CLOAKS-&-DAGGER
Scheming fashion exec joins rival: suit
A fashion executive tried to edge designer Carolina Herrera out of creative control over her own company and, when that bid failed, left to work for rival Oscar de la Renta, a new lawsuit charges.
Laura Kim (near right), then a vice president at Carolina Herrera, turned down a $1 million offer from CEO François Kress to become the fashion house’s creative director in July, the Manhattan lawsuit filed by Herrera states.
In an October letter included in the suit, Kim’s attorney, Neil Capobianco, says his client worried she wouldn’t have full design control at the company because Carolina Herrera (inset far right) was never informed by Kress that she was being “transitioned out” of her role as creative director.
“Ms. Herrera intended to run CH as if she were the creative director. While Laura was supposed to be reporting to François Kress, Carolina Herrera frequently took charge, without objection from Mr. Kress,” Capobianco says in the letter.
The suit says that “Kim made it known to CH that she wanted to be creative director, in effect displacing Carolina Herrera herself.”
When that move failed, Kim left for the creative-designer job at Oscar de la Renta in September. The move violated a six-month noncompete clause in Kim’s contract, according to court papers.
Since Kim’s departure, Carolina Herrera has lost business with the luxury department store Bergdorf Goodman, and its fall collection was a flop, the suit alleges.
The suit seeks to bar Kim from working at de la Renta until April 2017. It calls Kim a “unique employee” who is “very adept at creating designs that are what commercial clients are interested in stocking in their stores.”
Her Resort 2016 collection for Carolina Herrera was the company’s “most commercially successful ever in its 35-year history,” the suit says.
Kim started at Carolina Herrera as a $450,000-a-year consultant in January after spending 12 years at Oscar de la Renta, where she worked on Amal Clooney’s wedding dress as well as gowns for Sarah Jessica Parker.
Kim’s lawyers say the noncompete clause is unenforceable, alleging she was pushed out of the company.