Paris fashion tightens belt in economic crisis

Hurriyet Daily News with wires

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Haute couture shows for the 2009 spring-summer season in Paris have slimmed down in response to the global financial crisis. The shows, which started yesterday, are spread over three days instead of four this year and will have fewer catwalk presentations.

All the major players are still present Ñ Dior, Chanel, Christian Lacroix, Givenchy, Jean-Paul Gaultier and Valentino Ñ but the smaller fashion houses are being forced to cut their coats according to their cloth.

"There were 23 catwalk shows in July; this season there will only be 20," said Didier Grumbach, president of the French federation in charge of the couture calendar.

"We were the ones who told them, 'Do not force yourselves to mount a show when times are so hard for you.' When it is risky for them, we encourage them not to spend the money on a show when it is not necessary," said Grumbach. Many of the smaller houses have decided they cannot afford the tens or hundreds of thousand euros that it costs to stage a catwalk presentation.

French designer Anne Valerie Hash is one who freely admits she is not showing this season to save money. "It would be inconceivable to stage a show when my main worry is to be able to pay staff their salaries."

Fans of Hash’s work will nevertheless get a taste of her vision for next summer by looking in the windows in the Palais Royal arcade, which the culture ministry has put at her disposal. Other no-shows this season, who gave no reason for their absence, include Maurizio Galante, Jean-Paul Knott, Marc le Bihan and the London-based label Boudicca. Boudicca's designers Zowie Broach and Brian Kirby said, "Haute couture does not exist only in the context of a catwalk show," and said they were working "on a series of dreams on paper" that they would post on the Internet.

French designer Franck Sorbier, who showed his last collection on the Internet because of an 11th hour crisis in funding, said he would be staging a "modest" catwalk show. He said he had tried to minimize costs by ordering the strict minimum of material.

Lebanese couturier designer George Chakra, whose workshops in Beirut survived the Israeli war on Hezbollah, is confident despite the global downturn. "If it is a marriage, then maybe instead of ordering 10 couture dresses they will order four. But they will not cancel the wedding," he said.

He is not letting the crisis derail the launch of his luxury ready-to-wear line next month during New York's fashion week. Among the big names, Chanel will not be unveiling its collection under the impressive glass dome of the Grand Palais, which has been its venue for several seasons. Instead, it will be staging two presentations in more intimate surroundings. The shows will be near the company headquarters on the rue Cambon. Chanel says that the change in venue is not for budgetary reasons but because the Grand Palais was not available.

But the fashion house has admitted it is taking "prudent measures" in response to the global downturn, which have included cutting travel costs for staff, hiring on a temporary basis and halting a world tour of a mobile art exhibition inspired by the iconic Chanel quilted handbag. There are no new names to create a buzz about the coming season. The only debuts will be by Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pier Paolo Piccioli at Valentino. The pair worked for 10 years under the veteran designer and are taking over for Alessandra Facchinetti, who was let go in October "after disagreements with the management," only a year after being appointed to the job on Valentino's retirement.