LVMH has announced som surprising changes at Kenzo, the designer label it has owned since 1993. Italian designer Antonio Marras is out as creative director and widely admired American retailers Humberto Leon and Carol Lim (pictured at right) of Opening Ceremony are in. The team will be tasked with taking Kenzo back to its youthful, contemporary roots. According to WWD, one of the team's goals will be to return the label to the U.S. market which it exited in 2003, only a few years after its namesake, designer Kenzo Takada, left in 1999.
While it seems unusual to see a famous Paris-based fashion label's creative direction taken over by American retailers, Lim and Leon have been successfully wholesaling an original Opening Ceremony labeled collection in about 300 independent stores which now includes separate collaboration lines with Rodarte and the actress Chloë Sevigny. Considering that, it's not such a surprising choice.
Pierre-Yves Roussel, chairman and chief executive officer of LVMH’s fashion division tells WWD, “It’s great to bring this young, contemporary generation into Kenzo. They’re really embracing what was the origin of Kenzo — that Jungle spirit,” referencing the designer's 1970s Paris boutique, Jungle Jap.
Under Marras, the label had reflected Takada's aesthetic, but its offerings had become more expensive and elaborate, and lost ground in markets like the U.S. and Europe where it had once thrived. Lim and Leon are expected to brighten the line and return it to a younger market to compete with labels with similar heritage like Cacharel and the successfully repositioned Carven. Their first collection for the label will be shown in October for Spring 2011 in Paris, and at the very least, Kenzo's owners can count on it being sold in Opening Ceremony's popular and influential boutiques in New York, Los Angeles and Tokyo.
New Creative Lead at Kenzo (WWD)
