Versace’s new owner wants to be a big beast. But it’s no match for Europe’s behemoths
For the past two years, Coach, Michael Kors and Kate Spade New York have been the cornerstone of a particular type of New York fashion.
A bit ritzy without being eye-wateringly expensive, they mushroomed during the 1990s and 2000s, defining American leisure-glamour – the sort of thing you might see in Sex and the City then and Real Housewives of New York now – and rolling it out for a wealthy middle class who wanted attainable handbags they could save up for, rather than just the 0.1% who had money to burn.
So in one sense, having them under one roof at Tapestry, alongside oldschool accessory brands Stuart Weitzman and Jimmy Choo – with a boost from the ritiziest of all, Versace – should be enough to shunt nostalgic American fashion back into the limelight.
After all, an $8.5bn (£6.7bn) acquisition is a lot of money. Except that, when you consider that French fashion colossus LVMH acquired Tiffany for $16bn alone back in 2021, it’s a drop in the conglomerate ocean. LVMH is worth more than $450bn. The Americans might be coming, but it’ll take a lot more to get anywhere close to the
Europeans.
For the past few years, luxury fashion has been dominated by LVMH and its rival, Kering – two Paris-based conglomerates that own about 100 huge, household-name-level brands between them.
The ascent of LVMH, in particular – whose founder, Bernard Arnault, overtook Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos as the world’s wealthiest person at one stage this year – is not only a testament to the resilience of fashion, but the speed at which a brand can grow. LVMH controls 75 brands, including Louis Vuitton, Dior and Fendi, and has the power to get Pharrell Williams on its payroll. Even Kering, which owns Gucci, Bottega Veneta, Saint Laurent and Balenciaga and is worth more than $70bn, is trailing in its wake. With six brands under its belt, Tapestry has a long way to go.
There is a lot riding on Coach, Tapestry’s
blueprint model for how to make a brand balloon overnight. It is run by the well liked, charismatic British designer Stuart Vevers, who this September will celebrate 10 years at the brand.
Just a few years ago, Coach was considered a bit beige and horsey. But with some clever campaigns and casting – Selena Gomez as a face, and Lil Nas X as a catwalk opener – as
well as a sharpened focus on upcycling (its waste leather handbags were rolled out just as the industry was under peak scrutiny for wasteful practices), it has been adopted by gen Z, who will represent 40% of the luxury goods market by 2035 (according to a report by the consultancy Bain). In June, Versace followed suit, enrolling pop star Dua Lipa to work on a butterfly and Barbie-pink collection which was geared towards the younger buyer.
It’ll take more than those two, of course. Kors himself is beloved in the industry but is also known for saying things like “What does it mean to look rich?” backstage. For context, you only have to look at New York fashion week, which plays host to these brands. For the past few years, it has been quiet, relying on the occasional big name to appear in the marquee slot to bring in the starry front row and the press. Sometimes, it’s Marc Jacobs. Last year, it was Tom Ford. In February, it was Luar, a young designer known for his cult handbags and cult following – but a far cry from the nostalgic banner names of yore. This purchase is as much about money as it about putting
American fashion back on the map.
As fashion conglomerates go, Tapestry is about as American as it gets, the apple pie to Kering’s pizza and LVMH’s croissant. But it’ll take more than a big purchase to change the tastes of the growing rich.
classes?MelissaLotzmanI started going to Buddhist teachings in 2007, the year The Sopranos ended. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. I really spent my 20s just trying to have a career as an actor. Everything else was secondary. Some of those things started to come to fruition, on a career level, artistic level, financial level, and I had a family by then, and good friends. Yet still I felt something lacking. I needed some other kind of teaching, wisdom. I explored a bunch of different spiritual practices and found a Buddhist teacher in New York and felt that was right for me. In 2008 my wife and I took vows and became Buddhists formally. When I got on to Instagram right before the pandemic, I started posting about artists that I admired, movies and books, and also stuff about Buddhism. A lot of people asked me how to meditate, and I would write people back simple instructions. It started happening quite a bit. I thought, maybe I should make a video instead. I tried to do that on Instagram Live and it was a disaster. But somebody offered tech support and said we can do this as a Zoom webinar. That’s how it started, as a secular meditation class. A lot of people have stayed with us, new people have come, some of the people have actually become Buddhists. Which is not what we’re trying to do, but some people became very curious. We work with our minds in meditation class. You’re trying to have awareness of how you’re interacting, how you’re responding to other people instead of a kneejerk reaction. People write back and say: I’ve had this ongoing situation with my lover or my father and because of practising I was able to kind of not react the way I normally would. We often get trapped in habitual responses and repetitive behaviour, and this kind of work can help that. It’s really rewarding to hear from other people that they were able to have that experience.
Have you actually seen Kundun? CountFiveI did see Kundun! I think it’s a really great, incredible movie, and a really important, beautiful one – to get a glimpse of not only the life of the Dalai Lama but also the Tibetan Buddhism perspective in general. I think Scorsese managed to do it extremely accurately and faithfully, as he usually does when he’s exploring worlds. And that certainly gives you a wonderful glimpse into that world.
You write, act, make music, meditate and you’ve also got three kids.
How do you find the time?AlexNeedhamAll my kids are out of the house so that opens up a lot of time. I am able to focus on what I’m doing in the moment. If you’re doing something like The White Lotus, you’re on location. But now I’m not shooting anything. Zopa has a show Sunday and we practise a few times a week. If I’m writing I’ll spend the day in the library and then the next day be in the music studio. It’s really about budgeting time but also being able to have focus. I’ve been playing music for a long time, I’ve been writing fiction that never went anywhere for many years – it may seem like I just started doing these things out of the blue when I was an actor but all these things come from the same place. I don’t compartmentalise. This may sound kind of strange but I’m envious of people who just do one thing. I wasn’t able to. I just had too much interest and passion for several things. And it’s not about proving I can do this and that. I’m just hooked on the expression through those forms.
What band would you love to have been a member of?Geo100Oh, the Velvet Underground at the beginning. That’s an easy one.
Zopa’s EP Tondo is out now on Mt Crushmore Records. The band play Our Wicked Lady, Brooklyn, on 13 August.
I got to meet Bowie backstage. He was wonderful – friendly, present and kind