Mallory Rubin and Ben Lindbergh crack the case to recap the Only Murders in the Building Season 4 finale. They discuss how this season’s central mystery measures up to past seasons, the (at times overly) self-referential aspects of the series, and how it sets up Season 5 (1:46). Later, they award a handful of superlatives, including favorite episode, smartest red herring, best (or worst!) podcasting moment, the season’s fit lord, and much more (22:54).
Hosts: Mallory Rubin and Ben Lindbergh Producer: Kai Grady Additional Production Support: Justin Sayles
Classic Vacations is honored to be one of the leading hospitality brands in the world, nominated alongside Abercrombie & Kent USA LLC, Micato Safaris, Tauk, and Context Travel.
SAN JOSE, Calif., July 12, 2023 (Newswire.com)
– Classic Vacations™, the #1-rated global luxury travel platform, announces its nomination for the 2023 Virtuoso Award, Best Tour Operator. Classic Vacations has been recognized by Virtuoso’s Best of the Best Awards in prior years, earning multiple nominations for Best FIT Tour Operator, winning a total of seven times, including in 2008 and 2010-2015 consecutively.
Virtuoso is a leading network of agencies specializing in luxury and experiential travel, working with top destinations and a vetted portfolio of the best travel brands around the world. Also nominated in the category for Best Tour Operator in 2023 are other top brands Micato Safaris, Abercrombie & Kent USA LLC, Tauck, and Context Travel.
Melissa Krueger, CEO of Classic Vacations, expressed her pride in being recognized by Virtuoso alongside an incredibly distinguished group of tour operators.
“I have always believed that the company you keep is a testament to your success, and I am proud to be included in this group of premier operators, and I am grateful to Virtuoso for the recognition. These companies are the gold standard for delivering exceptional experiences,” said Krueger. “I am excited to see what the future holds for us all.”
Dave Ferran, VP Sales of Classic Vacations, shares his appreciation for the nomination on behalf of the Classic sales team and contact center. “We love working directly with our Virtuoso agencies and advisors.”
Classic Vacations is deeply grateful to all its partners, peers, and the Virtuoso family for bestowing this prestigious honor. Virtuoso’s Best of the Best Award Ceremony will be held in August 2023, during Virtuoso Travel Week, taking place in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Classic Vacations, which is owned by The Najafi Companies, offers more than 1300 hand-picked, prestigious properties throughout the world, a curated portfolio of tours and activities, a robust Groups business, and has long been known for its commitment to providing the highest level of service and attention to detail.
In terms of what’s in store for Classic Vacations, Krueger said, “I am especially excited for new initiatives our team is building for our engaged community of Travel Advisors and supplier partners, international geographic expansion, and the enthusiasm around Classic’s newest launch, BEYOND, our self-service online booking engine.
To learn more about Classic Vacations and the suite of products, services and tools Classic Vacations offers to Travel Advisors, please call us now at 1800.221.3949 or visit www.classicvacations.com.
CONTACT: Lori Smith, Vice President, Marketing 5669 Snell Ave, Suite 343 | San Jose, CA 95123
Founded in 1978, Classic Vacations is the #1-rated luxury vacation platform. Over the past four decades, Travel Advisors have relied on Classic to help create and support millions of exceptional travel experiences for their clients. In doing so, Classic not only facilitates special vacation memories, but also helps travelers see a world beyond their immediate community. Classic has grown to represent over a hundred destinations around the world and offers a full line of accommodations, from mid-tier to luxury (including suites, villas, and residences), competitive pricing, first-class and private transportation options, and unique tours and excursions in Abu Dhabi, Asia, Canada, Caribbean, Costa Rica, Dubai, Europe, Fiji, Hawaii, Mainland USA, Maldives, Mexico, Oman, Seychelles, and Tahiti. For more information, visit www.classicvacations.com/travel-agent/login or call (800) 221-3949.
ABOUT THE NAJAFI COMPANIES
The Najafi Companies is an entrepreneurially driven private investment firm that makes highly selective investments across industries with significant holdings in consumer, hospitality, sports, media, e-commerce and technology. By funding its investments with internally generated capital and utilizing a strategy of concentration, not diversification, Najafi is empowered to think long-term, remain highly flexible and operate in true alignment with management. The team’s passion is to create value in areas that are underserved or undergoing rapid transformation. The Najafi Companies continues its mission to “do well and do good” and partner with world-class, entrepreneurial teams. Headquartered in Phoenix with offices in LA and NY.
The last few years have brought about a shift in how people use technology in all facets of their lives. More than ever, virtual realities, decentralized transactions and non-fungible tokens are altering how we approach everything from social life to business to creativity.
In the past year alone, Prada‘s linked its monthly physical Timecapsule to NFTs that grant access to global Prada Crypted and special events. Meanwhile, Gucci partnered with animated celebrities company Superplastic to release 10 unique NFTs. The metaverse has become so popular, there’s even a Metaverse Fashion Week with brands like Etro, Dundas and Dolce & Gabbana.
Fashion schools have been quick to adapt to these developments, bolstering their digital curriculums in order to keep up with industry demands.
At the Parsons School of Design, metaverse learning experiences are part of the core curriculum during students’ junior year. There’s a specialized studio class in which “students learn intensive 3D modeling software,” says Soojin Kang, an assistant professor of fashion technology, for example. Students learn the traditional skills of garment-making — like creating patterns or sewing — digitally. By senior year, those focusing on digital fashion take Senior Thesis 1 and Thesis 2 classes, both of which yield digital-heavy outcomes and cover skills such as 3D modeling, rendering and other hybrid technical aspects.
To further cement its digital education, the school also partnered with online game platform Roblox to develop a course through which students create hyper-realistic and inclusive 3D digital apparel.
Photo: Courtesy of Parsons
While interest in metaverse coursework has been prevalent for years, Kang explains that demand really increased during the pandemic, when schools moved to an online teaching format. Suddenly, tools like Clo3d became integral to the curriculum: “The software synchronizes the drapes and the fabric properties at the same time you make any changes to your 2d patterns,” she says, noting how that helped ease the transition between 2D and 3D design processes.
Drexel University offers a range of innovative classes like “Fashion Design in the 3D Space” and “CAD Patternmaking”. But the peak of its metaverse curriculum might just be a historic costume virtual fashion course, titled “Costuming the Metaverse”: Kathi Martin, the associate director of graduate fashion design at Drexel, says the class was initially developed for gaming and animation students, but the construction of virtual spaces has also allowed fashion students to drape and pattern-make on avatars. It culminates in an immersive Medieval-inspired project, in which students create detailed period costumes by designing appropriate textiles, silhouettes and embellishments — all in the metaverse.
Sample of Drexel University student work.
Photo: Courtesy of Drexel
In addition to educating students on how to use the various tools and programs to create digital products, schools are also thinking about teaching the new business models that come with them.
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Under its Baker School of Business & Technology, the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) recently introduced several new metaverse courses to its curriculum. “First Year Experience” educates students as early as freshman year about the metaverse, Web3, cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens. Other additions include “Understanding, Developing Web 3.0 Business Opportunities and NFTs” and “Introduction to Blockchain for Creative Businesses.”
The metaverse is novel and ever-changing, which means schools must adapt accordingly. At FIT, the faculty remains open-minded, and frequently evolves its curriculum in response to these trends, which “offers an unparalleled win-win for the students and the creative/fashion sector in which we serve” according to Vincent Quan, professor and department chair of fashion business management at FIT SUNY Korea.
For the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD), the push toward meta-education is opening students’ eyes to new opportunities and alternative career paths in fashion.
“Obviously, we’re focused on the current and future employment opportunities in this field… We think it’s essential that our next generation of SCAD graduates play a defining role in shaping the direction of Web3,” says Dirk Standen, dean of SCAD’s school of fashion. “Fashion and tech companies can benefit from their input.”
For instance, SCAD’s sneaker design minor program implements accessory design strategies geared toward the metaverse. “We’re using the Oculus Quest 2 VR headsets to teach our students to 3D model athletic footwear and other accessories,” says Michael Mack, professor of accessory design and sneaker design at SCAD. “Accessory and sneaker design is diving more heavily than ever before into the virtual and 3D space, and we’re preparing our students to be at the forefront of design and lead the way as they embark on their creative professions.”
Photo: Courtesy of SCAD
However, when it comes to the intersection of fashion and technology, it’s integral to consider the impact of what we’re creating within a still-unexplored frontier.
At the Pratt Institute, metaverse courses are part of a larger push toward building a responsible future. These electives — which cover new media, artificial intelligence, AR/VR, interactive installation and physical comp coding for artists — engage students in critical thought surrounding how decentralized technologies will impact the future of design and the ethics around that.
“We felt it was important to introduce curriculum exploring ethical questions and considerations about how this technology is restructuring the relationship between fashion creation and consumption” says Tessa Maffucci, adjunct assistant professor and assistant chairperson in Pratt Institute’s Fashion Design department. “In the fashion context, especially, decentralized models raise important questions about authenticity, creativity and ownership – and present new opportunities to design in collaboration with others, to design with empathy and to explore equity-centered and community-based design.”
These new curriculums are part of our new reality — and educators shaping the minds of the next generation of creatives are adapting accordingly.
Between the covers of any good book are pages that transport and enrich the mind of its reader. In 2022, leaders in the fashion industry turned to various texts to inspire their upcoming collections, deepen the knowledge behind their curations and find personal liberty within their identity.
Major book releases swept the fashion community this year, like Editor-in-Chief of British Vogue’s Edward Enninful’s memoir, “A Visible Man,” in September. Other books like Safia Minney’s made an urgent call to regenerative fashion and a closer look at today’s fashion system.
Across the fashion, leaders and experts like FIT Museum Director Valerie Steele and Business of Fashion Senior Correspondent Sheena Butler-Young reflected on their reading this in 2022. Favorite books span topics, eras in time, country in focus and connections to fashion.
See below for the 34 favorite fashion books that leaders in the industry read in 2022.
Jacques de Bascher: Dandy de l’ombre by Marie Ottavi, $24, available here
Photo: Groupe Robert Laffont
“A page-turner about Karl Lagerfeld’s great love, a decadent dandy of the 1970s, this has been an essential source for all the recent books about Lagerfeld, including Ottavi’s own biography, ‘Karl.’” — Valerie Steele, Director and Chief Curator of The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology
Trendy, sexy et inconscient: Regards d’une psychanalyste sur la mode by Pascale Navarri, $21, available here
Photo: PUF
“I’m working on a book about fashion and psychoanalysis, so I read with great interest this book by a French psychoanalyst exploring the unconscious aspects of contemporary fashion.” — Stelle
Pretty Gentlemen: Macaroni Men and the Eighteenth-Century Fashion World by Peter McNeil, $52, available here
Photo: Yale University Press
“A brilliant account of a controversial moment in men’s self-fashioning.” — Steele.
Black Futures by Kimberly Drew and Jenna Wortham, $40, available here
Photo: One World
“Black Futures, by Kimberly Drew and Jenna Wortham, and The New Black Vanguard, by Antwaun Sargent, are my top reads for 2022. The authors are true visionaries. I was inspired by them while working on my memoir, Wildflower. I have always had a desire to forge a new creative path, and I hope to lift up others through my own personal journey.” — Aurora James, creative director and founder of Brother Vellies, founder of the Fifteen Percent Pledge, author of “Wildflower“
The Colors of Sies Marjan by Sander Lak, $65, available here
Photo: Rizzoli International Publications
“I treasure my little collection of fashion monographs, and my new favorite is this book on the much-mourned label Sies Marjan. Designer Sander Lak is a virtuoso when it comes to color, and I love the way he organized everything by hue. Paging through this felt like a first-class flight straight into his genius brain.” — Véronique Hyland, Fashion Features Director at Elle, author of “Dress Code“
What Shall I Wear? by Claire McCardell, $24, available here
Photo: Harry N. Abrams
“This was a very kind gift from Tory Burch, who wrote the excellent foreword to this reissued version. Claire McCardell’s 1956 answer to the eternal question is very much of its time, but also feels relevant today. She maintains that fashion should be fun, and the same sense of ease that she brought to her designs is evident in her prose.” — Hyland
“This book is a daily reminder to myself to never ever compromise or conform on the things that really matter to me. Quinn’s photography of interesting people taking bold fashion risks is inspiring from a style and dressing standpoint, but also as a powerful statement against racism, ageism and homophobia. There should be no limits on beauty, style and self-expression. Quinn’s work is an apt assertion that fashion is at its best when it serves as a vehicle of change, not an endorser of status quo.” — Sheena Butler-Young, senior correspondent at Business of Fashion
Token Black Girl: A Memoir by Danielle Prescod, $25, available here
Photo: Little A
“I can’t think of one Black woman I know — in fashion or elsewhere — who hasn’t felt like 15-year-old Prescod flipping through the pages of glossy magazines in the ’90s and early aughts, seeing beauty defined as everything we’re not. Through the lens of Prescod’s life story, it powerfully unpacks the reverberating negative consequences of white supremacy in media, while gently reminding us of the power we have to recover from and reject ideologies that harm us. This book is much-needed wink — an ‘I see you, girl’ — to Black women, but it’s also a must-read for all women, period.” — Butler-Young
Africa: The Fashion Continent by Emmanuelle Courrèges, $65, available here
Photo: Flammarion-Pere Castor
“The more I scratch the surface of diversity, equity and inclusion issues in fashion, the more I uncover about the inherent biases we all have about beauty, style and influence. The title of this book alone disrupts long-held assumptions about who or what gets to define fashion. Courrèges takes the reader on a journey of discovery where you get to meet all of these amazing African designers, artisans, boutique owners and stylists whose work push the boundaries of innovation and craftsmanship. It features vibrant, awe-inspiring images of people adorning colors, prints, fabrics and patterns (Xhosa beaded embroidery, for example) and body artists using their vessels to advocate for change, hair tousled and contorted in fascinating and expressive fashion, street style that’s inherently environmentally conscious. It’s a true homage to a forgotten part of fashion’s roots.” — Butler-Young
Celebrate That!: Occasions by Kate Spade New York, $35, available here
Photo: Harry N. Abrams
“My ultimate — feminine, witty and whimsical — guide to planning a celebration however big or small. As an editor working in New York City, I’m constantly surrounded by big moments: cover stories, splashy fashion week shows, star-studded events. It feels like my friends always expect me to deliver something comparable when I host. This book has fun, thoughtful recipes and tips, like how to make a ginger mojito or plan a unique fundraiser for my son’s school, that make me seem way cooler and fashion-y of a host than I am. It also doubles as a self-help guide with cute reminders to celebrate moments — like making your bed, getting through a tough conversation or not spilling your coffee on a fancy coat — that we take for granted each day.” — Butler-Young
Karl Lagerfeld Unseen: The Chanel Years by Robert Fairer, $85, available here
Photo: Abrams
“Written by photographer Richard Fairer — whose previous work SCAD FASH highlighted in our exhibition entitled “Robert Fairer: Backstage Pass — Karl Lagerfeld: Unseen captures amazing access to one of fashion’s most iconic and fascinating figures. Through his behind-the-scenes images, Fairer provides a unique perspective that fashion fans dream of seeing!” — Rafael Gomes, creative director of SCAD FASH Museum of Fashion + Film
The Blonds: Glamour, Fashion, Fantasy by David And Phillipe Blond, $65, available here
Photo: Rizzoli International Publications
“In The Blonds, David and Phillipe highlight their 20 years in the fashion business through images and bold, elaborate creations. Blurbs from The Blonds and their star-studded clientele offer readers unique insights and inspirations behind their collections and collaborations.” — Gomes
Ring Redux: The Susan Grant Lewin Collection by Ursula Ilse-Neuman, $39, available here
Photo: Arnoldsche Verlagsanstalt
“Corresponding with a recent a SCAD Museum of Art (Savannah) exhibition, Ring Redux reexamines the traditional image of the ring as not just jewelry, but a contemporary art form, finding inspiration in the modern and sculpturally reimagined rings in the Susan Grant Lewin collection.” — Gomes
Embodying Pasolini by Tilda Swinton and Olivier Saillard, $75, available here
Photo: Ruediger Glatz/Rizzoli International Publications
“Commemorating their fourth collaboration, Embodying Pasolini is Tilda Swinton and Olivier Saillard’s ode to Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini. By presenting costumes from Pasolini’s film, Swinton and Saillard pay homage to one of the most important names in Italian cinema, sharing his work with hopefully a new generation interested in the convergence of fashion and film.” — Gomes
Regenerative Fashion by Safia Minney, $40, available here
Photo: Laurence King
“This compact sustainability handbook from social entrepreneur Safia Minney features interviews with more than 30 industry insiders, like Chloé Chief Sustainability Director Aude Vergne and Daniel Windaier, the CEO and Founder of Bolt Threads, a biotech company that’s partnering with brands like Stella McCartney to put mycelium leather bags ‘grown’ from fungi spores on the runway. It gave me fresh hope about the ways the fashion industry can lower its carbon footprint and actually improve the environment if creative people put their heads together.” — Alison Cohn, deputy fashion news editor at Harper’s BAZAAR
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The Fendi Set: From Bloomsbury to Borghese by Kim Jones, $135, available here
Photo: Nikolai Von Bismarck/Rizzoli International Publications
“I’m an English lit nerd at heart, so there’s something really delightful about this photo essay, which features portraits of Kim Jones’ friends — like Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell, and Bella Hadid — channeling the spirit of Bloomsbury, the 20th century community of British writers, intellectuals and artists that included Virginia Woolf, Vita Sackville-West and Vanessa Bell, dressed in looks from the Fendi artistic director’s first couture collection. There are also excerpts from diary entries and correspondence and snippets of Woolf’s Orlando.” — Cohn
Yves Saint Laurent at Home by Jacques Grange, $95, available here
Photo: Marianne Haas/Assounline
“Designers are storytellers who creating entire worlds through clothing, but we don’t often get to experience their personal environs. This book offers an intimate view into Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Bergé’s beautiful homes in Paris, Deauville and Marrakech, showing how their deep appreciation for art and design informed Saint Laurent’s work in fashion.” — Cohn
Rebel Stylist: Caroline Baker — The Woman Who Invented Street Fashion by Iain R. Webb, $50, available here
Photo: Acc Art Books
“British stylist Caroline Baker worked with just about every magazine (Nova, British Vogue, i-D, The Face) and just about every photographer (Helmut Newton, Hans Feurer, Guy Bourdin, Sarah Moon) while also collaborating with Vivienne Westwood; that was an inspired pairing, because she’s just as original and maverick as the brilliant Westwood. As a stylist, Baker riffed on vintage, army surplus, thrift, recycling and punk at a time when everyone else was still in the thrall of the news out of Paris. What makes this book a must-read? Author Iain R. Webb is a friend of Baker’s, so this is the inside story of a woman whose work is a masterclass in the art of style and subversion.” — Mark Holgate, fashion news director at Vogue
Living in Denial: Climate Change, Emotions and Everyday Life by Kari Marie Norgaard, $36, available here
Photo: MIT Press
“This Norwegian author interviews the inhabitants of a ski town in Norway about how they’re coping with climate change and why our modern culture at large is so disconnected from the environment. It illustrates how we, individually and culturally, must reconnect with our emotions and grief around climate collapse and environmental loss in order to get activated to make radical changes in our society. I think this is especially true in fashion, where overproduction and overconsumption is predicated on deliberate disassociation from our bodies and the Earth.” — Becca McCharen-Tran, Founder and Creative Director of Chromat
My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies by Resmaa Menakem, $18, available here
Photo: Central Recovery Press
“This feels like it should be required reading for every white person in fashion who believes in the importance of inclusion and diversity. It illustrates through somatic exercises how racial trauma lives in white and Black bodies, and offers ways forward to a place of healing. There’s so much healing we need to do in fashion when it comes to racial trauma, not only through ensuring more diverse casting or hiring, or how we perceive race in the fashion industry, but really attuning to the physical sensations in our body when we feel excluded or included, how it constricts or expands when we feel truly safe. We all have a responsibility to make the fashion industry a safe and welcoming place, and this book offers really tangible ways in which we can start that healing in our own bodies.” — McCharen-Tran
Shy: The Alarmingly Outspoken Memoirs of Mary Rodgers by Mary Rodgers and Jesse Green, $20, available here
Photo: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
“‘It’s not about the dress you wear,’ Diana Vreeland once quipped. ‘It’s about the life you lead in the dress.’ Well, then, the best-dressed woman I’ve read about all year is not a traditional fashion plate, but the late, great Mary Rodgers, the daughter of Richard Rodgers, who went on to compose the music for the unsinkable ‘Once Upon a Mattress,’ write the novel ‘Freaky Friday’ and lead ten other creative lives. Her memoir, co-authored with New York Times critic Jesse Green and published eight years after her death, is exhilarating, funny, dishy, heartbreaking and the most enjoyable book you’ll read all year. Did I mention funny? Show me one other fashion book that made you laugh.” — Erik Maza, executive style director at Town & Country
A Left-Handed Woman: Essays by Judith Thurman, $32, available here
Photo: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
“Judith Thurman’s Two For One, her 2008 profile of the Cuban designer Isabel Toledo and her husband, the artist and illustrator Ruben Toledo, is just one reason why her new collection of essays, A Left-Handed Woman, gets my vote for the best fashion read of the year. Isabel died in 2019 — Ruben continues to make incredible work, including a recent cover of T&C — but nearly 15 years after its publication, Thurman’s profile remains one of the most considerate ever published about a designer, as well as a poignant portrait of creative partnership.” — Maza
Selbstverständlich: a Century in Fashion by Akris, $88, available here
Photo: Lars Muller Publishers
“A murderer’s row of fashion journalists contributed to a monograph to mark the centennial of the Swiss label Akris.” — Maza
Prêt-à-Porter, Paris and Women by Alexis Romano, $38, available here
Photo: Bloomsbury Visual Arts
“French ready-to-wear fashion has been woefully understudied until now. Romano communicates its history through an analysis of photographs from Elle and other popular magazines; the rich selection makes this book as visually compelling as it is informative.” — Colleen Hill, curator of costume and accessories at the Museum at FIT
“I’m fascinated by the minds of highly creative people, and I was gripped by Enninful’s memoir from its first few sentences. I devoured this honest, captivating account of his life and career.” — Hill
In America: a Lexicon of Fashion by Andrew Bolton and Amanda Garfinkel, $50, available here
Photo: Metropolitan Museum of Art New York
“This book contains over a hundred garments that were on display for both rotations of this exhibition highlighting pioneers in American fashion, as well as emerging young designers. It’s a beautifully-designed publication, as well as a substantial fashion reference book, including full length images and detailed shots of the garment. Any reader interested in fashion history will also appreciate the text that accompanies each object.” — Julie T. Lê, associate museum librarian at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute
Nadine Ijewere: Our Own Selves by Lynette Nylander and Nadine Ijewere, $55, available here
Photo: Nadine Ijewere/Prestel Publishing
“Our library at the Costume Institute has hundreds of books on male photographers who have dominated the fashion world from the beginning, so it’s wonderful to see the work of a female BIPOC artist highlighted in book form for future generations to be inspired by. This monograph celebrates the work of fashion photographer Nadine Ijewere, who made history as the first Black woman of Jamaican-Nigerian descent to photograph a cover of American Vogue in 2021. Along with her fashion editorial work is a personal series called ‘Tallawah’ (which means strong and fearless), a project she worked on in 2020 in collaboration with hair stylist Jawara Wauchope celebrating the beauty and strength of Jamaican women and their unique hair culture.” — Lê
A Time Before Crack: Photographs from the 1980s by Jamel Shabazz, $40, available here
Photo: powerHouse Books
“I heart New York, and Jamel Shabazz is one of my favorite photographers who documented hip hop culture and fashion in the streets of NYC from the mid-70s to the 90s. For this publication, he revisited his photographic archive and rediscovered a treasure trove of unseen images that reveals a new nostalgic visual diary of life in New York and the street style of those people he connected with throughout his career.” — Lê
Really Free: the Radical Art of Nellie Mae Rowe by Nellie Mae Rowe, $50, available here
Photo: Delmonico Books
“Finding this artist has opened my creative side again. It has really been wonderful to read about her life, see and feel her art. She should be given a medal.” — Peter Jensen, fashion professor at SCAD, designer of Yours Truly by Peter Jensen
Fashioning the Afropolis: Histories, Materialities and Aesthetic Practices by Kristin Kastner, Reina Lewis and Basile Ndjio, $132, available here
Photo:Bloomsbury Visual Arts
“So few books focus on the influential and visually stunning fashion culture of the African continent. I love this book for its mix of scholarly study and rich visuals. It helps push past stereotypes we hold in the west on what African fashion is.” — Elizabeth Way, Associate Curator of Costume at the Museum at FIT
Africa Fashion by Christine Checinska, $45, available here
Photo: Victoria & Albert Museum
“This is another important book that illuminates the multifaceted creativity of fashion on the content. Africa Fashion accompanies an exhibition at the V&A in London. For those who can’t travel, the book immerses you in the gorgeous fashions on display and the designers’ histories and inspirations.” — Way
Please note: Occasionally, we use affiliate links on our site. This in no way affects our editorial decision-making. Some quotes have been edited for length and clarity.
Welcome to our column, “Hey, Quick Question,” where we investigate seemingly random happenings in the fashion and beauty industries.
MAC Cosmetics’ Whitney Houston collection is here, and it’s chock-full of the hyper-glam, 1980s-perfect staples with which the late vocalist remains associated to this day. Marked by bold smokey eyes and bold red and metallic-brown lips, Houston’s beauty regimen was as iconic as she herself was, throughout all her decades of fame. And now that it’s shoppable in luxe gold packaging, fans can get a small piece of her cult of personality, created alongside and approved by the Whitney Houston Estate itself.
MAC’s Houston line has been a long time coming. The brand announced the collection more than a year ago, last September, to be timed with the release of Houston biopic “I Wanna Dance With Somebody.” It’s also “something Whitney always wanted to do,” the artist’s sister-in-law and former manager Pat Houston told People. “I’m pleased we can do something that I know she would have loved.”
If any makeup brand was going to bring this to fruition, it was MAC. The cosmetics giant has collaborated with celebrities for decades, even before celebrity beauty affiliations became ubiquitous. Its charitable Viva Glam initiative, which raises money and awareness for HIV/AIDS, has been releasing collections since 1994, including ones in partnership with living legends like Rihanna, Lady Gaga and, most recently, Rosalía. MAC’s first significant posthumous launch came in 2012, with a 28-piece makeup line inspired by Marilyn Monroe.
Other late celebrities followed, including Selena Quintanilla, with a range that commemorated the 25th anniversary of her passing, and Aaliyah, thanks to a viral fan petition wherein shoppers went so far as to create mockups of products they wanted. Both sold out immediately. But experts attest that cosmetics brands like MAC aren’t just in it for the profits (although, yes, they do make money). For the estates of certain departed figures, like Houston, eye palettes and lipsticks are just one small, but not altogether insignificant, way to keep their legacy alive for a new generation. It’s also, somewhat uncouthly, good for business.
“These posthumous launches aren’t necessarily money-drivers, but more so relationship-builders in a few ways,” says Kirbie Johnson, a beauty reporter and co-founder of beauty podcast Gloss Angeles. “If MAC and Estée Lauder have a great relationship with a movie studio, why not work together on promoting a film? Not to mention the fan relationship, which is important to a brand.”
Johnson goes on to explain that if an estate like Houston’s is angling for a makeup collaboration, it may feel more comfortable with a behemoth like MAC because, well, they know it will be done right. In Houston’s case, the packaging is elevated and the formulas are what you’d expect from a MAC product, Johnson says, and “you don’t feel like the brand skimped to make it.” As one of the top three global makeup brands, MAC sees a reported annual turnover of more than $1 billion, with 500 independent stores.
“I feel like MAC is a household name at this point, but some of this could be a play to either increase reach or awareness of the brand to the departed’s fanbase or simply to add consumer value,” adds Johnson. “MAC is a legacy brand; collaborating with icons like Selena, Aaliyah and Whitney positions them in the same category.”
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A posthumous collaboration, however, is not without its risks. As Johnson says, the person the collaboration is being made for is no longer here, so how can they give approval? In 2017, for example, Urban Decay received a flood of criticism for its Jean-Michel Basquiat collection. (“An artist known for his highly critical takes on power structures like capitalism surely wouldn’t be putting out an eyeshadow palette,” says Johnson.) “You have to hope whoever is running the estate is someone they trusted and is acting in the deceased’s best interest,” says Johnson.
Indeed, fans of late icons, like Houston, are especially protective after their passing — which, ultimately, leads to higher sales. Cieja Springer, a longtime fashion marketer and founder of the “From the Bottom Up!” podcast, attributes this sensation to what she calls “brand regret,” which goes a step further than buyer’s remorse and tends to afflict those who, for a range of reasons, weren’t fans of the artist when they were alive. In the case of Gen Z, which is now captivating the cosmetics industry with its growing purchasing power, this is simply because they weren’t born yet.
“In order for fans to not constantly live with the regret of not giving the artist their flowers while they were here, they jump on it now so they’re not left out,” says Springer. “It’s all about not being left out, at the end of the day.”
With a posthumous product launch, fans are able to buy a piece of their favorite celebrity again (or for the first time) — and as Johnson adds, that opportunity may not come around again, which creates more incentive to buy the product. This is especially true in the case of figures like Aaliyah or Selena, who didn’t have a long period of fame before passing, “so perhaps there was less memorabilia for fans to purchase as a token of their love for both artists,” says Johnson. But of all the memorabilia and merch possibilities, why makeup?
“Whether the celebrity is currently active in their field or not, there’s a shorthand that exists with the ‘look’ and palette of a highly celebrated and media-visible celebrity that gives the consumer an ability to recreate famous looks or a style with which they identify, or find aspirational,” answers Professor Stephan Kanlian, chairperson of FIT‘s unique master’s degree program for emerging leaders in the cosmetics and fragrance sector. “It’s a basic need of universal beauty that individuals aspire to copy the look of someone they see as having great beauty or style.”
After all, makeup products are more attainable than, say, fashion items for most fans, especially younger ones. Johnson offers the example of Harry Styles’s HA HA HA capsule for Gucci, which starts at $235 for a pair of striped logo socks, with T-shirts running around $750. “I’d bet most fans are sporting his $20 Pleasing nail polish instead,” she notes.
“Most people cannot afford a Chanel bag, but they can afford Les Beiges Bronzer,” says Johnson. “As for celebrities who have passed, you can’t carry a record on your person to show you’re a fan, but you can pull a Whitney Houston-branded MAC compact from your bag.”
