WWDMILESTONES

CHLOE at 60The fashion house founded in 1952 by

Gaby Aghion ushered in an era of modern dressing by offering relatively simple, feminine clothes accessible to a wide

audience. Here, a look from spring 1960.

THE BUSINESS SIDE DESIGNERS THROUGH THE YEARS

Spring 2001 by Stella McCartney.

Spring 2006 by Phoebe

Philo.

Fall 2012 by Clare Waight Keller.

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Fall 1995 by Karl Lagerfeld.

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WWD FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 2012

The Frill of It All1921: Gabriella Anoka is born in Alexandria, Egypt.

1952: Gaby Aghion creates the first Chloé collection.

1956: Aghion and business partner Jacques Lenoir introduce their first collection at the Café de Flore in Paris.

1957: Gérard Pirpart is hired as designer.

1960s: Chloé brings young Left Bank designers including Christiane Bailly, Tan Giudicelli, Graziella Fontana, Maxime de la Falaise and Karl Lagerfeld into its studio.

1966: After freelancing at Chloé, Lagerfeld is tapped to become head designer.

1972: The first Chloé boutique opens at 50 Rue du Bac in Paris.

1974: Chloé launches its first fragrance, Chloé.

1983: Lagerfeld leaves Chloé.

1984: Guy Paulin joins the house as designer.

1985: Alfred Dunhill Ltd., now Compagnie Financière Richemont SA, buys Chloé. Peter O’Brien is hired as Chloé designer.

1987: Martine Sitbon becomes Chloé designer.

1992: Lagerfeld returns as Chloé head designer. Chloé’s Narcisse fragrance is launched.

1996: Chloé Innocence

fragrance is launched. 1997: Stella

McCartney becomes head designer.Phoebe Philo joins McCartney as her design assistant.

2000: See by Chloé, a second ready-to-wear line, is introduced.

2001: Philo becomes Chloé creative director. Hannah MacGibbon joins Philo at Chloé.

2002: Philo introduces leather goods and accessories to the Chloé line. A Chloé boutique opens in London.

2004: Chloé boutiques open in Tokyo, Shanghai, Beijing and Kuwait.

2006: Philo exits the company.

2007: Paulo Melim Andersson is named head designer of Chloé.

2008: Hannah MacGibbon becomes creative director.Chloé Eau de Parfum launches.

2011: Clare Waight Keller is named creative director.

2012: The house

marks its 60th anniversary.

CHLOÉ THROUGH THE YEARS.

2010: The Love, Chloé fragrance is introduced by Coty.

2005: Philo’s Paddington bag launches and becomes a bestseller.

Backstage, 1996.

A look from

1960.

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“AFTER A YEAR, you really start to get under the skin of a brand.”

So says Clare Waight Keller, who is slated to show her third runway collection for Chloé on Monday as the French fashion house marks its 60th anniversary.

Not that her spring collection will be a retrospective exercise.

“Everything should feel very rel-evant to today,” insists Waight Keller, who joined Chloé in May 2011 after six years at the creative helm of Pringle of Scotland.

While Waight Keller is the fourth young Englishwoman to helm the design studio in the past dozen years (after Stella McCartney, Phoebe Philo and Hannah MacGibbon), chief executive of-ficer Geoffroy de la Bourdonnaye noted that Waight Keller is one of the few design-ers at Chloé to have prior experience as a creative director for a global brand.

“Clare is ex-tremely smart and

very mature in her approach,” de la Bourdonnaye said. “Her collections are elevating the standards for Chloé.”

At Pringle, Waight Keller oversaw women’s and men’s collections plus all aspects of brand image, including shop design, packaging and advertising.

Before that, she was a senior wom-en’s wear designer at Gucci under Tom Ford, and earlier, was design director for Ralph Lauren’s Purple Label men’s line. Her first job was as a women’s wear designer for Calvin Klein.

An affable, down-to-earth mother of three, Waight Keller said she relates strongly to Chloé’s heritage.“[The brand] doesn’t take itself too seriously,” she said. “It caters to a real woman with more of a daytime wardrobe.…I love the fact that it feels very real.”

Indeed, rather than getting her kicks from seeing stars wear her gowns on the red carpet, Waight Keller appreciates the way clothes and accessories come to life when real women wear them in unex-pected ways. “Fresh” and “effortless” are

words that pepper her talk of Chloé.She said the brand’s laid-back, low-

key attitude stretches back to when Gaby Aghion conceived of the house as an alternative to the stuffy Paris world of high fashion.

“It had a resonance with women, because it was very comfortable to go there,” she said. “It was very real and approachable and everyday, rather than something elitist and couture.”

In her debut collection for Chloé, Waight Keller showed two densely pleated sundresses overdyed with kelly green and sunshine yellow that, when the wearer moved, erupted into rays of gleaming white.

They were in step with a nascent trend toward cleaned-up, modern de-sign, and arguably her first iconic looks for the house. “They have a drama that’s caught a lot of attention,” Waight Keller shrugged. “At the same time, they feel very easy.”

She characterized Chloé as a “sis-terhood” brand with a woman-friendly spirit, a quality expressed in advertis-ing imagery picturing several models, underscoring the “secret society” vibe.

“Even in Karl [Lagerfeld]’s era, it was all about groups of women,” she said.

“For me, Chloé is so much about feel-ing good in what you wear, sharing it, expressing yourself through clothes, but you’re never dressed by your clothes.”

Teaming with curator Judith Clark to mount the 60th anniversary ex-

hibition, Waight Keller took a wade through the archive and was struck by the varied facets of the brand — from a racy, breast-baring Helmut Newton photo of Paloma Picasso in a one-shoulder dress to some of the quirky designs by Lagerfeld.

“I always remember the floaty dresses and frilly collections. For me, it was quite an eye-opener to find a surrealist approach in [Lagerfeld’s] work,” she said, describing one dress covered with embroidered lightbulbs, and another depicting a showerhead raining water.

They were in fact a wink at founder Aghion and her husband’s inner circle, which included pioneers in various ar-tistic movements.

In Waight Keller’s estimation, they’re proof of Lagerfeld’s “sense of irreverence” and the lighthearted spirit that permeates the house’s his-tory, intermingled with some risqué moments in certain eras.

“You see a sense of femininity, and that’s really the root of the brand,” she explained. “There’s a lightness and fri-volity; it’s quite cool and nonchalant, yet confident.

“Even if the essential core of the brand is about movement, the move-ment has changed over the years,” she continued. “That’s something we’re try-ing to show across the exhibition. It’s more eclectic than just a fluid dress.”

— M.S.

Clare Waight Keller

WHEN GABY AGHION founded Chloé in 1952 as an antidote to the stiff for-mality of haute couture, she did noth-ing short of revolutionizing fashion.

The Egyptian-born designer had a simple vision: using fine fabrics to cre-ate feminine, alluring clothes that re-quired minimal alteration.

“She was shocked by how poorly French women were dressed,” her son, Philippe Aghion, recalled. “On the one hand, you had haute couture, for the very high bourgeoisie, but the majority of people were very badly turned out. She invented luxury ready-to-wear.”

Aghion herself put it somewhat less bluntly. “A lot of things did not exist in France,” Aghion, who at 91 has retired from the public eye, said in comments provided by Chloé. “Everything was yet to be invented, and this thrilled me.”

Born in Alexandria, Egypt, Aghion appeared destined for extraordinary things from an early age. The daughter of a cigarette factory manager, she met her husband, Raymond, when both were seven years old in elementary school. He was born into a wealthy family of cotton exporters, but displayed early stirrings of the social consciousness that would later land him in political exile.

“My parents were both appalled at the level of poverty in Egypt,” said Philippe Aghion, who is currently the Robert C. Waggoner Professor of Economics at Harvard University. “That does not mean my mother was a revolutionary, but she stood by my fa-ther and moved in those circles.”

Gaby and Raymond married at the age of 19. In Paris, too, the Aghions grav-itated toward artists, becoming close to writers Louis Aragon, Paul Éluard and Tristan Tzara. Raymond opened an art gallery in 1956, specializing in modern art, according to Philippe.

“She thought of herself as an intel-lectual. Her aim was to bring a touch of poetry to fashion,” said retailer Jeannette Alfandari, founder of the Jeannette boutique on the French cap-ital’s Left Bank. Alfandari opened the first freestanding Chloé boutique in 1972 and helped to develop the brand’s commercial strategy with Aghion and her business partner, Jacques Lenoir.

She remembers Aghion as a voluble presence, prone to addressing staffers as “my little kitten” — a perfect coun-terpart to the strict Lenoir. In matters of business, however, Aghion was noth-ing if not single-minded.

“I was carried away; it was like a tor-nado,” Aghion recalled. “I designed a small collection and decided to present it myself. I went to source the buttons, the fabrics. I was sticking my neck out. I was the client; I became the saleswoman. I en-countered a lot of terrible disdain.”

Philippe Aghion also recalled the young Karl Lagerfeld coming to the com-pany in the mid-Sixties: “When he ar-rived from [the house of] Jean Patou, Karl was a shy individual. He and my mother made a fantastic team. He came into the spirit of Chloé. He would have so many ideas — sometimes my mother would say ‘No’ — but they were very complementa-ry to each other. He expressed his creativ-ity, but in the framework of Chloé.”

Though Chloé became famous for its vaporous chiffon dresses and softly tai-lored suits, Aghion’s personal style was steady: For decades, her trademark out-fit has been a black tunic worn over a white shirt. “I always dressed in a very simple way,” she said. “I am not a so-cialite. I have friendships. I always said what I thought.”

Even after she sold Chloé to Alfred Dunhill Ltd. (now owned by Compagnie Financière Richemont SA) in 1985, Aghion remained friendly with the brand’s successive chief executives. Mounir Moufarrige invited her to watch Stella McCartney’s debut for the brand

in 1997. “She sat front row and she cried,” he said. “It was in her heart.”

Moufarrige called Aghion a “pioneer” and a “genius,” not only for her timely fashion impulse but also her “strategy about how to put the brand on the map with distribution and advertising.” He noted she played a key role in forging re-lationships with department stores.

In retrospect, one of her chief innova-tions was giving her collection a brand name rather than her own moniker, whereas many of Europe’s biggest fash-ion players — Dior, Chanel, Prada, etc. — are truncated names from the founding designers. She named her brand after a good friend, Chloé Huymans.

As a working mother in the Fifties, Aghion was also a pioneer. But Philippe stops short of calling her a feminist, pre-ferring to recall his parents as a perfectly modern couple. “I never saw my mother serving my father, ever. That just wasn’t how things were done at home. There was no machismo. They were equals. Both worked — both were emancipated.”

Judith Clark, curator of the “Chloé. Attitudes” exhibition marking the brand’s 60th anniversary (see page 14) said that even at her advanced age, Aghion remains an inspiration.

“She’s the most charismatic, extraor-dinary woman with the most youth-ful eyes in the world,” said Clark. “She has the eyes of a 20-year-old, and she’s incredibly seductive and full of energy. She’s very open. I think that must have been key to allowing different designers to express themselves with her brand.”

— With contributionS froM MileS Socha

Then and NowGaby Aghion founded the flirty house, and Clare Waight Keller holds the design reins today. By Joelle Diderich

gaBY aghiON an undated photo of gaby aghion, shot by her husband, raymond.

Clare Waight Keller

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coty prestige congratulateschloé on 60 years of style

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East and for picturing garments in ad cam-paigns he never designed, in violation of his contract.

In 1985, Aghion and Lenoir sold the company to Compagnie Financière Richemont SA, formerly Dunhill Holdings. “They had to sell very quickly after I left,” the designer explained.

Lagerfeld was lured back to Chloé in 1992 for a final stint during which he turned out a series of dreamy ad cam-paigns starring Linda Evangelista — and battled with then-chief executive officer Mounir Moufarrige. “Five years was more than enough,” Lagerfeld said.

In 1997, Lagerfeld was replaced by Stella McCartney, whose work for the label he came to admire, along with the “more romantic” approach of McCartney’s even-tual successor, Phoebe Philo.

— Miles socha

The Legacy Myriad designers have taken Chloé’s helm, but the carefree nature of the house has always ruled its aesthetic.

KARL LAGERFELDDuring his epic fashion career, Karl Lagerfeld logged some 25 years at Chloé in two separate stints, helping define its soft, romantic spirit — and occasional Art Deco bent.

The multitasking designer started at Chloé in 1963, working alongside sev-eral other freelance talents engaged by founder Gaby Aghion, including Graziella Fontana, Tan Giudicelli and Michèle Rosier. Lagerfeld took over as the sole creative force in 1966, relishing his collab-oration with a dynamic fashion pioneer.

“Gaby was fun, sparkling and witty — very cultured and very funny,” he recalled in an interview. “I like to discuss with women when I do dresses. She was very open, very cultivated.

“We did quite interesting things. What I liked was the mix of feminine clothes and quite wild Pop things,” he continued.

Hand-painted dresses, layered looks and oversize coats were all part of Lagerfeld’s legacy at Chloé. In particular, his early Art Deco collections for Chloé made waves in fashion.

“I don’t like retrospectives,” he told WWD in 1969. “But the Twenties and Thirties were the last epoch near to us when things were still well made…when

there was quality.”While famous today for the elaborate

sets he constructs for Chanel, Lagerfeld actually introduced the concept while at Chloé, for his celebrated “Fellini’s Casanova” show in 1977 at the Palais de Congrès, and another in 1978 at the Palais de Chaillot in which models clad in heavy jewelry were penned in a cage and re-leased at the beginning of the show by vi-vacious model Pat Cleveland.

“We did quite wild things for them. Gaby was never afraid,” Lagerfeld said.

Prints were key to the collections, and Lagerfeld designed them all himself. Italian textile house Bini realized them.

In the Seventies, Lagerfeld took Chloé — built on the concept of luxury ready-to-wear as an unstuffy alternative to couture — to a new zenith. Evening dresses eas-ily sold for more than $1,000 — among the most expensive at that time.

“It’s funny, but often the most expen-sive pieces — like my Casanova blouses — are the ones the buyers want the most,” he told WWD in a 1977 interview. “I do de-sign for a special woman. She is not nec-essarily 17, and she is not necessarily 50. I cannot classify my clients as to type or age. But my customers range from people like Gaby van Zuylen to Veronique Peck to

Margaux Hemingway.”And he was eons ahead of the high-

low fashion antics of Sharon Stone, who famously paired a $22 Gap turtle-neck with a Valentino skirt at the 1996 Academy Awards, repeating the stunt in 1998, pairing a Gap button-down with a Vera Wang skirt.

“I like the idea of showing a soft cotton shirt or jacket with a silk evening dress — mixing the most expensive fabrics with the cheapest. There is humor in this sort of dressing,” Lagerfeld said in 1977.

Lagerfeld credited American depart-ment and specialty stores, including Neiman Marcus, Bergdorf Goodman, Bloomingdale’s and I. Magnin, and mer-chants like Sonja Caproni, Phillip Miller and the late Marvin Traub, for building Chloé’s name and reputation overseas. “They did an incredible job,” he said.

The designer and house parted ways in 1983 at the end of his contract — the same year he signed on as the new coutu-rier at Chanel. According to sources, the Chloé business was in robust health when Lagerfeld left, selling almost as much rtw as Yves Saint Laurent.

Still, Lagerfeld was openly criti-cal of Chloé management, having long clashed with Aghion’s business partner

Jacques Lenoir.“They have been damaging my reputa-

tion for years,” he lamented to WWD in 1982, charging the company with selling a “horrible couture line” in the Middle East and for picturing garments in ad campaigns he never designed, in viola-tion of his contract.

In 1985, Aghion and Lenoir sold the company to Compagnie Financière Richemont SA, formerly Dunhill Holdings. “They had to sell very quickly after I left,” the designer explained.

Lagerfeld was lured back to Chloé in 1992 for a final stint during which he turned out a series of dreamy ad cam-paigns featuring Linda Evangelista — and battled with then-chief executive officer Mounir Moufarrige. “Five years was more than enough,” Lagerfeld said.

In 1997, Lagerfeld was succeeded by Stella McCartney, whose work for the label he came to admire, along with the “more romantic” approach of McCartney’s even-tual successor, Phoebe Philo.

— Miles socha

MARTINE SITBONWhen Martine Sitbon arrived at Chloé in 1987, the concept of a young designer rejuvenating an established brand was

The creative crew Three of Chloé’s best-known designers reminisce about the house.

Fall 1995

Spring 1958 Spring 2003

Fall 2012 Spring 1970

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still in its infancy.Yet that is what she proceeded to do

over the next four years, helping to put Chloé back on the fashion map after the turbulence that followed the departure of Karl Lagerfeld in 1983.

Sitbon, who had launched her name-sake label a year earlier, was initially ex-cited to work for the house, which at the time produced some of the most expen-sive ready-to-wear on the market.

“For me, it was fascinating, because I could work with embroiderers like François Lesage and Montex. I loved the experience,” she recalled. “Everything was made in France and it was semi-couture.”

But the collaboration got off to a bumpy start when she realized she would be part of a team of three cre-ative directors, alongside Samy Shalom, 33, previously with the design stu-dio at Pierre Balmain rtw, and David Chaumont, 25, a former assistant to Christian Lacroix at Jean Patou.

“The way they worked at the time is completely unthinkable today — you had one designer working on one part of the collection, and a different one in charge of the other,” Sitbon recalled. “The collec-tion was a total mishmash.”

Sitbon was ready to slam the door

after just six months when a manage-ment change at Dunhill (now owned by Compagnie Financière Richemont), the brand’s owner, signaled a change in strategy. Incoming chief executive officer Jaime Rovira chose her as sole creative director, leaving her free reign to impose her signature blend of strict tailoring with softer feminine elements.

“The media reaction was immediately quite positive, and it signaled that Chloé was back with a new, feminine energy,” she said. “It was one of the first houses, if not the first, to hire a young designer and let them design the collection in a way that redefined the identity of the brand.”

The period also coincided with the rise of the supermodel, though Sitbon recalls that her longtime personal muse, Kirsten Owen, was deemed too edgy by Chloé executives and rejected. The de-signer, in turn, was wary of highly popular models detracting from the clothes.

“One time, I decided not to book Claudia Schiffer again, because all you could hear during the entire show was the photographers shouting ‘Claudia! Claudia!’” she laughed. “But the models gave the Chloé shows a fantastic energy. They were part of the success.”

— Joelle DiDerich

STELLA MccARTNEyThe search that ended with Stella McCartney succeeding Karl Lagerfeld at Chloé was a long — and significant — one. Lagerfeld had been firmly installed at the house for years, and his replace-ment was always going to be operating under a magnifying glass.

In 1997, McCartney was 25 years old, and straight out of Central Saint Martins fashion degree program in London. Overnight, she had a major role as creative director, an atelier in Paris — and the gaze of the fashion world upon her.

“I was very young and they were my first ever fashion shows in Paris,” said the designer.

“When I arrived, I always sort of had the feeling that the house of Chloé had this incredible foun-dation, history and story. It was in need of a breath of fresh air — a new lick of paint.

“And I think I opened up the label to a whole new audience, and brought a more masculine conversation into the brand whose roots were more feminine and girly.”

McCartney made an immediate im-pact with her tailored jackets and low-rise trousers, boy-meets-girl aesthetic,

lingerie-inspired looks and her roman-tic — and sometimes even folksy — take on fashion.

Her highly anticipated debut collec-tion drew mostly high praise from retail-ers and critics alike. It was dubbed by WWD as “charming” and “simply delight-ful, an upbeat frolic with a party atmo-sphere,” and while she didn’t “set fashion on a new course,” she “has indeed turned the house of Chloé in a new direction — one that’s fresh, young and laced with a trace of English eccentricity.”

The designer, a lifelong vegetarian and animal lover, said she was proud to have stuck to her beliefs during her tenure there. “We used no leather and no fur and I’m proud of that,” she said.

Her stint at Chloé lasted until 2001.

She added she came away with a whole new education: “All of a sudden, I had an atelier, where clothes were handmade, where there was craftsman-ship. I got to witness the expertise of the atelier and a fully working fashion house first-hand, with all of its history, talent and knowledge.”

— saMaNTha coNTi

For more on some oF Chloé’s other

designers through the years, see

WWD.com/fashion-news.

Three of Chloé’s best-known designers reminisce about the house.

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Spirited AwayImage-building at the house of Chloé has consistently supported the iconoclastic essence of its fashions. By Laure Guilbault

PRIZED FOR ITS daywear, Chloé shuns the red carpet, thrives in nature and doesn’t need celebrities.

Instead, the brand has relied on ac-complished photographers and expres-sive models to portray its free-spirited, playful essence and effortless sense of elegance — values that founder Gaby Aghion held in high regard back in the Fifties, when she created the label.

Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin, Craig McDean, Terry Richardson and Mario Sorrenti are among famous names behind the camera, while Linda Evangelista, Anja Rubik and Raquel Zimmermann are among the top models who portrayed Chloé’s unapolo-getically feminine upbeat spirit.

Van Lamsweerde and Matadin shot nine fashion ad campaigns for the label, the first for fall 2004. In it, blonde mod-els in long, romantic dresses frolic in the Tuileries gardens in Paris. Yet, they are

strong, running, like unleashed amazons.The outdoors is a consistent leitmo-

tif in campaigns.“The Chloé girl is about a lightness of spirit and easy cool. She’s not precious or contrived,” explained Fabien Baron of Baron & Baron, Chloé’s creative agency, which oversees the cam-paigns. “So nature and the outdoors are a fitting context for the Chloé girl. It rein-forces that ease and authenticity.”

Baron, who took over from art di-rector Ezra Petronio, signed his first campaign for the brand this fall, show-ing Rubik and Suvi Koponen on the top of a building. The duo wear ivory sweaters and scarlet trousers from the label’s fall collection designed by Clare Waight Keller. They look like sisters.

Indeed, gangs of girls are key, as seen in van Lamsweerde and Matadin’s spring 2007 campaign fea-turing Trish Goff along with Rubik and Zimmermann. “They are like a girls

band. That gives the impression of women’s power,” noted Marc Ascoli, a former creative director of the label.

The Chloé girl is independent and sure of herself, but there is undeniably a softness to her.

“[Chloé girls] are very often delicate, classically ele-gant, not bling-bling. Demure,” said Ascoli, who art direct-ed campaigns when his long-time partner, Martine Sitbon, was head designer at Chloé, as well as at the beginning of Phoebe Philo’s tenure.

One shoot, under the guidance of Philo, took the cam-paign to the wilds of South Africa, with Russian model Anne Vyalitsyna (aka Anne V). “The collection was sunny, with a lot of romantic blouses,” Ascoli recalled.

In a similar vein, Karl Lagerfeld’s Chloé campaigns in the Nineties with Evangelista and Naomi Campbell re-semble paintings or vintage photographs, telegraphing a turn-of-the-century elegance.

Ascoli is overseeing a large-format coffee-table book on Chloé published by Rizzoli, slated for release in fall 2013. He noted that the different head designers have had dif-ferent visions of the Chloé girl.

“Under head designer Martine Sitbon, the Chloé woman was a little bit dandy, determined, modern. Under Karl Lagerfeld, she had the allure of a heroine, she is a magical woman,” he said. “There was a shift [in terms of advertising style] when Stella McCartney came in, in 1996. Stella hired younger photographers such as Liz Collins. The photos are more realistic.”

Baron is set to shoot the spring campaign in November.

Fabien Baron’s current fall campaigns for See By Chloé and Chloé.

Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin’s spring 2007 campaign.

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As A consumer, marty Wikstrom appreciates chloé’s face-flattering color palette, its intricately detailed blouses and its marcie bag, which the executive deems ideal for her fre-quent business travels.

As president and chief execu-tive officer of compagnie Financière richemont’s fashion division, par-ent of chloé, Wikstrom has a host of other reasons to appreciate the brand, which in her view could harbor bil-lion-dollar potential.

“Why not?” she said, while not set-ting any timelines to reach that revenue threshold. “That’s up to the consumer.”

The swiss luxury group does not break down its revenues or profits by brand. However, it is believed chloé is the largest of its fashion and leather goods businesses, which also include Azzedine Alaïa, Dunhill, Lancel and shanghai Tang.

chloé i s grouped in to richemont’s “other business” seg-ment, along with online retailer net-a-porter and the group’s watch component manufacturing activities. For its fiscal year ended march 31, 2012, revenues in the “other” seg-ment vaulted 27 percent to 1.231 bil-

lion euros, or $1.7 billion at average exchange rates for the period. That represents about 13.9 percent of the group’s total revenues.

“Across the board, it was the best year we’ve ever had in the business,” Wikstrom said.

A decade earlier, the “clothing and other” segment saw sales grow 7 per-cent to 618 million euros, or $546.6 mil-lion at average exchange.

While richemont’s long-term com-mitment to fashion has occasion-ally been questioned over the years, Wikstrom stressed that the London-based conglomerate is putting resourc-es behind its successful houses, as its investment to add 20 chloé stores to its network attests.

“What’s important about the fash-

ion business is it gives us a third leg to our stool,” Wikstrom said. “We are very patient. We won’t force things.”

she characterized chloé as a “sig-nificant pillar” of its fashion business.

“It’s also one of the most diverse of all our maisons,” she noted, referring to the fact that the chloé brand ex-tends from its core ready-to-wear and leather goods to fragrances and see by chloé, a second fashion line.

“This house has always been about real women,” she enthused. “It’s always had a modesty, and I think that goes back to [founder] Gaby [Aghion]. she grew up in a stiff world of couture, and she in-jected effortless style. she kind of freed women — and they looked beautiful and dressed well, but they weren’t confined.

“It’s a confident, very self-assured brand,” Wikstrom continued. “chloé is less apt to chase trends and in-stead chase the consumer who loves the attitude of chloé.”

Wikstrom said the brand per-sonifies the founder. “she has such a head for women. she really did this to modernize and free women, and we should all be grateful for this contribution to the industry,” she said. “she’s the one who really had the initial idea of this feminine, modern, confident, self-assured house providing effortless, rather than structured, fashion.”� —�M.S.

cHLoe enTers ITs 60th anniversa-ry year in fine fettle, and with robust development plans to thrust it further into fashion’s big leagues.

“The business of chloé has never been in such good shape,” chloé chief executive officer Geoffroy de la Bourdonnaye said in an interview, trumpeting 2011 as a record year and citing strength across geographic re-gions and product categories. “The year is starting very well.”

While parent compagnie Financière richemont, whose other luxury properties include cartier, Jaeger-Lecoultre and Dunhill, does not break out figures for its various di-visions, chloé is said to have contrib-uted to the group’s strong performance in fiscal 2012, which ended march 31.

And the world’s second-largest luxury group by revenue is committing resourc-

es to ensure chloé’s global development.The brand is slated to open about

20 directly operated units this year, and should end 2012 with about 100 freestanding boutiques and in-store shops. A new 5,000-square-foot Paris flagship on the rue saint Honoré is slated to open in november with a light-filled design concept by architect Joseph Dirand.

The updated decor will also be re-flected in new stores in new York’s soHo district and the Wynn in Las Vegas. In Asia, where chloé’s growth is rapid, new locations are planned for shanghai, Hong Kong and in Japan.

The new store concept, based on a nude color palette with mineral and wooden elements, will also come in tandem with new personalized service protocols. “We want to get closer [to our customers], the proximity is impor-

tant,” the executive said.“chloé is a brand you can only

understand if you’re close to it,” he explained, alluding to its subtle col-orations, luxurious fabrics and high-quality manufacturing.

The company is also fortifying human resources, strengthening de-sign and commercial teams, along with back-office functions. De la Bourdonnaye likens it to construct-ing a foundation for a building that could one day be a high-rise tower. “We want to grow at a sustainable pace without sacrificing the soul of the house,” he said.

Alongside christian Dior and Yves saint Laurent, chloé is seen as one of the key French brands of the postwar period.

Today, Japan is a key market for chloé, and its signature fragrance, chloé eau de Parfum, has held a number-one ranking there since its launch in 2007, the executive noted.

“china is picking up quite substan-tially. We will have 15 boutiques there by the end of the year,” he added.

By contrast, the company has bare-ly scratched the surface in europe, with only four directly operated stores: two in Paris, one on sloane street in London and another in marbella, spain.

While declining to give the break-down of the business by product cat-egory, de la Bourdonnaye stressed that “the root of chloé is ready-to-wear” and that it still accounts for the major-ity of sales in its own boutiques.

Looking ahead, de la Bourdonnaye said the company would focus for the next three to five years on growing rtw, leather goods, shoes, scarves and costume jewelry.

chloé made a quantum leap into leather goods when Phoebe Philo took over from stella mccartney, who has a staunch anti-fur and anti-leather

policy. The house’s handbag business was ignited in 2005 by the Paddington, a style with a heavy padlock.

De la Bourdonnaye asserted that an “element of reality” combined with a luxurious product makes for a compel-ling sales proposition.

Indeed. The size of the chloé busi-ness has multiplied more than 30 times over the past decade. “That signifies the strength of this house,” he said.

“effortless grace” is a term de la Bourdonnaye uses frequently to describe the essence of chloé. “It’s never been a logo brand,” he said. “Women never buy chloé to become someone else.

“All the values which underpin chloé are also the values modern women of today embrace,” de la Bourdonnaye added. “It’s all about a youthful, free spirit and an effortless, natural attitude and elegance.”

He noted that roughly 80 percent of chloé’s employees are women. “That’s the essence of our brand — femininity,” he said.

Proud Parent

Strength From FemininityGeoffroy de la Bourdonnaye

The store in Beirut.

The “effortless grace” that characterizes the soul of the house is behind its flourishing business. By Miles Socha

Marty Wikstrom

w28b010a;7.indd 10 9/27/12 1:45 PM09272012134602

WE PROUDLY SALUTE THE 60TH ANNIVERSARY OF CHLOÉ.

SECTION II WWD.COM

wwd milestones

WWD friday, september 28, 201212

How My Garden Grows

A Chloé fragrance is nothing if not

romantic and floral. By Jennifer Weil

CHLOE WAS a late bloomer in the fra-grance world, with its first scent com-ing out only in 1974 — more than two decades after the brand’s inaugural fashion collection in 1952.

Simply called Chloé, it was created with Karl Lagerfeld, then the label’s de-signer, who tried to express olfactively the brand’s romantic, floral essence.

“I knew I liked heavy perfumes, old

perfumes, and I knew I hated green scents. There are so many of them around today,” he told WWD in a 1976 interview. Lagerfeld was describing the initial stages of his work on the fragrance, which was developed with Elizabeth Arden, Chloé’s fragrance li-censee at the time.

Working with an International Flavors & Fragrances perfumer, he learned a lot. “I learned that the ex-tract isn’t like the flower at all,” said Lagerfeld. “Jasmine in extract is the worst, and I love jasmine flowers.”

Lagerfeld found the process of translating his ideas and feelings into a scent both fascinating and difficult: “It’s like asking someone without

hands to do a sketch. You just can’t mix up a fragrance yourself.”

The designer predicted that of the 20 or more fragrance introductions over the two prior years, only two or three would still be around a few years hence, and he hoped Chloé would be among them. That dream became real-

ity as the signature scent for women became a strong seller and still figures in the brand’s portfolio.

Chloé’s next major perfume launch came in 1992, with Narcisse, followed by some smaller introductions, such as Chloé Innocence in 1996 and Chloé

Collection from 2005. In May 2005, Coty Inc.

acquired the brand’s fra-grance business as part of an $800 million deal with Unilever, which involved the consumer goods giant’s portfolio of prestige scent licenses that also included Calvin Klein, Cerruti, Vera Wang and Lagerfeld.

At the time, that Chloé ac-tivity was “really small,” ac-cording to Françoise Mariez, senior vice president of marketing for European fra-grances at Coty Prestige. Yet fast-forward to today, when industry sources estimate the business rings up more than $100 million in whole-sale revenues annually and has been chalking up double-digit gains each year.

Right away, Coty began reconstructing the Chloé fragrance branch practi-cally from scratch. To ac-complish that, it looked at archives and the fashion

collection, for instance. Chloé stands for “femininity,” “ef-

fortless chic,” “strength” and “free-dom,” explained Mariez. “Our first step rebuilding the fragrance house was to really encapsulate in one fragrance the core values of the brand today.”

So Chloé Eau de Parfum was born

in 2008. That it would be a floral was evident.

“As soon as you mention Chloé to fra-grance consumers, the first thing they’d say is there are two values: romantic and floral,” said Mariez, who clarified that it’s a modern romanticism.

The signature scent was created by Robertet’s perfumers Michel Almairac and Amandine Marie and includes notes of rose, magnolia, lily of the val-ley and cedarwood.

Mariez maintained that the signa-ture scent, which is the brand’s best-seller, works so well “because it’s a perfect translation of the Chloé spirit and brand values.”

Chloé Eau de Fleurs, a trio of soliflore scents, was introduced in January 2010. Yet the second major fragrance launch for Chloé under Coty was Love, Chloé, in 2010. Fronted by model Raquel Zimmermann styled as a modern-day Charlie girl, it targets a slightly more mature consumer. The juice, concocted by Givaudan per-fumers Louise Turner and Nathalie Gracia-Cetto, includes notes of orange blossom, pink pepper, lilac, wisteria blossom, musks, talc and rice powder.

The Chloé business, whose two main brands were subsequently ex-panded, is a particular hit in Japan, where it ranks first among prestige women’s fragrance labels. In Italy, Germany and Spain, Chloé figures in the top 10. It’s in the top 15 in the U.S., where it’s “growing quite fast,” Mariez said, and in France and the U.K., Chloé lands in the top 25.

The next major Chloé project will be a women’s fragrance launching next spring. It’s possible that the brand could ultimately branch out into other beauty product categories, as well.

MORE IS MORERALPH TOLEDANO, former chairman and chief executive officer of Chloé International, is credited with having mas-terminded the house’s now full-fledged product range.

When Toledano came on board in 1999, Chloé was a modest operation, with one Paris store and a smattering of wholesale accounts in Europe and the U.S.

During his first year at Chloé, Toledano introduced an eyewear line, licensed to L’Amy. The brand changed partners this January, however, signing a licensing agreement with New York-based Marchon Eyewear Inc. to manufacture and dis-tribute its sun and ophthalmic collections. The first deliveries started rolling out this month.

A swimwear line was added in 2001, licensed to Albisetti SpA. Then in 2002, the com-pany brought production of handbags and small leather

goods in-house and launched footwear licensed to Iris.

The Bracelet bag, released in 2002 under then-creative director Phoebe Philo, was among early successes, but the big bang came with the launch in 2005 of the Paddington, also

under Philo. Carrying as its signature an oversize padlock, the bag became one of the big-gest “It” bags of the time, shift-ing several hundred thousand pieces annually and laying the foundation for an extensive leather goods line at Chloé.

Among the house’s other best-selling bags are the Marcie, the Paraty, Angie and Alice.

Re-editions of Chloé’s Paddington and Silverado bags and the Eventail clutch will feature among 16 emblematic archive designs to be celebrat-ed in the house’s 60th anniver-sary Re-edition collection for spring 2013, along with a re-issue of wooden wedge sandals launched in 2006 under Philo.

The launch of the house’s See by Chloé franchise, mean-while, which is produced under license by Italy’s SINV SpA, dates back to 2001, under then-design director Stella McCartney. In March 2011, Laure de Sade was appointed

design director of the collection.A See by Chloé bag line

made its debut in 2008.The first See by Chloé store

opened in Japan in February 2003, growing to 27 stores inter-nationally today. Two openings are planned for 2013, with their locations yet to be disclosed. The house declined to provide sales figures for the line.

In 2007, Chloé signed

a license with Children Worldwide Fashion for the Chloé Children’s Wear line, with the first collection launched for fall 2007. Emilie Gaulupeau, head of brands at CFW, overseeing Chloé Children’s Wear and other la-bels, said, “This added to our portfolio a brand that reso-nates luxury and couture.”

— Katya Foreman

L’Eau de Chloé was introduced in February.

Chloé Eau de Parfum

launched in 2008.

Shoes from See by Chloé.

Chloé’s Alice bag is a bestseller.

w28b012a;8.indd 1 9/27/12 1:37 PM09272012133917

To 60 years of sTyle!

YEars

stYlECCHLOéTo 60 years of sTyle!

As the ultimate in feminine couture and the pioneer of

prêt-à-porter, Chloé continues to produce brilliant fashion

and celebrated designers. We are truly inspired.

Congratulations, Chloé!

SECTION II WWD.COM

WWD MILESTONES

WWD FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 201214

TWELVE GRAND windows. Mannequins clustered together. A list of quirky names for dresses.

These are among the elements fash-ion curator Judith Clark employed in the exhibition “Chloé: Attitudes” to telegraph, respectively, three celebrat-ed characteristics of the brand: light-ness, community and playfulness.

One could argue that the choice of venue itself — the funky contemporary art museum Palais de Tokyo — is itself a signifier of the brand’s youthful, care-free spirit.

Clark, an Australian whose back-ground is in architecture, also played up the Art Deco features of the brand and the building, inaugurated in 1937. She assembled some 85 outfits, 100 drawings and 50 photos for the lively anniversary showcase, which opens to the public on Saturday and runs through Nov. 18.

The work of nine key designers is showcased, from founder Gaby Aghion to incumbent Clare Waight Keller. Iconic looks — such as Aghion’s simple jersey Embrun dress from the fall 1960 collection — are displayed alongside lesser-known designs.

“It really is an extraordinary archive,” Clark enthused. “It was no hardship.”

The other Chloé designers fea-tured are Gérard Pipart, Maxime de la Falaise, Karl Lagerfeld, Martine Sitbon, Stella McCartney, Phoebe Philo and Hannah MacGibbon.

Rather than chronologically, Clark

opted for a thematic exhibition. A row of windows illuminates 12 iron display boxes, each based on themes ranging from obvious — Art Deco and Horses — to quirky, as in Bananas, a wink to one of Philo’s show invitations, in which an inflatable banana was photographed in

It’s like using the archive as a mood

board and behaving like a magpie.

— JUDITH CLARK, CURATOR

A Playful Look BackCapturing the essence of a brand with big personality. By Miles Socha

PHOT

O BY

FRA

NCOI

S GO

IZE

various tourist locations.For Power, Clark assembled sev-

eral dresses with wave patterns, and one embroidered with lightbulbs. Hats from the archive of the late Anna Piaggi finish off the looks.

“It’s like using the archive as a mood board and behaving like a mag-pie,” she said.

Clark noticed that in Chloé ads, girls are often whispering or chatting together. She echoes the gesture in the exhibition by placing mannequins in close proximity. In one scene, mod-els stand together in a field of wheat, their hair braided together.

Like many European brands, Chloé only recently began assembling and cataloguing its archive, com-pelled by a strong heritage trend in fashion partly fanned by rapid growth in China, whose consumers value names with history and pedigree.

“What I’m doing is gleaning ele-ments of [Chloé’s] history through surviving fragments,” Clark said. “It’s very important that I’m an out-sider. This is not an inside job.…They called on me as a fashion neutral.”

To be sure, Clark played up Chloé’s legacy of “wearable fashion” as op-posed to “high-concept” or only-for-the-red-carpet designs. After all, Aghion founded the brand to create an infor-mal, yet stylish and luxurious wardrobe for women no longer constrained by couture and a coddled lifestyle.

“It can be casual even though it’s beautifully made. It’s daywear, primar-

ily,” Clark said. “Some of the beading was a surprise to me. I expected the silk blouses.”

Changing with the times, Chloé collections included graphic prints in the Sixties, groovy chiffon daywear in the Seventies, tongue-in-cheek surre-alist elements in the Eighties.

“There’s always a knowing playful-ness,” Clark noted. “It’s not stark.”

For example, while Aghion and her husband surrounded themselves with intellectuals, she referenced them and their ideas in a lighthearted way.

The curator was particularly tick-led by the clever names she chose for dresses, anointing one Aubrey in-stead of the more obvious Beardsley, a playful nod to the English illustrator and author. Other fun ones included Boomerang and Bois de Boulogne, il-lustrating Aghion’s “mental elasticity.”

Photographs by Helmut Newton, Guy Bourdin, Jeanloup Sieff, David Bailey and Deborah Turbeville offer still more interpretations of the Chloé look.

Clark was particularly dazzled by Lagerfeld’s sketches and collages illus-trating his far-flung cultural references — from Italian friezes to Pop Art.

“A book on these drawings needs to be done,” she said. “The breadth of references is really extraordinary.”

The Chloé exhibition inaugu-rates a cycle of shows at the Palais de Tokyo dubbed “Fashion Program” and organized by esteemed curators at the invitation of Palais president Jean de Loisy.

Inspired by a Chloé campaign photographed in a field of wheat, one installation features clothes with nature motifs.