FASHION NEWS: Retailer/Fashion Designer Collaborations Expand

With the economy still struggling to recover, high-end fashion may have taken a serious hit, but have learned to adapt as well. How? By working to make high fashion affordable for the average consumer, which is a good thing.

H&M and Target took the lead on the idea of bringing a version of high-end fashion at affordable prices to the masses by establishing collaborative relationships with top fashion designers.  The designers created separate capsule or secondary diffusion lines in a limited amounts specifically for the retailers. This has proved to be a huge success .

Last year, the Jimmy Choo collection at H&M caused a shopping frenzy at stores around the world and recently a near riot broke out in a Paris H&M for the launch of the Sonia Rykiel Pour H&M knitwear line. Target has also had tremendous success with their Designer Collaborations series. Target ‘s long list of the who’s who of high fashion creating for their store includes most recently Zac Posen and Jean Paul Gaultier.

Other major retailers have listened and learned and are in pursuit of the ellusive retail gold mine!  Payless Shoes, Macy’s and JC Penny are expanding on their designer collaborations to compete with Target and H&M. Starting this spring designers Ruffian, Ellen Tracy, Kenneth Cole and Kimora Lee Simmons will be bringing their fashion and style to Macy’s stores. Madonna is also producing a fashion line for Macy’s. JC Penny showed off their collaborations with designers Nicole Miller and Charlotte Ronson this week. Payless Shoes tapped Project Runway designer Christian Siriano to create a line of shoes and handbags.

[Kouture By Kimora Lee Simmons photo courtesy of Macy's]

Tags: affordable celebrity fashions, affordable designer clothing, affordable fashion, designer diffusion lines, H&M, jean paul gaultier, jimmy choo, Kenneth Cole, kimora lee simmons, Lauren Conrad, Macy's, madonna's fashion, payless shoes, Ruffian, sonia rykiel, target, zac posen

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 20th, 2010 at 9:00 am and is filed under Fashion News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.