The Fashion Industry Is A Mystery Of "Advanced Customization Is Not Dead" In Wulin

People think that as Premium custom dress It is a "sunset industry", which will be sung down every once in a while, saying that "advanced customization is dead". In view of the fact that the editor has been singing it down for several years, I have written many articles such as "advanced customization has gone down the altar", "advanced customization has not died, exquisite elegance has died" 2014 Paris High Custom Fashion Week At the end of all the catwalks, I'm going to say something lucky: "Advanced customization is immortal". Because my favorite designer, current Dior Designer Raf Simons, the director, gave a new idea to look at advanced customization this year: it is a collection of superb skills that only the wearer can understand, "not for outsiders".

　 Reason 1: The fashion industry is a Wulin. How can we lose the leader?

As the "Wulin Alliance Leader of the Fashion Industry", the high-end customization industry has a "martial arts secret book" of fashion: the museum like manual workshop and unparalleled craftsmanship is a "fashion unique skill".

　 What is "advanced customization"?

This French fashion series is called "Haute Couture", which does not mean that the senior tailor of XX Shop can sew a big dress for you according to your figure, and then buy the thing that you pay a sky high price; It's not like Louis Vuitton, an "international brand", who can "customize" you by changing your clothes according to your personal size.

"Advanced customization" requires "organizational certification", just like when a mafia needs to complete a series of "organizational rules", adhere to "organizational discipline", and go through "organizational observation" to join the membership. Can be“ Advanced customization ”The brand of must meet the following regulations:

a. It has a studio in Paris and can participate in the women's clothing exhibition held by the Association of Senior Uniform Ordering in January and July every year;

b. At least 50 pieces of clothing shall be displayed each time;

c. More than 3 full-time models are employed throughout the year;

d. The number of styles is very small and most of them are completed manually;

e. Strict review and approval from the French Ministry of Industry are required

During the Spring/Summer 2014 High Custom Fashion Week, there were 21 members of this "organization", 15 French brands and 6 brands from other countries, as well as 10 "invited brands" (this season, Chinese designer Yin Yiqing was among them, and she was the wife of the president of the country Peng Liyuan Marco, a female designer who has produced fashion, has also produced "high-level customized invitation brand" and "useless").

It can be seen that "advanced customization" is a "minority" game, and only "Wulin experts" are destined to participate.

What are the "Wulin experts" in the fashion industry like?

They make "expensive" clothes, but also make something called "luxury". Luxury is not only because it is expensive, but also because it has excellent fabrics and superb workmanship. These top handicrafts are masterpieces that must take 30 days to complete manually. They are "unsurpassed handicrafts" and the secret collection of the museum's manual workshop.

Those "Wulin leaders in the fashion world" have "martial arts secrets" of fashion: Dior has Vermont embroidery workshop; Chanel owns Massaro Shoes Workshop, A. Michel Hat Workshop, Lesage Embroidery Workshop, Lemarie Feather Workshop, Goossen Gold and Silver Workshop, Guillet Decorative Flower Workshop, Desrues Button Workshop, Montex Embroidery Workshop, Causse Glove Workshop, Lognon Pleat Workshop, Lanel Embroidery Workshop... These workshops have preserved precious process databases for hundreds of years, and no one can compete with them.

The inheritance of these "secrets" has become the genetic code of the brand from generation to generation. During the Spring/Summer 2014 haute couture week, Dior invited more than 80 fashion majors from all over the world to Paris to visit Raf Simons' senior customized series for the brand in the fourth quarter, fully demonstrating the long history of Dior brand. Sidney Toledano, the brand CEO, said that the purpose of this initiative was to share and pass on the concept of senior customized clothing, so that more young designers could join in.

Reason 2: Get through the "two veins of appointment and supervision": modernity and penetrability

These fashions were born from complex handicrafts, but they are ultimately a piece of clothing that can allow the wearer to move freely in the society of the 21st century.

When Yves Saint Laurent announced his withdrawal at the beginning of 2002, he made a distraught declaration: "High fashion is dead! The grandeur, luxury and luxury of the past have been replaced by the absurdity and weirdness of the present!" In fact, the new generation is always regarded as "weird" by the old generation: when the miniskirt was born, the old generation thought that only sluts would wear it; When jazz was born, the older generation believed that people who played jazz were gangsters; Before Yves Saint Laurent designed pants for women, the older generation felt that women wearing pants were not decent... {page_break}

Today, Yves Saint Laurent Obviously, it belongs to the "old generation", which belongs to the era of dying with advanced customization. The high-end customization of "luxury and grand" is the "antique" of the last century. This "antique" is to turn women into a kind of decoration. Wearing complicated clothes, being unable to move, and staying quietly become the scenery in the eyes of others.

At the Paris haute couture fashion week in spring and summer 2014, the haute couture brand led by Christian Dior and Chanel gave the way to save "haute couture": "young" and "practical wear". The contemporary and gorgeous handicrafts are like the "two veins of supervision" of advanced customization. If you don't really understand how they exist in contemporary society, "advanced customization" will die.

Comfortable clothes are the needs of modern women. Although advanced customization was born from complex handicrafts, it is still a piece of clothing that can allow the wearer to move freely in the society of the 21st century. They should be light, comfortable and athletic. Those complicated handicrafts and precise tailoring exist to make the wearer more comfortable.

Perhaps in the eyes of the "defenders of the old era", Christian Dior's high-end customized dresses in the spring and summer of 2014 were too simple, which could not match the momentum of "red carpet competition"; Chanel even matched the dress with sneakers and knee pads, which was a "disaster". They just mistook the essence of fashion in the future world. The girl wearing Dior does not need to be proved, and the woman wearing Chanel has her attitude towards life.

I particularly agree with Ms. Hong Huang's words: "The luxury is expensive because it respects people's wisdom. Whether it is design or handicraft, it is an expression of recognition for people who use their hands and brains."

In the new era, people who buy high-end customization do not want to "show off", but they "feel the same way" about this fashion - it is not only a hot headed consumption, but also needs to have taste, time, work hours, and clothes (Dior For a piece of advanced customization, the buyer needs to go to Paris for 5 times in person from the selection, tailoring, white cloth test to the final production), identify with this sense of ritual and this craftsmanship, and pursue the most intimate and comfortable wear

　　 Christian Dior Raf Simons, the design director, described the woman who bought Dior's advanced customization this season: "What she wears is not only fashion, but also a kind of strength and attitude. Any outside opinion and evaluation has nothing to do with her. What she wears is her own." In the year since Raf Simons took office, Dior has been conveying this message. Exquisite craftsmanship is not to produce gorgeous and complicated gowns, or "dead objects" like stage props, but to produce clothes that are more comfortable to wear and can better express the wearer's attitude. Therefore, handwork is traditional, and advanced customization is modern. It uses traditional exquisite sewing to create the latest fashion concept.

　 Reason 3: Change into a "new blood" and bring the dying old brand back to life

Every piece of advanced customization is an art laboratory. What happens on this runway determines your future wear and becomes a fashion indicator.

In May 1968, when Balenciaga left the advanced customization arena, he said to Time magazine: "The life supporting customization has ended. Real customization is too luxurious for this era and can no longer survive."

Now, nearly half a century has passed, most people in the world are happy to pursue the trend wearing H&M, Zara and other fashionable clothes with poor quality, while the advanced customization is still alive, and the fashion week is still held twice a year.

In the first decade of the 21st century, Yves Saint Laurent, Emanuel Ungaro, Versace, Christian Lacroix all quit the stage of advanced customization, and even Givenchy said goodbye to the week of advanced customization in 2013; But in the second decade, we have welcomed the return of Versace, Vionnet, and Schiaparelli. New thinking designers have revitalized these old brands, while Maison Martin Margiela, Alexis Mabille, Bouchra Jarrar, who represent modern thinking, are joining us. Advanced customization has changed new blood!

Just like this season, Chanel's "sworn enemy", Schiaparelli, came back to the stage of advanced customization in the 1930s, 60 years after its last show. Schiaparelli was once famous for being avant-garde. She had played with the idea of wearing high heels on her head as a hat in the 1930s. Many of Lady Gaga's strange clothes are picking up her wisdom. She is more than half a century ahead of the society. She deconstructs and challenges stereotypes. She tells people that fashion is not only clothes, but also works of art.

How does Marco Zanini, the designer, restore Schiaparelli on today's catwalk? This is the 21st century. People who wear high-end customization do not need to attract attention like Lady Gaga. They need Schiaparelli's "elite sense of humor", and they also need to wear well. Marco Zanini designed a two-sided suit, which is both serious and sophisticated, just like the two forms of daily clothes and evening clothes that modern people need; He designed a trouser for the bride, so that the wearer can stand out from the crowd in many wedding dresses; He also used flat sports slippers with long gowns to illustrate that comfort and magnificence are not incompatible

The designer who took over the old brand Vionnet of the same era from Schiaparelli is the wizard Hussein Chalayan. This designer once brought a variety of groundbreaking fashions to the 21st century: dresses that can be lengthened in one second, luminous clothes, clothes that can be free from gravity, clothes that can be folded into a table... Like a scientist, he seriously considered the shape of fashion in the future world, rather than designing clothes to attract attention from the crowd.

The rebirth of old brands is not to copy the past, but to let designers' fresh blood transform old brands to adapt to the new era and lead the new trend. {page_break}

Not every piece consumes hundreds of man hours full dress They are all called Haute Couture, and not every designer with a right to attend Paris Fashion Week. Every piece of advanced customization is an art laboratory, designers can freely exert their imagination, and they use creativity to influence the direction of future fashion; What happens on this catwalk determines what you wear in the future and becomes a fashion indicator.

Reason 4: Provide "heirs" with daily clothes

"Old Money"（ Old Money ）It is not the growth point of advanced customization, but the "inheritors" are the future customer base. Designing fashion for them is the future of haute couture.

Who is buying "advanced customization"? Before the abolishment of the court system, the customers of advanced customization were mainly members of the royal family. Since then, he has joined celebrities and stars. Before 1914, 50% of the tourists came from France; After World War I, most of them came from North and South America; After the 1970s, the main customers came from the Middle East, South America and the Far East. However, the list of customers has been declining. In 1945, there were 1100 high-end customized fashion stores and 20000 customers worldwide; In the 21st century, this number has dropped to 20 high-end customization stores and 2000 customers.

However, it seems that the "new rich" are expanding this number: emerging consumers from Arab countries, Asia, Eastern Europe and the United States are expanding this group. Some of the most commercially successful advanced customization brands, such as St é phane Rolland, have targeted Asia and the Middle East. The newly rich obviously like the word "customization", which gives people a natural sense of superiority.

Sidney Toledano, CEO of Christian Dior, believes that advanced customization is well received in spring and summer 2014, and has not been affected by the economic situation at all: "Everyone is very interested in advanced customization. This year, there are many customers in their 30s and 40s, most of whom are from the entertainment or high-tech industries in the United States and Asia, and they pursue the most high-end design."

These customers in their 30s and 40s are Korean dramas《 Successors 》1% of the population described in, the so-called "rich second generation". "Successors" realize the importance of "wearing". It is not that there was a popular clothing guide, Style, which had various definitions of upper class society. Wearing is a particularly important part: "a little polyester fabric in an oxford shirt" can make people find "middle-class blood". Advanced customization is obviously a sharp weapon to prove blood lineage - it is not to wear a dress on the red carpet to tell everyone about their wealth, but to have a unique dressing experience in daily life. This low profile is just like Peng Liyuan wearing the coat made by Ms. Marco when she went on a visit. Only the wearer can experience the high quality and comfort of the clothes.