The Shophound

CINTRA WILSON GOES SHOPPING: Minimal Disappointment Edition

In her roundabout journey through every major designer boutique in Manhattan, The Times' Critical Shopper Cintra Wilson gives an American Icon a fair shot at the Calvin Klein Collection boutique on Madison Avenue after having been lured by decades of the designer's sleek, sexy imagery.
When it comes to the Calvin Klein Collection of today, however, things are not exactly as one would have remembered them. In the Francisco Costa era, the brand's new parent company, PVH, has focused their considerable attentions and resources on launching the label's moderate department store line. While creative director Costa's runway collections have racked up the awards, they have languished at retail as Calvin's hard-core customers have turned away over the past few years. Our intrepid shopper finds that what was once an American Designer Sportswear mainstay is now styled more to appeal to Asian and European tastes and, unfortunately, bodies. Here's the verdict after trying a shimmery satin tank dress:

It didn’t give me the chrome hood-ornament effect I had hoped for. There was an asymmetrical bunching at one side that made me resemble a sock scrunched the wrong way down a combat boot.

A pewter cocktail dress:

It was a roiling mass of gray pin-tucks, swooping in conflicting directions for a crosscurrent-undertow effect. I was willing to be won over, but the dress was not kind. I staggered out to show [my friend].
“I am your lung after five years of chain-smoking,” I said in the affectless voice of a disembodied organ.

Shopping pal Johanna tries on a teal silk-jersey dress:

It was clingy in all the wrong places — too tight over the curves; loose and baggy in the middle — basically the problem I had with the things I tried on: knit numbers that had a kicky Zelda Fitzgerald look on the hanger, but on the body evoked the wrong years of Brigitte Nielson.

Word has it that the folks at PVH are now trying to bolster the flailing commercial fortunes of the flagship Collection label, but it looks like it may be a much bigger task than they thought it would be.
Critical Shopper | Calvin Klein: New Bow on a Minimal Box by Cintra Wilson (NYTimes)
Calvin Klein Collection 654 Madison Avenue at 60^th Street, Upper East Side

Racy Windows: Another Day In The Greased-Up World Of Calvin Klein

Calvin Klein's billboard at the corner of Houston and Lafayette streets has been a center of controversy for a while, lately featuring provocative and scantily clad images of actress Eva Mendes in jeans and underwear ads. For Spring, however, Calvin's space has been devoted, for the first time if we are not incorrect, to the top men's ready-to-wear Collection with an image that is bound to produce even more contention.
This month, the billboard features two images of model David Agbodji photographed by Steven Klein. On the right, we have David wearing a sleek, black suit, and on the left, David wearing only a generous amount of baby oil, bare backside and all. We're fairly sure that opinion will be split between those who find the image totally inappropriate and those who would like to see David take a quarter turn to the right.
Of course, it's uptown at the Calvin Klein Collection boutique on Madison Avenue where things really get kinky. The possibly NSFW image is after the jump...

Billboard Watch:Quick Change Calvin Strikes Again

Is Calvin Klein looking to have the fastest billboard turnover in SoHo?
Just a few weeks ago, some vocal Houston Street denizens started getting vocal about the sexy threesome (foursome?) depicted on the huge ad space Calvin has controlled for a while now, but before the controversy could reach any kind of fever pitch, the image was abruptly changed to sexy supermodel Doutzen Kroes as a latter day Bo Derek, emerging from the surf in a skimpy red bikini. Now, a scant couple of weeks later, the picture has changed again. This time it's Calvin's contract starlet Eva Mendes modeling the new "Body" jeans, a high waisted style apparently meant to be worn without a top, but with a healthy slathering of body oil. Who hasn't been waiting for that look to come around again?
Ad watchers assumed that the change in images last month was due to public outcry. It wouldn't have been the first time the designer had to pull jeans ads (Remember the Steven Meisel "basement porn" campaign of the early '90s?). In fact, it looks like this ad space is on an accelerated schedule that keeps each image in view for only a couple of weeks, so perhaps the sexy three/foursome had simply completed its brief, allotted time on the wall. If that's the case, then your time to see a giant topless Eva is ticking away.