In-house designers discuss the internal politics of luxury brands
Candid conversations with the insiders who know the industry from top to bottom.
Behind-the-scenes content is increasingly popular in fashion, communicating the PR-approved musings of this week’s creative director (gone the next). But what we really need is honest information about the inner workings of the top brands and conglomerates. We decided it was time to ask the experts who are never asked.
1 Granary has interviewed in-house designers at the height of their careers – the stalwarts who have been researching, conceptualising, designing, and producing every collection for the past three decades. Over the next few weeks, we will release a series of newsletters devoted to a different thematic area that emerged from our conversations: money, power dynamics, motherhood, equality, ageism and much more.
Following our conversations about salaries and power dynamics, in this edition we’ll be discussing the power dynamics inside the often old-fashioned, hierarchical luxury brands of Paris, Milan, London and New York.
Some creative directors are only invested in the spectacle. They direct the overarching vision, so then you need a good team to make sure those quality products actually come out season after season.
The team behind the creative director is really important. As an insider, I can tell which products come from a house that is dedicated to the product, not just the image.
As a designer, I have very little to do with the spectacle of the brand I work for. I just have to make sure the customer gets a product that is long-lasting and makes them feel good. Some brands don’t have the resources or expertise to do that with their product.
It feels antithetical to the entire idea of luxury, but some brands just don’t have time to go in depth on the design, to make multiple prototypes and production fittings before pushing it out. That must be so unsatisfactory to design in. There is no point for this product to exist except for the image.
To survive as a brand without quality product, you need constant change. You’ll never be able to build a core customer, so you need constant drama and celebrity to stay in the news. That is a brand, not a clothing line.
██████, Senior Designer at ██████
I was at ████ at the worst time, just after ██████ left. The company had been struggling financially for a while, when suddenly 30% of the company was fired. A lot of directors and senior designers were gone.
But the surprising thing is that when the team became smaller, and the leadership left, everything turned out fine. The people with the most experience were gone, but it worked. There were simply fewer voices in the room, so decision-making went faster and concepts didn’t get diluted as much.
In a company like ██████, where quality is at the base of everything, you do need more experience and more eyes, because we want the best product.
██████, Senior Eyewear Designer at ██████
I worked for a big Japanese house that just started showing in Paris. I stayed there for less than two years, but it feels like five. I worked non-stop, morning to night. There was a very strict hierarchy. My life was just: work, eat, sleep. I would be crying at night because it was so hard, but looking back now, I do see it was a good experience. I was taught a lot of patience. I learned a lot about beauty and creation. It was almost a spiritual approach to design.