Runway shows in five cities around the globe sent outer-space tourists and fur flying, while French fillies in '50s skirts galloped with garcons. But what did it all mean?
Long gone are the days of one New Look, when the style powers handed down a trend each season and women followed, raising or lowering their hemlines accordingly. The looks on the runways for Fall 2004 were all over the place, though one of the more salient themes continues to be a throwback to postwar, pre-lib "ladies," seen in a dainty, beaded bolero sweater worn over a silver satin gown at Perry Ellis, crocodile pencil skirts and mink capes at Celine, and black crystal-edged satin coats with three-quarter sleeves at Prada. Tom Ford -- the standard-bearer of sultry -- is leaving fashion, but it may be too soon to declare that sex no longer sells, considering how quickly female contestants on "The Apprentice" were willing to break out their miniskirts. (Sadly, when women think they need to, they still flaunt it. Though the competitors on the NBC reality show might have gotten further with Donald Trump in one of the gender-blending suits from Valentino.)
In the 13 years that Ford designed for the Gucci label, three of those also at Yves Saint Laurent, his hot '70s look -- the tousled bedroom hair, the chubby furs, the aviator glasses and the slinky white jersey gowns -- was synonymous with glamour. A master marketer, Ford also invented a black-lacquered, streamlined aesthetic for Gucci stores that helped define design in the 1990s, influencing everything from hotel to car interiors. Outside of the fashion bubble of boucle and broadtail, however, many people -- even close followers of pop culture -- don't know his name, much less about his replacement by a team of unknown designers.
"The majority of fashion consumers, even fanatic ones, are not as brand loyal to the behind-the-scenes designer," says Marshal Cohen, a fashion and retail analyst for the market research firm NPD Group. "The high-end designer market represents at best 5% of total U.S. apparel sales. Now take those consumers, and only 25% of them are even conscious of who the designer is. The majority is buying for the aspiration factor, not because of their relationship to the designer." For most consumers buying GG logo bags and sunglasses, Ford's exit and replacement will be seamless, Cohen says. "Think of it as if you were going to a restaurant and the chef changed -- you probably wouldn't notice. We in the industry know, but most everyone else doesn't."
