try has been cheering from the sidelines, aware that this case could roll back the

limited amount of protection available.”The fashion industry already lost one

important design battle at the High Court in December. The court ruled in favor of Samsung Electronics Co. over Apple Inc. in a ruling that could weaken patent protec-tion for fashion designs.

“In light of the recent decision in Sam-sung v. Apple, in which the Supreme Court used a 19th-century dictionary to dramat-ically reduce the value of design patents, fashion — like other creative design-based industries — has reason to be concerned,” Scafidi warned.

While apparel and textile companies have made strong commitments to sustainability through more environmen-tally friendly strategies, Trump’s picks for Energy Secretary and Environmental Protection Agency administrator portend a potential rollback of gains made.

Rhea Suh, president of the Natural Resources Defense Council, opposed Trump’s choices for Energy Secretary — former Texas Gov. Rick Perry — and EPA administrator, naming Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt – both of whom she said are unqualified and diametrically opposed to the agencies they will run if confirmed by the Senate.

“The American people didn’t vote to return to the dirty old days when smog choked our cities, and we didn’t vote to turn a blind eye to the dangers of climate change,” she said.

The NRDC said Trump’s potential envi-ronmental policy threatens gains made in America’s transition to a clean energy economy. A December report said the U.S. has made deep pollution reductions, with coal use at record lows but renewable energy higher than ever. One sign of how far things have advanced: more than one-fifth of the U.S. population lives in a state with a goal of at least 50 percent renew-able energy.

However, the same day that PVH Corp, signed two environmental initiatives – the U.N. Global Compact and CEO Water Man-date – chairman and ceo Emanuel Chirico said, “There’s enough going forward in initiatives that are built into business strat-egies that I don’t see a rollback.” — Kristi Ellis with contributions from Arthur friEdmAn

● Political Agenda Holds Opportunities,

Concerns

Vice President-elect Mike Pence, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, President-elect Donald Trump and Melania Trump in the Capitol.

Good Signs Ahead for Made in USAthe Made in the USa movement has slowly built momentum in the last few years and seems poised to pick up steam even as inherent problems persist.

The textile industry in particular has re-es-tablished itself, notably in the more automat-ed yarn and knitwear sectors, as an efficient, quality source of fast-turn production.

Lenzing Inc. said last month it was investing $293 million to build a Tencel fiber plant in Mobile, Ala., where it already has a factory. The facility will have a production capacity of 90,000 tons a year and will be the largest Tencel fiber plant in the world. The plant is scheduled to start production in the first quarter of 2019.

“This expansion strengthens Lenzing’s commitment to our customers and con-sumers in the U.S.,” said Stefan Doboczky, chief executive officer of Lenzing.

Also last month, Everest Textile USA, a maker of performance fabrics, said it plans

to build its first manufacturing plant outside Asia in Forest City, N.C.

Meridian Specialty Yarns is investing $8 million to build a 265,000-square-foot facility in Valdese, N.C., that will feature a new gener-ation of technology, machines, controls and robotics for package, top and tow dyeing.

The project should be completed in the first quarter and is expected to add 26 jobs to Meridian’s 146 employees in Valdese.

The knit factories American Giant has ei-ther acquired or with which it has exclusive contractor relationships in North Carolina have been modernized with new equipment and a switch from batch to modular manu-facturing and are operating at full capacity. So the company is looking at other facilities for pants and jackets, for instance.

“One question looming for us is, as we look get into wovens, the infrastructure isn’t as established as knits,” said ceo Bayard Winthrop.

“I’m of a mind that free trade is a positive thing for the U.S. economy and the average U.S. consumer,” Winthrop added. “Protec-tionist strategies can often be satisfying in the short-term, but in the long-term are dampening on growth and innovation.”

President-elect Donald Trump appears committed to Made in the USA and execu-tives welcome that, but they don’t neces-sarily hold to the theory that U.S. production and global trade are at odds.

“President-elect Trump has some im-portant points to make concerning a level playing field,” Emanuel Chirico, chairman and chief executive officer of PVH Corp., recently told WWD. “Is there a level playing field when you’re talking about China? No, there’s not. So we should see what we can do to address those issues, but we can’t take them to the nth degree and have a trade war because that would be nonpro-ductive.” — Arthur friEdmAn

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Forecast 2017The pace of change in a turbu-lent-yet-slow-to-innovate retail industry is poised to accelerate.

Bankruptcies? Possibly a few. But there's plenty that retailers have to grapple with amid shifting consumer dynamics and shopping patterns, and all the uncertainties that the new Trump administration brings.

Look for intensified consolidation of America's overstored retail landscape, as well as ongoing convergence of brick-and-mortar and digital operations, monetizing of flagship properties through sell-offs and redevelopments, increased mobile shopping, advanced analytics, and Inter-net pure plays adding retail stores to their business models.

And expect a wave of successions with new leaders possibly emerging at J. Crew Group, Kohl's Corp. and Abercrombie & Fitch Co. At Lands' End, Jerome Griffith became chief executive officer in Decem-ber, and in February, Jeff Gennette steps up to the ceo post of Macy's Inc., succeed-ing Terry J. Lundgren.

Retailers will be operating with lower inventories, bringing products to mar-ket quicker and turning them quicker, and pop-ups will proliferate, hoping to heighten that sense of newness and change. Offerings will be further shaped by deeper mining of consumer data and the use of artificial intelligence to devise

personalized and localized marketing and merchandising, and retailers will work harder to remake selling floors, pumping up activewear, beauty, food and experi-ences like yoga and cooking classes and makeovers, to offset softer categories.

“It’s not about just selling goods anymore,” Glen Senk, ceo of investment firm Front Row Partners and former ceo of David Yurman and Urban Outfitters Inc., said in a recent interview regarding industry consolidation. “Brands have to be more than just products; they have to have meaning. Stores need to keep evolv-ing. I don’t think retailers are changing as much as they need to,” Senk said. “I don’t think there’s enough customer centric-ity. What technology does is give you tremendous insight into people’s behav-iors. Some people use technology to their advantage to gain access to that [insight] and some people don’t.”

“People have been going to the market-place since the time of the Greeks. We will continue to do that, as long as we see new environments, like Nike in SoHo and Adidas on Fifth Avenue, where they have created

environments with activity, energy. People want that," said Michael Gould, the former Bloomingdale's chairman and ceo, who was also interviewed about retail consolidation and what retailers must do to survive.

"To quote Lyndon Johnson, you have to walk and chew gum at the same time — create exciting energetic stores and develop the online," Gould said. "The customer who shops [both] online and in the stores spends three-and-a-half to four times as much.”

Among other priorities in 2017:• Getting a handle on Millennials.

Retailers must figure out their wants and needs. Millennials have limited brand loyalty, spend more on experiences and less on material things, and patronize products and brands tied to social and environmental causes.

• Monitoring President Trump's policies on trade, government regulations, health care, job creation and tax reform, which will impact imports, consumer prices, business growth and corporate profits.

• Stressing convenience and ease of shop-ping. Consumers are likely to see better trained, more knowledgeable, empowered and technology-equipped sales associates; additional payment options, additional shipping options and faster deliveries of all types of goods and services, with the touch of a button or the sound of your voice.

• Stepping up the quest for unique and exclusive products.

• As online sales grow at a slower rate, brick-and-mortar retailers will play up the social aspects of shopping, as an outing for

friends and family, and the desire to touch, feel and try on clothes before buying them.

Among the retailers to watch is Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest and America's biggest importer in terms of seaborne shipping containers. The mass merchant could see rising costs if new Trump policies impose tariffs on imports from China and elsewhere. Anti-import policies, while encouraging domestic man-ufacturing, could rile China and impede Wal-Mart's aggressive expansion there. On the digital front, Wal-Mart will seek to grow Jet.com, which was purchased in August for $3 billion, and its overall [and underdeveloped] dot-com businesses, which represent just 3 percent of the chain's $482 billion in annual sales.

Other retailers to watch:• Amazon, and its thrust into apparel

and brick and mortar beyond existing book stores.

• Sears Holdings Corp., which continues to close stores and lose money.

• J. Crew, which needs to revive its col-lection and reconnect with consumers.

• Bon-Ton Stores Inc., which continues to suffer poor results and shoulder the burden of having many stores in poor locations.

• Neiman Marcus, which has been losing traffic and sales, is saddled with $4.7 bil-lion in long-term debt, and must widen its appeal and renew the aura of exclusivity.

• Hudson Bay Co., a high-flying news-maker, is always on the prowl for an acquisition. — dAvid moin with contributions from shAron EdElson

● Retailers Brace for a Game-changing Year

The Wal-Mart web site.

LONDON — It's time for luxury to make do and mend — as World War II Britons would say — and rely on its wits and existing resources to survive increasing uncertainty in the months to come.

Even as high-end demand begins to show signs of recovery, there are still battles still to be fought and one fundamental prob-lem: Too much stuff, not enough demand.

Consolidation will be the great aspira-tion of brands, retailers, designers and showrooms. Larger, more mature busi-nesses in particular will have to examine their budgets and strategies as the sands of consumer demand continue to shift amid geopolitical and economic uncertainty.

No one knows what Brexit negotiations will mean for Britain or the sort of leaders France and Germany will elect in the coming year. Hong Kong — once a boom-town for luxury brands — is fast becoming a ghost town, while the high-end watch industry continues to struggle. And the threat of terrorism is ever-present.

"The big, big question will be about spending," said Avery Booker, cofounder and chief executive officer of Enflux, a London-based company that monitors con-sumer data and behavior.

In particular, he said, brands and retail-ers will be looking at how to consolidate their retail networks and online social presence. "A lot of them have wasted so much money, throwing it at the wrong things," such as splashy events, celebrities and influencers who fail to deliver a return on investment.

Mario Ortelli of Bernstein Research has pointed to the “potential for

deterioration" in the underlying economic fundamentals that support luxury sector growth, especially against the backdrop of political uncertainty.

In the personal luxury market, Ortelli is forecasting 0 percent growth for 2016; 2 percent for 2017, and 4 percent thereafter to 2020, with the “potential for year-over-year volatility,” due to macroeconomic uncertainty.

What to do?For starters, brands are doubling down,

showing men's and women's together on the catwalk. It's cheaper, easier and allows buyers to write their orders earlier in the season. Burberry, Tom Ford, Dsquared and Thom Browne kicked off the trend, with Gucci, Paul Smith, Kenzo and others set to follow in 2017.

The Kering brands, meanwhile, are making their stores work harder. “We are present today in the most important cities and locations in the world," said Kering chief executive officer François-Henri Pinault. "Our priority is to extract more value from them."

According to a report by Ortelli and

Boston Consulting Group, "tier 2" cities — such as Washington, D.C. — and "marginal" areas will see the most closures or store resizing from fashion and luxury groups.

Burberry is focusing on local consum-ers rather than fickle tourists, while other brands are putting a greater emphasis on omnichannel and alternative retail formats as they expand into new markets.

Selene Collins, who specializes in sales and strategy for fashion brands at her London showroom, said pop-up culture will remain strong, because it’s a low-risk approach for retailers and allows for more direct interaction for the consumer.

On a similar note, she said Selfridges Designer Studio is a window onto the future of retail. "It's a free-moving, organic envi-ronment — a mix of contemporary, street and designer, with anchor brands like Chris-topher Kane, Vetements and J.W. Anderson. It's the Dover Street Market model," she said.

Inspired by a contemporary art space, the new Designer Studio showcases men’s and women’s wear side-by-side; highlights items rather than brands, and changes its special configuration every season. It

opened in July and is part of an ongoing, multimillion-dollar revamp of the store.

Collins is also a big believer in another trend that's taking fashion and luxury by the throat: Instant fashion. "People are not investing at the beginning of a season. We're an instant culture — we're Uber, Deliveroo — buy-now-wear-now. The busi-ness is getting faster and faster."

The luxury watch industry, meanwhile, is facing its own set of woes as it read-justs to lower levels of demand, higher input costs, a Chinese crackdown on gifting and import duties for big-spending tourists returning home to China. After a tough year of buying back watches from its wholesale clients, and two rounds of layoffs at Cartier, Gary Saage, chief financial officer of Compagnie Financière Richemont, said the company is adjusting to the new normal for the watch business.

“Before the gifting explosion in China, we were seeing modest growth in watches. We don’t know where sales are going to be in the future, but we can no longer expect a return to growth of 20-odd percent,” he said.

Although the year-on-year decline in watch exports appears to be slowing, the light at the end of that particular tunnel remains a pinprick.

According to analysts, watch prices in the new year will remain flat and inven-tory buybacks are in the cards, although volumes are set to edge up.

Ortelli calls the outlook "subdued," while Thomas Chauvet of Citi said the mood remains cautious among watch retailers globally given all the political uncertainty, travel fears, depressed oil prices and stock market and foreign exchange volatility.

A year, then, for a quiet reboot. — sAmAnthA conti

● Smaller, Faster, Better?

Selfridges’ designer studio.

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Forecast 2017What's on tap for fashion? Direc-tion-wise, the bets for early 2017 were placed months ago. Following the spring collections in September-October, retailers continued to cite the European powerhouses that have ruled the trend roost for the past few seasons: Gucci’s maximalist neo-nerd; the indulgent irony of luxury streetwear from Demna Gvasalia at Vetements and Balenciaga, and Gosha Rubchinskiy. Net-a-porter’s vice president of global buying, Sarah Rutson, for exam-ple, drove home the ongoing importance of street style during the company’s spring presentation — Vetements, Vete-ments, Vetements and Off-White. These are names, labels and looks that have reverberated up and down the fashion food chain for a while. The question now: Is there still room for one more designer sweatshirt and embroidered bomber jacket in even the most devout, fash-ion-hungry Gucci acolyte’s closet?

It’s true that the big, exciting fashion news and influence have come mainly out of Europe for several seasons, while the U.S. has fueled a far less sexy, if no less relevant, “fashion system” frenzy. We have not nearly heard the last of the see-now-buy-now blah-bitty blah, but for fall, American fashion is positioned for high-profile newsiness and, perhaps, reclamation of style authority by way of a Belgian designer now in command of an iconic U.S. brand. In February, all eyes will be on Raf Simons’ debut at Calvin Klein, where the vision he presents will have been at least six months in the works. No pressure.

Speculation is part of the fun in any new marriage between a major creative force and a megabrand, but truthfully Simons’ Klein is a bit of a wild card. Simons’ vision for women’s wear at Jil Sander and Christian Dior was modernist and lady-fied, while he’s dealt in edgier, artier, cooler fare for his own men’s wear collection. The Klein tenets of sensual minimalism could bring Simons closer to his men’s aesthetic, particularly in light of the fact that Simons is taking over the entire CK purview including Calvin Klein Collection; Calvin Klein Platinum; Calvin Klein; Calvin Klein Jeans; Calvin Klein Underwear and Calvin Klein Home brands. According to the company, Simons will oversee all aspects of design, global marketing and communications and visual creative services. That gives him a lot of creative latitude. Will Simons be the second coming of Calvin, in terms of fashion zeitgeist? Is that even possible nowadays? It will be fun to watch.

There’s another debut at a major American house on deck for fall, with co-creative directors Fernando Garcia and Laura Kim at Oscar de la Renta. This one comes with a side of legal scandal. To recap, Kim worked under de la Renta for 12 years before leaving in 2015 to launch her own label Monse with Garcia, who also worked for de la Renta for several years. Though Monse was a creative hit from the beginning, the designers took side jobs consulting at Carolina Herrera, where Kim was eventually hired as senior vice president for design last January. Yet Peter Copping’s abrupt departure from de la Renta in July had left a major hole, and speculation spun early about a possible

homecoming for Kim and Garcia. Come September, they were named co-creative directors of de la Renta. Herrera didn’t like that. Not one bit.

Last month, Herrera filed a lawsuit in the Supreme Court of the State of New York seeking to block Kim from joining de la Renta until April in accordance with Kim’s non-compete agreement. The suit supplied juicy grist for the gossip mill, including plans to replace Herrera in the role of designer with Kim, and the fact that the non-compete only applied to Kim’s potential employment at de la Renta. Businesswise, Carolina Herrera and Oscar de la Renta are fierce com-petitors. According to Kim’s affidavit, following her resignation from Herrera in July, she and Garcia were told not to come back to the office. “In fact, Carolina Herrera said to me at that time: ‘Nobody knows you and nobody knows that you are here. I am more famous than you and have more powerful friends.’”

A preliminary injunction barring Kim from working at de la Renta was issued and lifted the week of Dec. 19. As of press time, a hearing date is set for Jan. 10 in a Manhattan state court. Following the court’s dismissal of the temporary restraining order, the Herrera company said, “The company, Carolina Herrera Ltd., understands and appreciates the judge’s reasoning for today’s decision, which is to ensure the January 10 hearing is the final word on the question of the preliminary injunction. It’s important to note the judge put the opposing parties on notice that if he grants the preliminary injunction, they will be prohibited from using any and all work product they have jointly created if they choose to work together before January 10. We are satis-fied with this decision and look forward to continuing to pursue this matter.” Stay tuned… — JEssicA irEdAlE

L.A. Garnering More Fashion Names

it seems that every few fashion cycles, the industry tries to make Los Angeles a thing, asking if the city will finally be a viable fashion capital. Remember in 2015 when everyone was going there? First Tom Ford took his runway show west for a pre-Oscars publicity bonanza; Burberry staged an encore of its fall collection at the Griffith Observatory; Louis Vuitton took over Bob Hope’s house for its cruise collection in Palm Springs (not L.A. but close enough.) All the while Hedi Slimane was running his hot, hot, hot Saint Laurent

from Los Angeles.For the upcoming February show sea-

son, there’s a real Westward fashion wagon train, led by Ford and a bunch of see-now-buy-nowers, including Tommy Hilfiger and Rebecca Minkoff, who are staging elaborate happenings in L.A. Details on Ford’s plans haven’t been disclosed, but it’s thought that he’ll reprise his Oscar-timed show. Rachel Zoe, who is based in L.A. but typically shows in New York, is presenting her fall collection, plus some buy-now stuff in her hometown Feb. 1. Minkoff is going to

The Grove on Feb. 4, also a buy-now show. Hilfiger is staging his second immediately shoppable show in Venice Beach Feb. 8, the night before New York Fashion Week kicks off. More than 3,000 press, buyers, industry influencers and consumers are expected to attend an ocean-side runway show along the beach. Then there’s Rachel Comey, who has scheduled her fall 2017 show for Feb. 7 at L.A.’s Hauser Wirth & Schimmel gallery. In the past, Comey has held her show in Red Hook, Brooklyn. And people thought that was a trek. — J.i.

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● Fashion’s Fresh Faces and

Legal Cases

8 january 3, 2017

Forecast 2017The election of Donald Trump to the United States presidency is ushering in an era of uncertainty for Asia and its econ-omies. The region is waiting to see how much of the president-elect’s protectionist rhetoric will materialize into actual policy — like his threat to impose a 45 percent tariff on all Chinese imports to the U.S. Such a move would dent China’s gross domestic product growth and likely ignite a full-fledged trade war, with wide-ranging implications for the entire region.

Even before taking office, Trump is mak-ing his mark in Asia as a disruptor hell-bent on shaking up decades-old geopolitical protocol and openly challenging China. Just a little more than a week after accepting a congratulatory phone call from Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen on his election, Trump told Fox News that he might not respect the “one-China policy” that tacitly acknowledges Taiwan is part of China. China’s state-run Global Times newspaper fired back that he was “ignorant as a child.”

Such provocations come at a time when China is already grappling with an eco-nomic slowdown, a shrinking labor force, overcapacity and languishing exports — not to mention mounting fears about

its perilously high credit levels and their potential to spark a financial crisis.

“After the U.S. election result, we believe 2017 will be even more challenging for Asia to stay on an even keel,” Nomura research analysts said in a recent report. “Simply put, we see too many large risks stacked to the downside. Asia’s economies are struc-turally slowing — its largest, China, is in a late-stage credit cycle — and after Mexico, we judge that Asia is most vulnerable to U.S. President-elect Trump’s inward-look-ing policies.”

China’s real GDP growth has been con-stant at 6.7 percent for three quarters and Nomura said it expects Beijing will strive to keep it at that level next year ahead of key political changes. But the bank char-acterized this stability as a “facade” and stressed the need for China to tackle large-scale state-owned enterprise restructuring, including the re-pricing of credit risk and market-opening policies.

“But all these reforms entail short-term pain for long-term gain, a trade-off that Bei-jing seems unwilling to accept,” they said.

Taking a somewhat more optimistic

stance on its outlook, CLSA said a Trump presidency might actually pave the way for badly needed changes in China.

“Trump’s measures will have a nega-tive impact on trade, but the silver lining is that it could push the government to accelerate reform and move away from the low-end manufacturing that has created the most trade tension. He could provide the sense of urgency to make the hard choices of slowing credit growth, cleaning up bad debts and restructur-ing state-owned enterprises. We expect reforms to accelerate in 2017,” CLSA analysts said in a recent report.

It will be easier and faster for Trump to deliver on trade and immigration issues rather than tax cuts and infrastruc-ture-spending plans, which puts China at particular risk in the first half of the year, CLSA said. As for the 45 percent tariff on Chinese imports, it is still unclear how realistically Trump can follow through on his threat. Unless a national emergency is declared, the president can’t impose blanket tariffs of more than 15 percent — even then he can only do so for as long as

150 days. However, Trump can unilaterally impose tariffs on targeted goods, the finan-cial services group noted.

Beyond China, there are several other dynamics in Asia set to dominate 2017 and shape the future of the region. Japan’s econ-omy is showing signs of a pickup, although its longer-term prospects for growth are rather limited compared with other Asian nations. South Korea’s economy is expected to suffer in the wake of a political scandal and the impeachment of President Park Geun-hye. Hong Kong’s economic prospects are far from stellar and political friction with China — its number-one trading part-ner — is seen continuing.

Meanwhile, other countries are emerg-ing as economic powerhouses. India’s GDP growth is expected to clock in at 7.1 percent in 2017 and accelerate to 7.7 percent in 2018, while certain Southeast Asian countries are becoming significant protagonists in the region.

“In the longer run, once the storm passes we see a growing divide as Asia’s striving cubs (India, Indonesia, the Phil-ippines and Vietnam) unlock their full growth potential and replace the aging tigers (China, Hong Kong, Korea, Singa-pore and Taiwan) as the core of economic dynamism in Asia,” Nomura said. — AmAndA KAisEr

● Asia Anxiously Awaits the Trump Era

Tech Trends

Chinese fashion companies are set to continue their international shopping sprees next year.

Aquascutum’s Hong Kong-listed owner YGM Trading Ltd. is reportedly putting the brand up for sale to the tune of $120 million. Word has it the potential buyer is Shan-dong Ruyi Group, which acquired French fashion group SMCP earlier this year. Shandong declined to comment. Chinese Gangtai Group Ltd. just snapped up a majority stake in luxury jeweler and watch-maker Buccellati. Shenzhen Ellassay, which bought Ed Hardy and Laurel, has been explicit in its aspiration to become a global fashion group so it could do more deals.

Elsewhere, Chinese apparel company Trendy International Group is reportedly planning a $5 billion IPO in 2017, which would be a major development for China’s homegrown fashion industry. Set up in 1999, it owns and operates nine brands including their own labels Ochirly and Five Plus, Miss Sixty’s Asian business, and through various partnerships was responsible for introducing Superdry and

10 Corso Como to China.Meanwhile, Singapore’s Charles &

Keith is aiming to be the “Zara of shoes.” The budget-conscious accessories brand is planning to enter Russia, the latest step in its international expansion strategy. The brand is currently scouting for franchisee partners with the ambition to open dozens of stores there next year. It’s already set up across 38 countries as disparate as Azerbaijan, South Africa and Panama, growing from the original shoe shop set up by brothers Charles and Keith Wong in 1996.

Though it will require adapting its product line for Russia’s much more varied and cold climate, Charles and Keith prides itself on being completely vertically inte-grated and has some powerful backers in the form of L Catterton Asia.

Charles & Keith is still noticeably absent from the U.S. other than e-commerce but it did get a dose of Stateside exposure when Game of Thrones actress Maisie Williams toted two of the brand’s bags to this year’s Emmy Awards. — tiffAny Ap

Apps to Watchthe Chinese sharing economy was worth 1.96 trillion yuan (or $281.71 billion) in 2015 and is expected to grow by 40 percent annually over the next five years, according to a report released earlier this year by the country’s State Information Center, a government think tank. The same report also predicted that the sharing economy would be worth 10 percent of the country’s GDP by 2020.

Clothes-sharing apps are riding the consumer adoption wave of the sharing economy. One More Closet is one such platform that was founded earlier this year and allows users to rent dresses, accessories, jewelry and shoes, at 10 percent of the retail price, as well as connect users to share their wardrobes. “We partner with famous designers who want to test new prod-uct lines and promote their current collection. We also partner with rental shops that have a large selection of top international brands. And of course, individual users are our biggest asset, with closets full of top brands such as Dior, Chanel, Prada and so on,” said chief executive officer Crystal Yu.

Ms. Paris, an online service with iOS, Android and WeChat apps, rents out its own inventory of designer dress-es, such as Vera Wang and Michael Kors, to consumers across China at a 90 percent reduction in retail prices. Launched in 2015, the success of the online concept has allowed the com-pany to open two brick-and-mortar locations in Shanghai and Beijing. Social commerce has played a role in the development of this platform. “Challenges are for customers to get over the mental hurdle of wear-ing clothes that have been worn by others. It’s a word-of-mouth business, so after seeing friends use it, they will likely reconsider,” said Chris Roxbury, business development director. — nyimA prAttEn

in 2016, virtual reality was the most searched-for tech term on Baidu, China’s most popular search engine. Alibaba began trialing VR retailing in November, in the run-up to Singles’ Day, and launched a VR online chan-nel called Buy+. This channel allowed smartphone users the opportunity to browse and pay for products in the vir-tual reality stores of eight international chains, including Macy’s. According to Alibaba’s data, 76 percent of the 8 million people who tried VR shopping in the runup to 11/11 were born after 1980.

Next year, virtual reality and aug-mented reality will be increasingly used for training, customer care and shop-ping in China, predicts Mark Tanner, founder and managing director of Chi-na Skinny, a marketing, research and online agency. “Low-cost cardboard VR headsets, which smartphones can be slid into and cost a couple of dollars, make it a viable marketing option. The explosion of VR ‘cafés,’ similar to the old Internet cafes in China, offers a very rich experience, he predicts.

Chinese brand Babyghost, launched in 2010 by Qiaoran Huang and Joshua Hupper, is incorporating technolo-gy in both their presentations and clothing. At their spring presentation, Babyghost not only had a VR display of its popular Instagram feed, but also included blockchain chips — the unique code used to make the virtual curren-cy Bitcoin — sewn into the clothes.

The idea is for blockchain to guaran-tee the authenticity of garments and communicate with a wearer’s smart-phone to alert them to promotional activities, styling tips and connecting them with the Babyghost community. “[This] technology offers a vast and, until now, relatively unexplored po-tential for a whole new level of label interaction,” Hupper said. — niymA prAttEn with contributions from cAsEy hAll

Companies to Watch

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Forecast 2017● Calls for Optimism Amid Uncertainty for French Fashion

PARIS — Political uncertainty and a still-ailing tourist industry will challenge the French fashion industry in the year to come, but signs of a rebound in global luxury demand are fueling optimism for the famously resilient sector.

As France prepares to choose a new pres-ident in two rounds of voting in late April and early May, businesses and individuals would normally hold off on spending while they wait for the election’s outcome. Gildas Minvielle, director of the Economic Obser-vatory at the Institut Français de la Mode, said that “2017 is an election year, and this is not typically good for consumption."

But amid widespread dissatisfaction with the Socialist government headed by President François Hollande — whose approval ratings had plumbed record lows of four percent before he said in Decem-ber that he would not seek reelection — the conventional wisdom may not apply.

“People are optimistic about what could happen when Hollande leaves,” said Renaud Dutreil, a former politician who has served as chairman of LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton’s North American arm. “A new president bringing some hope and some fresh air could really push up consumption and investment.”

Status-quo candidates have quickly fallen out of favor in the current presiden-tial campaign, with the leading candi-dates running on platforms that include substantial economic reforms.

The center-right candidate François Fillon — who is broadly favored to win — has been branded a “French Margaret Thatcher” for his promises to raise the age of retirement, reform social security, scrap the 35-hour work week and simplify the rules for firms to fire long-term staff.

Dutreil served as a minister alongside Fillon in the center-right government of Jacques Chirac, but has been a vocal supporter for an independent candidate for president, Hollande’s former economy minister Emmanuel Macron. The 39-year-old Macron, who stepped down from the Socialist government in August, has also proposed sweeping reforms to social secu-rity, retirement, and labor — but has placed an emphasis on liberalizing the economy while still maintaining social protections.

“A large majority of French people are against a Thatcherian revolution,” said Dutreil. "Macron thinks there can be mix of security and flexibility. He embodies two contradictory aspirations of the French people, the desire to move forward but to keep the best aspects of our system. People are not open to reforms that would make them regress to the Seventies.”

Macron has been polling mostly in third place — behind Fillon and the National Front’s Marine Le Pen — meaning he would not be expected to make it past the first round of voting. “Macron has the strongest trend,” however, according to Dutreil. “He is starting from scratch and is creating surprise. He has everything to gain.”

While the French fashion sector could benefit from the looser restrictions on labor as well as tax cuts proposed by either candidate, firms could face sig-nificant disruptions in the short-term as reforms are expected to produce vehe-ment opposition from labor interests.

Strikes and protests — at times turning violent — already roiled French cities in spring 2016 as unions mobilized against a comparatively modest labor reform spear-headed by Macron under the Hollande government. A second round of reforms by Macron or Fillon’s more radical program could both lead to prolonged periods of social unrest.

“Our sector has a good social climate which has been able to manage reforms peacefully and respectfully,” said Frédéric Galinier, director of social and legal affairs at the French Federation of Couture, who

doesn’t expect strikes to impact French luxury firms directly.

But strikes and protests could threaten the recovery of France’s tourism industry — a key contributor to luxury sales which have struggled to bounce back following terror attacks in Paris and Nice. For the year from November 2015 through Octo-ber 2016, tour operators saw a 10 percent drop in the number of clients, according to the tour operators’ trade union Seto.

“We’ve had a big drop in affluent tour-ism, and these people aren’t coming back yet,” said Olivier Abtan, head of global lux-ury at Boston Consulting Group. “If there are strikes and the country is blocked for weeks or months this is a problem.”

For Abtan, political uncertainty is sec-ondary to the structural challenges facing France’s export-focused fashion indus-try. Despite signs of a rebound in global demand — particularly in China and North America — “growth in the global luxury market will continue to slow down — and this is structural,” Abtan said.

The French luxury industry was built on the rising wealth of Baby Boomers in the Eighties and Nineties, and then on sales to emerging China — “and there isn’t another China — at least not yet. Much slower growth of 2 to 4 percent per year is here to stay," he said.

A bright spot for French fashion in 2017 could be the “accessible luxury” sector, including brands like Sandro, Maje and Isabel Marant. “These brands have been developing in the white space left by lux-ury, which has pushed up prices a lot over time,” said Abtan. “They have taken the luxury approach to brand building and a fast-fashion approach to supply chain.”

While Abtan and his colleagues at Bos-ton Consulting Group project top luxury growing at 2 to 4 percent in 2017, and mass market fashion at 2 percent, afford-able luxuries could grow by 6 percent in the year to come. — robErt williAms

François Fillon

Stagnating incomes, unemploy-ment above 10 percent, widespread concern on terrorism and national security, frustration with the political class — France appears to have all of the elements in place to be the next country to be shaken by a wave of populism.

It may come as no surprise, then, that the far-right National Front’s Marine Le Pen — who is promising a national referendum on France’s EU membership and a near-complete shutdown on immigration — is coming in at close second in polls for France’s presidential race.

At 24 to 25 percent of votes de-pending on the scenario, Le Pen trails the front-runner François Fillon by just 2 to 5 percent, according to a December 14 survey by Sciences Po’s political research center Cevipof. (Emmanuel Macron would win 13 to 18 of votes, according to the survey, up from 10 percent a month earlier.)

But even if Le Pen comes in sec-ond or were to win the first round of voting, moderate voters are widely expected to rally around a main-stream candidate to block the Nation-al Front’s rise — as they did in 2002, when Jacques Chirac took 82 per-cent of the vote in a run-off against Le Pen’s father, Jean-Marie.

“Marine Le Pen has no allies,” said Renaud Dutreil. “She is not able to gather more than 50 percent of voters. Alone she is doomed to be beaten in the second round.”

“’I think that France is more resil-ient when it comes to the far right,” said BCG’s Olivier Abtan. “We have had Le Pen and the National Front for 30 years now and we have known how to resist it, even in periods of economic difficulty.”

France is a founding member and architect of the European Union and euro zone. As such, a Le Pen win could signal the demise of the Euro-pean project and send shockwaves through the world economy. “Busi-nesses are not preparing for this,” however, “because it’s not going to happen,” according to BCG’s Olivier Abtan.

Add another ingredient for a popu-list upset to the list: experts who say it’s impossible. — r.w.

After Brexit and Trump, Could It

Be Le Pen?

“A new president bringing some hope and some fresh air could really push up consumption and investment.”

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Forecast 2017MILAN — Italy’s fashion industry saw its share of moving pieces at major fashion houses in 2016, both in design and man-agement. Alessandro Sartori will debut his first collection for Ermenegildo Zegna in January, as will Guillaume Meilland for Salvatore Ferragamo’s men’s wear under new chief executive officer Eraldo Poletto. Men’s wear brands Corneliani, Boglioli and Pal Zileri will all kick off the year with new ceos — Paolo Roviera, Andrea Perrone and Giovanni Mannucci, respectively. In February, Bottega Veneta, under new ceo Claus-Dietrich Lahrs, and Gucci will each show their first co-ed shows. The Roberto Cavalli company is in the midst of a reorga-nization helmed by ceo Gian Giacomo Fer-raris, which has led Peter Dundas to exit the brand as creative director. Francesco Risso will show his first presentation for Marni in January after Consuelo Castiglioni’s exit.

In Italy, political uncertainty has been avoided for now following the defeat of Prime Minister Matteo Renzi’s referendum and subsequent resignation, but the coun-try is grappling with a banking crisis and government debt of $2.48 trillion, accord-ing to Italian government data, as well as an ongoing high tax burden and a slow judicial system, just as interventions on the issue of migrants arriving in and passing through Italy continue to be a priority.

The unemployment rate in Italy decreased to 11.6 percent in October 2016

from 11.7 percent in the previous month. However, the economy shed 30,000 jobs and 82,000 more people left the labor force, according to Tradingeconomics.com.

Consumer confidence has been under pressure throughout the year, and, in December, Raj Badiani, senior Italian economist at IHS Global Insight, said in

a research note that “households are increasingly fearful of accumulating risks, namely growing political tensions, the country’s banking sector tensions and disappointing labor market developments in recent months. The political mess and the prospect of a particularly hostile future general election could spark a further retreat in consumer confidence during 2017, which would be a major risk to our assessment that consumer spending will underpin near-term growth prospects.”

In December, Italy’s President Sergio Mattarella appointed former Foreign Minis-ter Paolo Gentiloni as new prime minister following Renzi’s resignation. Renzi had been promoting a referendum to vote on a change in the country’s constitution, which he claimed would streamline Italy’s government decisions. Renzi, who had vowed to step down if he lost the referen-dum, took full responsibility for the defeat. Opposition parties have been lamenting the fact that Gentiloni is entirely aligned with Renzi and that his government mir-rors that of his predecessor and are clam-oring for new elections. These, however, will depend on a new electoral law that is being drawn up and needs to be approved by parliament. In the meantime, Rome’s administration under beleaguered mayor Virginia Raggi continues to be plagued by scandals and the mayor of Milan, Giuseppe Sala, has returned to work after temporar-ily suspending himself from office as his role as the commissioner of the Milan Expo

in 2015 was under investigation.Following Renzi’s resignation, Luca

Solca, managing director and sector head of global luxury goods at Exane BNP Paribas, predicted “more austerity” for Italy. “Italy has used debt and devaluation in the past to absorb social tensions. The problem is both are no longer available now,” he wrote.

A weaker euro, on the other hand, is providing a breather, as is solid business with the U.K. following the Brexit vote and the reappearance of Russian shoppers.

According to Focus-Economics.com, in 2017 “Italy’s economic growth should broadly mirror this year’s subdued per-formance, as stronger growth in exports is expected to offset weaker domestic demand. Nevertheless, Italy remains exposed to both internal and external risks: a worsening in the conditions of the banking sector and a weaker global environment represent the main downside risks to growth.” Analysts, the site said, expect the Italian economy to expand 0.8 percent in 2017.

Financial instability continues to hit the Italian banking sector. The Italian state is rescuing storied bank Monte dei Paschi di Siena through a bailout package of 20 billion euros, or $20.9 billion at current exchange.

According to revised data released by the National Statistical Institute, Italian con-sumer prices fell 0.1 percent from the pre-vious month in November. — luisA ZArgAni

● Italy in a Quagmire

Paolo Gentiloni

LONDON — Britain is buckling up for one wild ride this year, with the Brexit pro-cess expected to begin by the end of the March and economic growth set to slow to 1 percent, compared with 2 percent in 2016. Inflation will accelerate due to the pound's collapse in 2016 against the dollar and euro, although household incomes are unlikely to rise.

The weak pound — a boon for foreign shoppers, a headache for British manufac-turers and retailers — is likely to claw back some ground against the dollar by late next year. The big banks, meanwhile, expect consumption — and investment — to slow as Prime Minister Theresa May's govern-ment begins negotiations to extract Britain from the European Union — on the best trading terms possible.

The year will be defined by Brexit and will undoubtedly be filled with angst — political bickering and backstabbing are already rife — but there are those who believe the country can pave a yellow brick road out of Europe.

"I think the challenges we face mean it's not a bed of roses, no one should pretend that, but equally it is not the end of the world and there are some real opportu-nities that arise from the fact of Brexit we might take," former Bank of England gov-ernor Mervyn King told the BBC in a recent radio interview.

"Being out of what is a pretty unsuccess-ful European Union — particularly in the economic sense — gives us opportunities as well as obviously great political difficul-ties," he added.

Brexit anxiety, however, has done little to dampen the retail momentum in London,

with openings set to mushroom across the capital in the coming months and property developers thinking like the former Bank of England governor: Crisis spells opportunity.

Developers such as The Crown Estate, Tribeca Holdings and Capco are continuing to bankroll the retail revival of neighbor-hoods including Regent Street; St. James's; Spitalfields, and Covent Garden, which are now brimming with designer, contempo-rary, beauty and accessories stores.

In the first quarter of 2017, Tory Burch and Lululemon will both open flagships on Regent Street, the latest in a legion of big North American brands, such as Coach, Stuart Weitzman, and Polo Ralph Lauren, to plant their flags on the central London thoroughfare. Ralph Lauren will also cut the ribbon on a new cafe and bar concept next door to the Polo flagship.

Tory Burch will take up 3,200 square feet of retail space over two floors, and the store will carry the full collection, including beauty, home and watches. The letting is part of a 1 billion pound, or $1.23 billion, investment by The Crown Estate into retail, offices, and leisure businesses on and around Regent Street.

Selfridges, meanwhile, is in the midst of a 300 million pound, or $368 million, facelift: The store is looking to build the world's largest accessories hall by 2018, a 60,000-square-foot affair that will take up a third of its ground floor space on Oxford Street. Those millions have also gone into an unprecedented number of new openings on the upstairs floors, including the Body and Designer studios and a new contemporary space.

"It's hard to say that any city can com-pete with London right now," said Avery Brooker, cofounder and chief executive officer of Enflux, a London-based company that monitors consumer data and behavior. "There's a New York pace to the openings — they're relentless."

Brooker said the first quarter will likely remain strong with regard to footfall and sales, thanks to the weakness of the pound, which has fallen 20 percent against the dollar since the Brexit referendum in June.

From a British brand perspective, the weaker pound will continue to bring mixed blessings in the New Year.

Tourist spending at Mulberry's U.K. stores has been robust but the brand,

which produces its higher-end bags and accessories at two factories in Somerset, England, still has to source raw materials and components from outside the U.K. and operate overseas subsidiaries. In December, the company said it's expecting some 1 million pounds, or $1.3 million, in additional costs linked to currency in the 2016-17 fiscal year.

The weaker pound has also been having a big impact on Burberry in its year of cost-cutting and restrategizing. Burberry, too, has wrestled with higher input costs (most of what it sells is not made or sourced in the U.K.) and hiked some of its prices to compensate for the weaker pound.

The currency has been driving tourist purchases at its U.K. stores and will boost the company's bottom line in the 2016-17 fiscal year. Retail-wholesale profit is set to get a 125 million pound, or $155 million, boost based on Oct. 31 exchange rates in the full year.

The pound aside, there are more Burb-erry changes in the pipeline. Chief creative officer and ceo Christopher Bailey has said layoffs are “embedded in the plan,” although he has not elaborated on the number — or timing — of job losses linked to the company's new strategy.

By July, Burberry will also welcome a new ceo in Marco Gobbetti, a luxury busi-ness veteran who's currently serving as ceo of Céline. He is set to tackle the mechanics of the business and fuel retail sales in an ever-competitive luxury environment. Bailey will continue as head of creative and take on the new title of president.

Bailey outlined an austerity plan in May aimed at saving 100 million pounds, or $124 million, by 2019. Burberry has said its overarching plan is to outstrip luxury mar-ket growth, which is projected to be 2 to 3 percent in coming years. — sAmAnthA conti

● Brexit: Reality Starts to Bite

Burberry

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Expect the same old, same old — at least for the early part of this year.

That’s the general consensus on Wall Street — while the new administration tran-sitions into power — as it awaits signs on what direction the Trump administration will take on economic policy. There is an expectation that fiscal growth stimulus will kick in later in the year, but to what extent remains unclear.

Ethan Harris, head of global economics at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, said in the short run, he expects more deregula-tion and tax cuts. The firm’s head of U.S. economics, Michelle Meyer, has projected first quarter GDP at 1.5 percent growth, while its head of U.S. equity and quantita-tive strategy, Savita Subramanian, said one sector that would benefit from corporate tax cuts is consumer discretionary, which includes retail.

Brien Rowe, an investment banker at D.A. Davidson Cos., expects a “very busy first quarter” on the mergers and acquisi-tions front for consumer brands, although not all deals necessarily would be fash-ion-related nor would they be completed during the first quarter. “When you look at the credit markets, rates have risen a quarter of a point and debt is very plentiful — still very cheap compared with historical levels,” the investment banker said.

Heading into 2017, high on that list could be the future of Kate Spade & Co., which has seen pressure from an activist inves-tor to sell itself. Last week shares of Kate spiked up on news that it was already in discussions with an investment banker to identify possible buyers.

For now, M & A activity is expected to surpass initial public offerings activity. IPO research and tracking firm Renaissance Capital said 2017 could mark the end to the U.S. IPO recession that began in August 2015 through 2016. While tech-related firms are expected to comprise the mega IPO filings, three industry names to keep an eye on for 2017 are Canada Goose, brand management firm Authentic Brands Group and J. Jill.

Joseph Nemia, head of asset-based lending at TD Bank, said whether the Fed moves to raise rates two or three times next year will “depend on the velocity of the economy, and whether it is growing faster than they wanted it to.” The lending environment has been fairly steady for the last 12 months, and according to Nemia, that is expected to continue in 2017.

With a new Republican president in office, Joseph Nastri, Capital One’s market executive for the Metro New York region, is hoping that federal regulations will mod-erate, noting that current regulations have “definitely make it more difficult for small- and midsize businesses to get capital.…Banks want to lend [and] will loosen up the reigns a bit” if there are fewer restrictions.

Ken Frieze, chief executive officer at Gordon Brothers, a financial services firm that’s better know for its legacy business in asset dispositions, expects to see more announcements of store closings, given the typical seasonality early in the year when retailers assess their locations plus the added pressure from the consumer shift to online from offline. He expects value retailers such as off-pricers and discounters to continue to do well, com-pared with traditional retailers such as department stores and specialty apparel

chains. Much of that change has to do with the growing Millennial consumer base, Frieze said.

A potential Black Swan event could be what policies get implemented under President-elect Trump’s administration. “Barring some international crisis, we’ll have to see about the changes in policy that he talks about. There may be some benefits, but also some costs. Who knows what he wants to do and what he can get done domestically,” Frieze said, noting that “President-elect Trump will likely have more influence outside than inside the country, given our checks and balances system [of government].”

While the retail and apparel sectors are struggling more than they have in the past, Frieze did see some potential benefit for consumers, and in turn possibly more spending on apparel, should there be a corporate tax cut. “That could create addi-tional disposable income, but how much of that will flow into the general population’s pocketbook is the question. We’ll have to see what he actually can get through,” Frieze said.

Jeffrey Edelman, former retail analyst and now director of retail and consumer products advisory services for RSM, expects to see more online firms building their own stores to have a brand presence in the physical world. And while he sees traditional retailers continuing to invest in technology, he said most “still don’t know what the return on the investment is going to be except that they know if they don’t invest [in technology] they will lose out…. Selling online is not the golden goose everyone thought it would be. They may be gaining market share, but they are losing on profitability. The only way to counter this is to have unique merchan-dise that’s not available down the street. The way of the future for retailers will be having brands that are exclusives.”

Bill Lewis, senior vice president of consumer products, retail and distri-bution for Capgemini Consulting, said mall operators will continue to focus on how to reinvent the mall concept. Some developments, such as Brookfield Place, Runyon Group’s Platform in Culver City and the redevelopment of Hudson Yards, are examples. Those developments will continue as companies see that the “cura-tion of stores is what drives interest” to the malls.

One area that probably won’t change much going into 2017 is the distressed side of retail, and which retailers could con-tinue to face financial pressures.

Ratings agencies Fitch and Moody’s have often noted the publicly traded firms Sears Holdings Corp. and Bon-Ton Stores Inc. Among the privately held firms, most owned by financial sponsors, Claire’s Stores, Nine West and Rue 21 are on the watch list. J. Crew, on Moody’s list, is in discussions to restructure its debt. And struggling apparel chain Limited Stores, owned by Sun Capital Partners, has been said to be moving closer to a bankruptcy filing, or even a liquidation if a buyer can’t be found.

And finally, one certainty heading into 2017 is that all eyes will be on the Dow Jones Industrial Average hitting 20,000. There was hope during the rally following the U.S. presidential election that Dow 20,000 would occur before the end of 2016, but that faded last week when on Wednesday the Dow shed 111 points, and then slipped more on Friday to close out the year at 19,762. — vicKi m. young

Forecast 2017● Challenges Remain

For RetailersTax cuts, if they happen, could boost consumer spending.

Retailer

Bon-Ton Stores

Claire’s Stores

J. Crew

Sears Holdings

Nine West

99 Cents

Rue 21

True Religion

Declining same-store sales and operating margins hurt ability to invest in technology and real estate.

High-yield bonds; difficult mall traffic trends, and economic headwinds in Europe.

Leveraged debt structure; increased competition from fast fashion

High-yield bonds; institutional term loans; cash-burn rate; lack of clear catalyst for profit improvement

High-yield bonds; institutional term loans; fashion miscues, and poor trends in women’s denim.

High-yield bonds; institutional term loans

High-yield bonds; institutional term loans

Institutional term loans; adverse denim trends

Reason

** Data from Fitch Ratings and Moody’s Investors Service

Retailers on Ratings Agencies' Watch List

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Forecast 2017For the global beauty industry, the year ahead promises the continued rise of indie brands and perpetuation of competitive and reactive acquisition sprees from major players. Barring financial market distur-bance, trends for 2017 are expected to simply be an evolution of those from 2016 — where the big players enveloped smaller, growing companies in hopes of benefitting from their expansion and innovation.

L’Oréal paying a 6.1 times multiple to buy It Cosmetics for $1.2 billion and Estée Lauder paying a 5.5 times multiple to purchase Too Faced for $1.45 billion are prime examples of corporations’ thirst for burgeoning brands. And while acquisi-tions are expected to roll in throughout the new year, the focus is expected to diversify away from makeup, highlighted by deals like Unilever’s planned purchase of hair-care brand Living Proof.

Makeup (and selfies) will still be in vogue— but as the youngsters driving growth realize their makeup-heavy routines have taken a toll on their pores, the skin-care category could show signs of life. And the mass market might just one-up prestige — NPD Global beauty industry analyst Karen Grant divulged to WWD that mass skin-care was on track to surpass prestige skin-care in sales gains for the year.

“The momentum around mass right now, especially in facial — which is its biggest category — is huge,” said Grant. The key is shifting focus away from antiaging and towards overall skin health. “It’s a question of evolving the offering and the messaging,” said Grant. “It’s not so mono-focused [on antiaging]. The

consumer is not just looking for one option.”

In 2016, the mass skin-care category quietly gained traction as the pressure of competition galvanized legacy brands to churn out prestige-inspired innovation, such as the Pure Clay Masks from L’Oréal Paris, Garnier SkinActive Micellar Water and Neutrogena’s Light Therapy Acne Mask. The newness will continue in 2017 as legacy brands unleash more upscale-lean-ing product innovations. Inspired by the success of SK-II in the U.S., Olay is releasing its Regenerist and Luminous Miracle Boost Concentrates, and Garnier is launching a line of sheet masks. Ingredients at mass will become more sophisticated, as L’Oréal Paris launches a clay range for hair and

Garnier utilizes hyaluronic acid.In prestige, this could be the year that

Victoria Beckham's limited-edition color collection for Estée Lauder becomes permanent. On the ingredient front, Korea remains to beauty what Silicon Valley is to the tech world, producing goods with higher concentrations of star ingredients. The beauty retail specialty stores — including Sephora, Ulta Beauty, Bluemercury, Cos Bar and Space NK — will continue to grab market share from mass-market chains and department stores. Specialized beauty "bars" oper-ating on the DryBar model will prolifer-ate, becoming more and more part of customers' daily routines and expanding to major U.S. cities beyond New York and Los Angeles.

Behind much of the beauty boom is a younger consumer who is simply using more products. That anticipated contin-ued growth means that the sector giants, and even the private equity firms that can swoop in ahead of the major players, are going to keep pouring their dollars into beauty companies. For the bigger

participants that means acquisitions of brands that don't overlap too heavily with anything they already own, while digest-ing the myriad of businesses they added over the past couple of years. For the PE shops, it means beating the strategic play-ers and investing with hopes that in three years, conditions will have remained the same or improved and they can sell off at a five-times-plus multiple. Prices for companies will remain high in 2017.

Social media will continue to propel indie brands into hot takeover targets. Hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of followers are liking, commenting and sharing their favorite products and making previously unknown brands into household names.

“For 2017, we’re going to see more indie brands hit the market and get funded,” said Martin Okner, managing director at SHM Corporate Navigators. Venture capitalists already displayed their interest in the beauty category in 2016 with investments in Glossier, Memebox and Goddess Garden.

“More brands that have a multicultural angle to them will hit the market and achieve success through social influenc-ers,” Okner added.

Those beauty influencers are indeed kingmakers, proving that social media sells product. Upending the traditional notions of advertising, this group is responsible for a shift in marketing dollars from some of the leading global brands. That, and they are becoming brands in and of themselves, with some names launching their beauty lines and products at retail. Influencers proved they can sell — and surely momentum in this space will only yield bigger deals for this group going forward. — Allison collins, rAchEl strugAtZ And EllEn thomAs

● Beauty M&A To Stay Hot

Victoria Beckham’s limited-edition color cosmetics collection with Estée Lauder.

Companies that may sell or seek investment in 2017:

Cover FXDevacurl

Dr. BrandtDrunk Elephant

Josie MaranMineral Fusion

MyChelleNest

Perricone MD

In the Market

Last year could be called the year of con-solidation as technology’s disruption of the media industry continued across print and digital publishers alike. Companies contin-ued shifting their gaze to video, live events, branded content and e-commerce in order to grow new streams of revenue.

Meanwhile, publishers tried to gain footing as advertising in print continu-ously shrank.

“The print drop has been astounding in the third quarter,” said media analyst Ken Doctor. “The fourth quarter, I hear isn’t a whole lot better…much of the print world is anticipating a 10 percent drop in print advertising in 2017. So if you connect the dots of print continuing to nosedive, there will be more buyouts and more layoffs" in the coming year.

That process already started in 2016, as Time Inc., Hearst, Condé Nast and Meredith Corp. endured layoffs, structural reorganization, circulation reduction and, in some cases, shuttered magazines. Mere-dith closed More magazine at the beginning of the year, and Condé Nast ended its year by folding Self. Meanwhile, Time Inc. rejig-gered its c-suite under new chief executive officer Rich Battista by reconfiguring its business side with publishers selling across categories, such as beauty and autos, instead of for a particular magazine. The company's renovation comes at a time when there's buzz it may be up for sale — a

storyline that will be one to watch in 2017.Condé Nast, which will unveil a new cor-

porate structure in the new year, reduced the frequency of Teen Vogue to a quarterly, and said it would consolidate creative direc-tors, copy teams and researchers across its stable of titles. Hearst followed suit, in a way, lowering the frequency of its teen glossy Seventeen to six times a year and qui-etly consolidating editors of Cosmopolitan, Redbook, Good Housekeeping and Woman’s Day under the lifestyle group. More job consolidations are said to be on the way at all the magazine publishers, as many in the industry wonder if the publishers are cutting too much, and forfeiting the quality of their print products to evolve their digital busi-nesses. Other magazine closures last year included Complex, Bloomberg Pursuits, Mental Floss, Fitness Magazine and a group of travel magazines at Bonnier.

Buyouts were doled out at The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, as both publishers reallocated their resources, placing less of an emphasis on lifestyle cov-erage and more on audience development, emerging technologies, such as virtual reality and, in the case of The Journal, financial coverage.

But it was also survival of the fittest in the digital world. Mode Media, which was once valued at $1 billion, shuttered in Sep-tember, sounding alarm bells that perhaps those sky-high valuations were overblown. In order to cultivate his brands, Group Nine chief executive officer Ben Lerer inked a $100 million deal with Discovery Commu-nications this year.

“I think there’s going to be a meaningful consolidation in the media space,” Lerer told WWD, citing similar “roll-ups” in media such as Univision’s buying spree of Gawker Media, The Onion, The Root and the remaining stake of Fusion, or Hearst and Verizon’s acquisition of Complex Media, among others.

Weighed down by hefty costs, Univision cut about 250 jobs, with the majority coming from Fusion, which had been a money-losing venture since it launched in 2013. With its eye on going public, Univision will need to integrate Gizmodo Group, the former Gawker properties, according to Doctor, who cited affiliate commerce opportunities.

Aside from native advertising, which is expected to become a $59 billion global industry by 2018, according to data firm Adyoulike, media companies have begun looking at commerce again. Towards the end of 2016, The New York Times made a big push into commerce when the company snapped up Wirecutter and The Sweethome, and New York Magazine launched The Strategist for product rec-ommendations. In 2017, the trend is widely expected to continue and expand — after

all, media cannot live by ads alone.Meanwhile, the role of the third-party

platform came under fire as these new media companies facilitated the dissemina-tion of fake news, which emerged as a key topic in the presidential election and the dawn of the “post-truth” era. The danger of permitting the Facebooks, Googles and Twitters of this world to be a touch point for news — both fake and real — without regulation was, arguably, the biggest media story in 2016 — and will continue to be an issue in 2017.

Once the purview of supermarket tab-loids, fraudulent, sensationalized stories are more believable in an environment where readers are less likely to differentiate news sources and were given greater reach thanks to social media algorithms that prize engagement over content. But, during the election, Facebook was a petri dish for fake stories by sites that positioned themselves as real news organizations. After a con-tinuing outcry, the firm announced some stopgaps that would at least alert users when they share stories that are demon-strably untrue.

But as with so many terms, “fake news” has become a catchall employed by the left and the right on the political spectrum to slam stories that they felt were biased or contained errors. In 2017, the term will continue to be a way to call out unfavorable coverage and is likely to gain even more currency as a rhetorical staple of the politi-cally divided country. — AlExAndrA stEigrAd with contributions from KArA bloomgArdEn-smoKE

● Media Consolidation Expected to Continue

Media cannot live by ads alone.

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Forecast 2017In 2017, expect technology to cater to — and imitate — humans, as robots get smarter and customers expect personal-ized, on-demand service.

The past year was one for retailers to kick the tires of emerging tech such as chatbots, virtual and augmented reality, mobile payments and drone deliveries; 2017 promises more implementation and, hopefully, monetization.

“This year will be about how to generate a return on tech investments — not creating them, but understanding them,” said Kimiko Thornton, who as senior director of innovation at Westfield’s Bespoke, works with retail-tech start-ups in San Francisco.

Thornton foresees fashion companies increasingly behaving like tech firms with rapid prototyping and live testing (often in the form of a pop-up store). Pop-ups at Bespoke, for example, saw a 400 percent sales jump online after opening a physical location in Westfield San Francisco Centre, the home base of Bespoke.

Similarly, RocksBox founder and chief executive officer Meaghan Rose said that retailers will increasingly act like tech com-panies like Google in that they will acquire other firms to stay relevant while focusing on the core business. She has found that tech, and data, are evolving in a way that allows businesses to truly listen to what the customer wants, and to personalize and

target advertising accordingly. She also sees it allowing brands to facilitate a community network among customers.

This is especially important when the customer’s inspiration moment takes place at home, said Lisa Bougie, who is chief merchandising officer at Stitch Fix, which, like RocksBox, shares its data with retail vendors and has developed in-house brands based off of in-depth customer feedback.

Rati Sahi Levesque, who is chief mer-chant at The Real Real, said that Facebook data increasingly allows personalization and targeting of advertising, and that the company, like many e-commerce pure-plays, will increasingly experiment with physical retail offerings.

On the personalization front, Robin Chan, cofounder and chief operating offi-cer of “Uber for fashion” service Operator,

said that tech such as chatbots that use artificial intelligence will enable brands to deliver customer service, rather than just transactions, to build loyalty. “AI and chat-bots so far have just scratched the surface,” he said. “They should know what you buy and add on to that. I think we’ll see deeper things that build brand affinity.”

He is also predicting autonomous deliv-eries from companies such as Uber and Amazon, which has begun testing drone deliveries in the U.K. “The biggest cost of on-demand delivery is human capital,” Chan said.

The purchase path has become more

diversified. “Consumers crave omnichannel shopping experiences with little resistance across the digital and physical,” said Doug Baldasare, founder and chief executive officer of in-store charging station provider ChargeItSpot. He predicts that the option to buy online and pick up in-store will flour-ish, and that retailers will follow the lead of Amazon Go with self-service kiosks and other streamlined checkout options. In the short-term, however, he said that fragmen-tation in the mobile payment landscape will hinder the speed of adoption. “Banks, retailers and credit card companies are all trying to control the mobile payment experience,” Baldasare said.

Finally, 2017 might be the year in which contextual commerce, which means selling at the point of inspiration on platforms such as Pinterest and Twitter, might finally take off.

Brian Marvin, chief operating officer and cofounder of contextual commerce platform Bringhub, highlighted media outlets such as NBC Today and Buzzfeed that have connected editorial content to commerce, and Facebook’s partnership with Shopify, which gives users access to product catalogues and purchases within Facebook Messenger. “In 2017, traditional digital marketing will begin to merge more drastically with commerce, creating the opportunity for marketers to merchandise their products at the moment of discovery. As publishers, retailers and brands continue to invest more in contextual commerce, marketers will see an uptick in return on investment,” he said. — mAghAn mcdowEll

● The Tech Frontier: More ‘Human’ and

Right Now• Chatbots and conversational

commerce on messaging platforms• Commercialization of augmented

and virtual reality• On-demand deliveries by autono-

mous drone and driverless cars• New methods of payment — mobile

and otherwise• Contextual commerce on social

sites and in e-mail• Live video streaming on social

media• Self-service kiosks and the death of

the cash register• Initial public offerings

from Snap and Pinterest

Tech Trends At a Glance

Blame it on the sneaker.The ubiquitous, comfortable, and oh-so-

trendy choice of footwear has created a sea change in men’s wear. Many guys today think nothing of wearing their Nike Air Jordans, Under Armour Curry 3s or Adidas Climacools for all occasions. And it’s not just sneakerheads — men from all walks of life have embraced the footwear model.

It’s not unusual for retailers to hold raffles or pass out wristbands to customers seeking the latest hot models. There are even Sneaker Cons in cities around the country as well as a National Sneaker Day — it was Nov. 5 in 2016.

This sneaker mania has carried over to the designer market as well, where luxury labels such as Saint Laurent, Prada, Gucci, Bally, Alexander McQueen and Fendi have introduced their unique iterations — Gucci emblazoned a Tian print onto glittery fab-ric and stuck a price tag of $650 on its low-top model, while Prada’s platform wingtip leather sneakers retail for $980.

But the impact of the sneaker is also being felt above the feet as streetwear-in-spired brands such as Off-White, Hood by Air and Vetements take the fashion industry by storm. Their distinct aesthetic — Demna Gvasalia of Vetements showed billowing suit jackets alongside high-end white joggers and Reebok track jackets on the runway for spring — has spilled over to the more traditional market. Established brands, many of which built their fortunes on tailored clothing, are scurrying to respond to this ath-leisure trend.

Eric Jennings, vice president and men’s fashion director at Saks Fifth Avenue, calls

the movement “active lifestyle” and said the store is “building a zone of business” around the trend. At Saks, this encom-passes everything from the urban version of activewear from Y-3, EFM and J.Linde-berg to the tailored casualwear offerings from more conservative brands such as Brunello Cucinelli and Ralph Lauren.

With athletic references as a backdrop, the big sports brands want a piece of the action as well. Nike, through its fash-ion-skewed NikeLab initiative, offered merchandise last year from everyone from Givenchy designer Riccardo Tisci and Balmain’s Olivier Rousteing to Undercov-er’s Jun Takahashi and Kim Jones. Under Armour brought Tim Coppens into the fold to design its UAS contemporary sportswear collection, and Adidas has long-standing relationships with Yohji Yamamoto for Y-3 Sport, Jeremy Scott, Alexander Wang

and Pharrell Williams. Its association with Kanye West the Yeezy collection will be expanded — presumably this year — with the launch of the Adidas + Kanye West line, which it has called “the most significant partnership ever created between a non-athlete and an athletic brand.” Of course, West’s recent hospitalization and his much-maligned spring show could delay the launch.

Surprisingly, the focus on the sneaker, ath-leisure, active and streetwear cate-gories hasn’t impacted sales of tailored clothes in the U.S. According to The NPD Group, men’s tailored clothing dollar sales increased in the 12 months ending November and accounted for 8 percent of total U.S. men’s apparel sales for the period. This could indicate that tailored men’s wear brands are making strides by adapting to the current marketplace. For

example, Barneys New York initially opted to not sell tailored clothing at its New York downtown store, but in October it picked up P. Johnson Tailors’ ready-to-wear and made-to-measure collections. The Austra-lian tailored clothing brand, which was founded by Patrick Johnson, is known for its comfortable, lightweight suits that are made for travel. And in September Berluti tapped the romantic designer Haider Ack-ermann as its new creative director — his first collection for the brand will make its debut this month. Antoine Arnault, chief executive officer of Berluti, told WWD, “All categories — whether it’s T-shirts, or sweat-ers — everything casual is overperforming the sartorial right now. Casual is king.” — JEAn E. pAlmiEri with contributions from AriA hughEs

● Men’s Wear Still Getting Its Kicks

Tim Coppens x Under Armour’s fall ready-to-wear show.

Hot Sneaker Release: Raf Simons x Adidas

Ozweego 2

adidas and Raf Simons have teamed up again on a collection of sneakers for spring and the new off-white color-way for the popular Ozweego 2 style, which typically retails for around $430, is one of the most anticipated releases for the year.

Consumers opened up to the idea of virtual reality

headsets in 2016.

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Forecast 2017What's in store for accessories in the new year?

It would appear that the category, starting with the spring season — which is now shipping into stores — is primed for reinvigorated interest.

A slip in sales has motivated brands, which had long relied on their basic shapes — reissuing them each season in new colors and fabrications — to reevaluate their offerings, and introduce new styles. Labels including Proenza Schouler, Thom Browne and Valentino have invested resources in redefining their core accessory lines. Designers are beginning to rethink the mold, and promote a sense of individualism through their accessories offerings. Bags from Balenciaga to Loewe are offered in a gamut of sizes, shapes and embellishments.

Bags constructed of luxe fabrics — like heavy-gauge nylon and durable satins — appear to be growing in popularity, for both their newness and friendlier price points. Candy-colored sacks by Loewe, elegant clutches from The Row and fun handheld options by Trademark exemplify the new fabric trend.

Footwear in particular is understood to be a particularly diversified category — with no true shape or silhouette currently deemed an “it” style. Rather, it would appear designers have issued a phalanx of stilettos, flats, and mid-heel styles in an effort to capture shoppers at each stage of their day. “There is something for everyone out there right now,” said of the shoe market.

For jewelry, the “demi-fine” category of delicate rings, necklaces and threadbare bracelets does not show any signs of slow-ing. The introductory price point has been massively successful at department stores like Neiman Marcus. Its success prompted Net-a-porter to give it its own landing page last year.

Costume jewelry, too — shown on the runways of Givenchy, J.W. Anderson and Saint Laurent — will continue to grind back into favor. Artful statement earrings and large necklaces crafted of resins and non-precious metals were purchased by department stores and specialty shops.

In the eyewear sector, novelty is also reigning supreme. Glasses are a key runway statement of Alessandro Michele’s success-ful Gucci vision, and his oversize, bejeweled sentiment has caught on across the category. Brightly colored lenses and frames, metal fabrications and outlandish shapes will continue to revive the category — which had

long relied on Wayfarer shapes. As seen on New York and Paris’ streets in the last quar-ter of 2016, aviator optical frames — made both of plastic and metal — appear to be the silhouette du jour, also thanks to Michele.

The one accessories category that is perhaps vulnerable is basics — particularly given the shop-your-closet mood in the U.S. and the Chinese market’s maturation (where shoppers, too, are understood to have their own fill of basic items). In an effort to capture shoppers in the moment, and aid in

the ‘experience’ of brick-and-mortar retail, buyers have waged their bets on extraor-dinary, emotional designs for the coming seasons. “I think that it’s these strike-an-emotion, I love it and have to have it items that are moving the needle will continue to move the needle,” said Bergdorf Goodman ‎senior vice president fashion and store presentation Linda Fargo. “Things that feel very basic and core are things I think people already have in their closet. That’s where the business can be in trouble.”

This said, Millennials’ disaffection for big businesses and their perceived markups could continue to disrupt business as usual. New, targeted brands including Everlane, Pop & Suki and Outdoor Voices — which aim to promote transparency, friendlier pricing and design integrity — have found suc-cess. Instagram-native labels like Maryam Nassir Zadeh, Simon Miller and Mansur Gavriel have found fame and cachet on social media, further diverting Millennials’ affections from traditional heritage labels. With income rates for the Millennial age group somewhat stagnated, the cohort has developed a growing appreciation for vintage and resale sites including The Real Real — where discounted prices have shed a light on the true value of luxury. This considered, brands may need to reevaluate their models of business — not only in 2017, but in years to come. — misty whitE sidEll

● How Will Shoes, Bags and Jewelry

Take Shape?

The Casa Loewe store in Madrid, Spain.

While still booming in men’s wear, the athletic trainer — which the fashion elite, as of late, have paired with everything from Adidas track pants to Chanel Couture — may be on the down-turn in women’s.

Athleticism appears to be declining in favor industrywide. “I would say there is definitely a general shift, particularly in the shoe world, away from the more casual mood that has dominated in recent seasons. The ubiquity of the sneaker is starting to

wane,” offered Net-A-Porter’s retail fashion director Lisa Aiken.

So how will style-hawkers now choose to carelessly roam around town? It would appear that in light of sneaker fatigue, the ballet flat is returning as the flat du jour.

The feminine style last rose to acclaim in the mid-Aughts, as a girlish counter to the Paris Hil-ton-era’s flashy inclinations for skin brandishing and spray tans. In the nascent days of high-street fash-ion, the style quickly proliferated

through all price points – starting at Chanel’s iconic flat and permeat-ing footwear’s ranks all the way to Payless pleather.

The flat’s latest incarnation is a bit edgier and less straightforward – embellished with grommets, ankle ribbons and spikes at Miu Miu, Celine and Valentino. Ballet flats are also offered by The Row, Aquazurra, and United Arrows’ in-house line, among others. Barneys New York’s web site has a specific section dedicated to the style.

Saks Fifth Avenue has teamed

with Manolo Blahnik on an ex-clusive run of ballet flats by the designer, and enlisted American Ballet Theatre principal dancer

Isabella Boylston to appear in promotional videos for the collection. The $550 ‘Tobaly’ style comes in a candied array of col-ors, and are “animated, fun and whimsical,” said Saks senior vice president and fashion director Roopal Patel.

The ballet flat mood is avail-able in lower price points as well, with Randy Ochart, the owner of French Sole — famous for its $140 flats — reporting a 41 percent increase in sales year-over-year. — m.w.s.

The Ballet Flat Rises as Sneaker Fatigue Grows

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“Things that feel very basic and core are things I think people already have in their closet. That’s where the business can be in trouble.”

— Linda Fargo

january 3, 2017 15

Forecast 2017

Get ready for President Reality Star — and all the glitz and glam that moniker suggests. Where President Reagan was very much the era of the presidency and the Hollywood actor, Trump is poised to be the champion of the reality star — none more so than himself. Meetings with Kanye West, Anna Wintour, Ray Lewis and Jim Brown have detracted from scandals and policy developing, and his penchant for social media rivals the most prolific of teens. Until it was canceled fol-lowing backlash, the auctioning off of a coffee date with Ivanka, and a hunting expedition with Eric and Donald Jr. were the latest in a string of headline-drawing ap-peals to the high-minded’s desire to get a word in with the Trump family — and none are viewed as powerfully as I.T.

“Republican administrations tend to place a little more em-phasis on society and their role in helping philanthropy and our country, and that’s a good thing,” New York socialite and philan-thropist Jean Shafiroff says. “Now with the new president coming in, Donald Trump, maybe his children will be the rebirth of a new society.”

And just what shape will this new society take? With Melania

staying behind in New York to care for young Barron, I.T. is poised to become the social bee of D.C. She and her husband, Jared Kushner, are reportedly house-hunting in the capital's glitziest neigh-borhoods, and looking for an Orthodox synagogue to attend. As their political appointments remain unsolved, their transition to Washington’s social scene — what there is left of it, after eight years of being ignored by the Obamas — seems certain. Will they bring a new kind of glitz to the White House?

The president-elect, a onetime front-row fixture at New York Fashion Week, will likely have to sit out collections, but Melania and Ivanka are sure to be the most eagerly sought-after social "get" in town. Similarly, while Trump is expected to continue frequent-ing stodgy favorites like 21 Club and Jean-Georges in the Trump International Hotel & Tower New York, I.T. and Jared might follow in the Obamas’ footsteps in trying out New York’s hottest restaurant openings: the pair were seen dining at new Williamsburg eatery Lilia before the holidays.

Dennis Basso, designer to the uptown fur-loving social elite, has been dressing the Trump family since the Ivana days — the

first Mrs. Trump was at his debut show. He feels that the women in the family will bring a unique brand of glamour to the White House. “I think that all of the Trump women are very pretty, they have beautiful figures, and they wear clothes very well,” Bas-so says. “I think there will clearly be a fashion addition — there is Mrs. Melania Trump, there’s Ivanka Trump, and then there are the two daughters-in-law, all very attractive, and Tiffany, the other daughter.…I think it’s going to be the first time that we’re ever going to see so many young, very attractive, glamorous women coming out of that White House.”

It’s Basso’s opinion, the Gucci and Balmain-loving Melania will opt to incorporate some American brands into her wardrobe — after all, she did wear Ralph Lauren on the campaign trail, which she bought at the designer’s Madison avenue store. “I think she’ll be very aware of the different designs, but she’ll also be very happy to wear American designers as well. I think she’ll wear American,” Basso pre-dicts. I.T. will “wear her own brand, but I think she also will venture out possibly and wear things from other designers that she likes and that she’s friendly with.” She’ll need to tread carefully when it comes

to wearing her namesake goods though, following controversy over the attempt to promote sales of a bracelet she wore in a family “60 Minutes” interview.

So just who are the Trumps expected to be friendly with? Basso believes “who they were involved with socially before

they became politically involved, I believe they still will be friendly with those same people” — and his cabinet picks seem to be narrowing that list down.

For one, there’s Hilary Geary Ross, wife of Trump’s pick for commerce secretary Wilbur Ross, who is expected to bring her Palm

Beach charity circuit ways to D.C.’s prim entertaining scene. The former society writer will no doubt swan with I.T. and Jared, as will Cindy Adams, longtime New York Post gossip columnist and a close friend to Trump.

Let the invitations fly. — lEigh nordstrom

Get ready for President Reality Star — and all the glitz and glam that moniker suggests.

Will the Swans Soar Under Trump?The president-elect is lauded as a swamp-draining change-agent hurtling toward Washington — but how will his presidency affect society?

PartiesDon’t get too used to your

cashmere socks and “West Wing” reruns — the hibernation from the party scene will start to thaw as early as Jan. 8 when the Golden Globes kick off an awards season that will dominate January and Febru-ary. The indie snow bunnies of the film world will swap their carpet gowns for Sundance, at the end of January, just be-fore New York Fashion Week: Men’s returns — here’s hoping the men’s brands hit their stride with their after-party effort. The Grammys will inter-rupt New York Fashion Week, and just as you’re recovering from the Marc Jacobs finale, the Academy Awards will kick off in L.A. After that, it’s off to the races — SXSW will draw hipster entertainment geeks to Austin, museums like the Frick and the Whitney are sure to usher the young socials of New York into a cocktail dress for their spring parties and the Chanel-touted Tribeca Film Festival will give a leg-up on what movies to add to your viewing queue. Will the Coach-ella steam continue to wane? What glamorous newcomer will debut at Cannes? And, the big one: just what will the fashion cognoscenti pick from

Rei Kawakubo’s oeuvre at this year’s Met Ball, dedicated to Comme des Garçons?

inauguration/MarchWhere do you plan to

be inauguration weekend? On Jan. 20, President-elect Donald Trump will attend two official inaugural balls and the Salute to Our Armed Services Ball, his transition team has announced. Several other unofficial (and nonpartisan at that) balls are being held through the capital over the weekend, including the Vettys Inaugural Ball and Awards and the Washingtonian Inaugural Ball. Actors including Connie Britton, Christina Hendricks, Alia Shawkat and Cheryl Hines are on the host commit-tee for the Creative Coalition’s Inaugural Ball for the Arts, held Friday evening. Talent has yet to be confirmed for this year, but past performers include the Black Eyed Peas and Sting.

Left-leaning designers like Michael Kors and editors such as Condé Nast Traveler’s Pilar Guzman are just some of the media and fashion people who have voiced plans to join in the Women’s March on Washington on Jan 21. After some contention, the D.C. police have officially issued

a permit for the march to take place, beginning not at Lincoln Memorial as originally planned, but at Independence Avenue and Third Street SW.

Restaurants:AbcV — Early 201738 East 19 Street

Continuing his dominance of New York’s dining scene, Jean-Georges Vongerichten has partnered with ABC Car-pet & Home chief executive officer and creative director Paulette Cole to open AbcV, a vegetarian spin-off of his pop-ular ABC Kitchen. The restau-rant, situated next to the ABC empire, will serve breakfast, lunch and to-go, with dinner

launching shortly after. Will Trump come knocking when a veggie craving strikes?

Made Nice — February8 West 28th Street

Will Guidara and chef Dan-iel Humm of Eleven Madison Park and the NoMad Hotel restaurants are set to make their fast-casual debut in February, with the opening of Made Nice. Located next door to the NoMad bar, the restaurant will serve a small menu of composed dishes, priced around $12 to $15, that are reminiscent of their famed dishes from the two other establishments. “We’ve been craving a place that we

can visit almost every day for delicious, wholesome food and warm hospitality,” Guida-ra and Humm said. “Some-thing accessible, convenient and hospitable.”

Party planner:Ron Wendt

Emerging as the fashion industry’s go-to for planning the chicest parties, Ron Wendt’s work will be seen all over New York in the coming year. In 2016, Wendt was re-sponsible for Chanel’s dinner at the New York Public Library, the opening of the Cartier mansion — and for filling Louis Vuitton’s Miami Design District store with 24,000 pounds of sand. “There is always an object to meet — most of them are Paris-based, and they have very specific directives they’re looking for,” he says of his clients. “But then there’s an interpretation, because this is New York.” His schedule for the new year already includes the Net-a-porter and MSK win-ter luncheon, the MSK spring ball, with Carolina Herrera, and an Oscar party in L.A. “that I can’t talk about.”

Breakout actors:Lucas Hedges

The son of the Oscar-nom-

inated screenwriter behind “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape” and “About a Boy” has been gaining momentum since his film “Manchester by the Sea” premiered at Sundance last January. Now, with the Casey Affleck-helmed film drumming up awards-season nods, Hedges is poised to be a face of 2017. He’ll be seen this year alongside Saoirse Ronan in “Lady Bird,” and “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri” from Academy Award-winner Martin Mc-Donagh, starring Peter Din-klage and Woody Harrelson.

Naomie HarrisThe British actress may

have catapulted into fame with “Skyfall” and “Spectre,” but she’s moved beyond her Bond days with “Moonlight,” one of this year’s most poi-gnant contenders for Oscar gold. And the fashion world has caught on quick; she’s graced front rows at Michael Kors, Dior and Burberry, and the award-season race has her out in Rodarte, Monse and Gucci. Much like we were glued to our TVs awaiting Brie Larson’s Oscar-night dress last year, we’ll be eagerly awaiting Harris’ gown come February. — l.n.

The Inauguration, Parties, Restaurants and Actors

The 73rd Annual Golden Globe Awards.

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january 3, 2017 17

Fashion Scoops

Memo Pad

narrowing Focusiconix Brand Group has sold the rights to the Sharper Image for $100 million to ThreeSixty Group.

The cash transaction included related intellectual property assets of the Sharp-er Image brand. ThreeSixty Group is the brand’s largest licensee.

The company said it plans to use the net proceeds, plus additional cash,

to pay down about $115 million of debt, a portion of which will be used to pay down the firm’s Senior Secured Notes issued under Iconix’s securitization facility and a portion of which will be used to pay down the company’s Senior Secured Term Loan.

While the company expects to record a gain on the transaction, Iconix said that for 2017, the net impact of the sale of the Sharper Image brand and the repayment of debt is expected to be neutral to earnings.

John Haugh, Iconix’s chief executive officer, said the brand did not fit the com-pany’s go-forward strategy as outlined at the firm’s investor day last month.

“After careful consideration, we determined that we could better lever-age our resources and generate greater returns by focusing on other areas of the business. This transaction generates a significant return on investment, and al-lows us to make progress on de-levering the balance sheet, which is a top priority,” Haugh said. The ceo added, “Portfolio

management will continue to be a key focus for the company.”

Sharper Image is the second brand that Iconix has sold this year. The com-pany earlier this year sold its Badgley Mischka brand.

At the company’s investor day presentation, Haugh made a point of noting that the company — now an active brand manager — is still in the mergers and acquisitions game, both as buyer and seller. The company has just over 30 brands under its umbrella, which include:

Umbro, Lee Cooper, Danskin, Candie’s, Nick Graham, Joe Boxer, Missimo, London Fog, Ocean Pacific, Strawberry Shortcake, Rockawear and Mossimo, to name a few. He also spoke about how the brands are divided into three categories, with high-growth brands such as “Umbro” called “drivers,” older and established brands like “Candie’s” referred to as the “maintain” group, and smaller and younger brands with runway potential like a Nick Graham that the company can “incubate.” — vicKi m. young

piccioli’s push“this was a very interesting year,” said Pierpaolo Piccioli from Rome the day before New Year’s Eve. Many people the world over would agree with him for grand-scale reasons, but, as the fashion industry knows, on a personal level, 2016 was the year that Piccioli and his longtime creative partner Maria Grazia Chiuri ended their 20-plus year professional marriage to go their separate ways. Chiuri headed to Dior while he remained at Valen-tino, where they had been co-cre-ative directors for eight success-ful years. Anyone wondering if Piccioli could keep up the brilliant work and hold his own at Valen-tino got a firm answer with his breathtaking spring show.

Piccioli is wasting no time getting into 2017, opening the year with three runway shows in January: pre-fall in New York, followed by men’s and then couture. “I’m really happy to face new challenges,” he said. To that end, one of his first major projects launching in the new year is the spring ad campaign, the first representing Valentino under Piccioli’s personal creative vision. It was photographed by David Sims in two parts — first, backstage at the spring runway show; and second, a series of powerful black-and-white por-traits of seven models, including Christy Turlington, Liya Kebede, Ratner, Fei Fei Sun, Lorena Maraschi, Blesnya Minher and Mali Koopman. The images will break Jan. 4 on Valentino’s digital channels and in February print issues, appearing as spreads juxtaposing the portraits and the backstage shots and as single pages.

For Piccioli, the campaign is less about clothes than a state-ment of his values for the brand. “I wanted to celebrate beauty as individuality and the one-of-a-kind,” he said. That translated to casting women across diverse ethnicities and age brackets. “I didn’t want to have an ideal wom-an,” said Piccioli. “I didn’t want to talk about the age and race, I just like them for what they are. There are no rules — no young or less young.…I didn’t want to create a tribe of women; ultimately I wanted to get individuality.”

Could his emphasis on the individual bear relevance to Pic-cioli’s new independence at Val-entino’s creative helm? Perhaps. Asked if he thought about this campaign differently than those

he worked on with Chiuri, he said. “I didn’t want this campaign to celebrate the collection, I wanted it to celebrate the values…it’s about the spirit, the feelings, the moment. More than usual? I don’t know. I didn’t think how it could be different, I just did what I felt.”

The spring show was certainly a special moment for him, which was partly why he asked Sims to shoot backstage, to document the milestone, but also because: “I feel there’s authenticity and emotion in the real moment of the backstage,” said Piccioli. “I didn’t want to miss that because it’s very spontaneous and fresh.” In addition to individuality and emotion, authenticity and real-ness is a key value. To that end, the models are not heavily made up in the portraits. In fact, Turling-ton is strikingly barefaced. “You don’t have to decorate beauty,” said Piccioli. “You have to catch it as it is.” — JEssicA irEdAlE

island LifeParis’ Île Saint-louis, a favored hangout of writers, artists and in-tellectuals across the centuries, is the setting for Louis Vuitton’s latest advertising campaign, shot by Bruce Weber and styled by Marie-Amélie Sauvé.

Titled “Series 6,” the cam-paign moves between minimalist studio shots of Vuitton ambas-sadors — actresses Michelle Williams, Jennifer Connelly, Adèle Exarchopoulos and Sasha Lane — and images of models taken on and around the island in modern silhouettes from the house’s spring collection.

Star leather-goods styles from the collection also get major play in a series of witty still lifes — like a Petite Malle “Column” bag hanging from a wrought-iron railing and a Petite Malle in printed epi leather sus-pended in a rusty dock ring.

Charles Baudelaire, Marie Curie and members of the so-called “Lost Generation” includ-ing Ernest Hemingway, John Dos Passos and Nancy Cunard count among former residents of the storied Île Saint-Louis, one of two natural islands on the river Seine in the heart of Paris, with views on Notre-Dame Cathedral.

Summoning up the energy of Paris’ avant-garde artistic, literary and intellectual move-ments, Weber channeled a flâneur strolling through the streets for the campaign, with shots combining a romanticized view of Paris with strong cultural references. Case in point: The Place Louis-Aragon, an area on

the island’s western tip dedi-cated to the French poet of the same name, a major figure in the avant-garde movements that shaped France’s literary and

visual culture in the 20th century, including Surrealism.

“Paris is the soul of this col-lection, with its Right Bank/Left Bank duality, Paris nourished by

all artistic influences. It is to this cultivated, intellectual, original and free-spirited Parisienne that I wanted to pay tribute,” said Nico-las Ghesquière, artistic director

of Vuitton’s women’s collections.The campaign will break in a

range of international luxury titles on Wednesday, including Vogue. — KAtyA forEmAn

Christy Turlington shot by David Sims for Valentino’s spring 2017 campaign.

Jennifer Connelly in the new Louis Vuitton ad campaign.