Shop Gen Art's Fresh Faces on Yoox

JF & Son fall/winter 2008

Gen Art’s Fresh Faces in Fashion, the national program that discovered the likes of Zac Posen, Milly and Rebecca Taylor, will kick off Fashion Week on September 4 with its annual show featuring the debut of 12 New York designers: four in accessories, six in womenswear, and two in menswear.

The extravaganza, held at the Manhattan Center, is going to be one tech-savvy evening. Blackberry and T-Mobile will provide instant photo coverage during the show from backstage, the red carpet and the runway. In addition, Gen Art is teaming up with YOOX.COM, the internationally leading online boutique for fashion and design, to offer 15 of JF & Son’s runway pieces for sale the next day.

Usually, unless you’re a celebrity or Anna Wintour, it’s a long time before you’re allowed any access to designers’ runway pieces. For the first time ever, thanks to Gen Art, the general public doesn’t have to wait.

“We are thrilled to give emerging fashion design an exciting retail opportunity and gain a global audience through the show,” said Lee Trimble, Vice President of Fashion at Gen Art. “We are also excited to give fashion consumers the ability to keep pace with the fashion press and be the first to wear the looks they see on the runway.”

JF & Son, one of the six womenswear designers, was picked by a panel of Gen Art, YOOX and former New York Times Style Editor Holly Brubach. The line, founded in 2007 by finance expert Jesse Finkelstein and costume designer Kathryn King, expresses an experimental and highly innovative marriage between modernist design and traditional fabric technique.

The other emerging New York talent showcased in the Fresh Faces in Fashion show are Ideeen, Sariah, Lialia, Richard Ruiz and Chree for womenswear; Hyden Yoo and Philip Sparks for menswear; and Antoinette Lee, Deka Ray, Heutchy and TNC Studio for accessories.

Gen Art’s Fresh Faces in Fashion will hold its Chicago show on October 1, and its Los Angeles show October 10th. Shop Gen Art's Fresh Faces in Fashion runway pieces after the shows at YOOX.COM
-Grace Bahk

Tracey Reese for Keds

Keds has announced they will be partnering with designer Tracy Reese to create a new shoe line entitled, 'Plenty by Tracy Reese for Keds'. The new line will include peep-toe wedge sneakers, skimmers and ballet flats inspired by designs and prints from the spring 2009 collection. The new collection will retail for $65 to $80 and will be available for retail in March 2009 at keds.com, Tracy Reese boutiques, and select department and specialty stores nationwide.
-Katherine Mingey

Cavalli will Not Sell

Back in April, Roberto Cavalli told the world his company is up for sale. Merrill Lynch, advisor to the sale, valued it at $2.19 billion, and rumors of bids started to arise. Then in June, Cavalli told the world he might sell the company, but that he comes with the package: “"Roberto Cavalli is me. I have built it all my life. It's like my big baby and I'm its big daddy,” he told WWD.

Now Cavalli says the sale is completely off, thanks to a bad economy. And despite big bids by heavyweight equity funds like Candover, Carlyle and Texas Pacific expected in the coming weeks, he refuses to give up his “baby” for a mere 800 to 900 million euros.

“I’m not selling the company,” Cavalli said in an interview with Italian fiancial daily Il Sole 24 Ore. “The timing is not ripe yet for such a step. What’s more, as I have already said a thousand times, we don’t need [to sell].”

For now, it seems like we can definitely count on more of Cavalli’s wild taste on the runway.
-Grace Bahk

Calling All Aspiring Fashion Designers

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