Why Hedi Slimane Is Leaving Celine
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- Опубліковано 3 тра 2024
- For months, Celine designer Hedi Slimane has been engaged in a thorny contract negotiation with owner LVMH that could lead to the designer’s departure from the brand, sources familiar with the matter say.
Since LVMH chairman Bernard Arnault installed Slimane six years ago, the star designer has transformed Celine, launching menswear (leaning into his trademark skinny silhouette), perfume and, most recently, beauty, in addition to reconnecting its womenswear image to the house’s historic identity as a purveyor of leather goods that incarnate Parisian bourgeois style.
At first, sales dropped as Slimane pivoted sharply away from predecessor Phoebe Philo’s minimalist, arty look. But since the pandemic, Celine’s business has surged to record highs. While owner LVMH does not regularly disclose sales for individual brands, Celine’s revenues surpassed €2 billion ($2.1 billion) in 2023, the company told investors in January. The brand’s full-year results were likely closer to €2.5 billion, meaning it had surpassed Fendi to become LVMH’s third-largest fashion label, behind only Louis Vuitton and Dior, according to HSBC.
Despite the strong results, sources say Slimane may be on the way out, adding credence to a recent report by Miss Tweed saying Slimane is set to leave the brand. Representatives for LVMH and Celine declined to comment.
Slimane is a rare talent. Known as the industry’s best stylist, he has generated perfectly precise fashion images since his trendsetting turn at Dior Homme in the early 2000s, when he helped usher in a decade-long trend cycle with his skinny silhouette. His approach to branding and merchandising invokes the strategies of French fashion heavyweights, with ultra-consistent, minimalist art direction that echoes Karl Lagerfeld - especially when shooting Celine’s black-and-white campaigns himself - and commercial collections that blend street style and luxury à la Yves Saint Laurent.
“Hedi is a genius of marketing, product and merchandising. He knows how to create that jacket, that shoe,” said Alice Bouleau, partner at executive search firm Sterling International. “It’s not overly intellectual; it’s not as subtle as what Phoebe was doing, but he really grasped the essence of what this brand was about.”
Slimane has put in place a commercially potent template for Celine with his ultra-refined, pared-back approach to art direction and campaign photography.
Slimane has put in place a commercially potent template for Celine with his ultra-refined, pared-back approach to art direction and campaign photography. (Celine)
But Slimane’s considerable talent has come with financial and creative demands to match.
In addition to commanding what’s understood to be a historically high salary for a designer, he’s also notorious for seeking royalties on all manner of creative output from campaign images to perfume formulas and more.
A true auteur despite his commercial savvy, Slimane expects complete creative control over a broad sweep of subjects - not just what goes in collections, but when and how they are shown, as well as to whom, and the environment in which they are sold.
That can lead to big results and fast, but only when the investment dollars are flowing freely. Since Slimane joined Celine, teams have spent countless hours, and company funds, ferrying samples back and forth to his home in St. Tropez, where he regularly holes up. Projects often reach an advanced stage before getting axed by the reclusive Slimane, creating frustration and high turnover in senior teams.
Shows and media can also be a sticking point. The brand has largely eschewed in-person runway shows in favour of fashion films that take months and millions of dollars to shoot. These are then released online without warning, limiting opportunities for editorial coverage (and, ultimately, visibility with consumers). When Slimane does stage an in-person show, influential guests are often absent. In addition to favouring off-calendar presentations at moments when editors and influencers are not around, since 2021 the brand has outright boycotted Vogue and its sister publications at Condé Nast in protest of the company’s cost-cutting move to oust regional editors-in-chief, including his longtime friend and collaborator Emmanuelle Alt, formerly editor-in-chief of Vogue Paris.
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I will miss Hedi Slimane era at Celine…The Fragrances were amazing and affordable! Hedi was the first designer I saw over a 15 years ago that had mens skinny jeans going down the runway way I think during his Dior or YSL tenure.
From my understanding it's not confirmed that he's leaving but it's 99.9% likely. Really sad to see him go, I think he is a great fit at Celine and the numbers prove it.
which fragrance exactly ? 😊
Hedi Slimane is genius! I admire him and bow in front of him.🙇♀️
They want to CONTROL him. He met the financial bottom line. Ppl are wearing the clothes . They may not want him to get so big the brand can’t live without him . He want to stay credit for his creativity. No different than a songwriter wants credit/royalties for there song. .
I'm a big fan of him demanding royalties but obviously big companies won't like it. Good on him for being so good at negotiations.
I think Hedi curating perfumes is actually a good thing. I always felt surprised that perfumes and clothing are treated separately by brands. It is all in the metaphor ‘wearing a perfume’. It makes sense of Heidi to consider the Celine person and all that they’d wear and how everything should be cohesive. A fragrance can make or break a dress code. Not because the fragrance isn’t great but because it is deviates from the underlying story of the other pieces. It’s as good as wearing a dunhill tailored suit with those Balenciaga oversized shoes. It’s only ignored because perfumes are not directly linked to the sense of sight
The concept for royalties for his creatively is solid. Why not. Celine is making Billionaires why not get a bigger slice of the pie.
I often wonder why Slimane doesn’t get an investor (you’d think investors would be lining up given his sales) and open his open label. He pretty much does “Slimane” wherever he goes, that combo of Parisian haute bourgeoisie x Rock and Roll. So why not do it for himself? Risk aversion? Insufficient time for his photography and social life? Surely he’d do well enough eventually that his own company could afford the teams and infrastructure to make his work life easy.
Also did you read the Style Zeitgeist newsletter on this subject? I loved it.
At this point he should just start his own brand. He has the track record to easily get investors I don’t know why he doesn’t just started his eponymous label.
My view is that it is a lot easier to succeed commercially with a brand like Celine that already does high end fashion. However, given Hedi’s exquisite taste and strict requirements in fabrics, it is probably a lot riskier to start a brand from scratch without stealing enough brains from a high end fashion company. Celine homme feels a lot like hedi’s own men’s wear. Personally I can’t see Hedi surpass what he has achieved with Celine even given his own label.
You understimate the high turnover for a company like Celine. It's a desastrous effect. And in france, Violation of worker right is heavily punished by the Prud'homme.
Possibly not practical in real life but personally I think it would be fantastic to see Hedi Slimane get out from under LVMH… he’s a brilliant designer and deserves maximum creative control. He could dictate when he releases his ideas to market like Philo & get off the revolting treadmill of having to churn out ideas too many times per year. These conglomerates are pure forces of exploitation at every level.
First thing first. Is the clothes selling? If so let the designer live.
They most certainly are
I love Hedi, I consider myself an Hedi stan, I loved Saint Laurent (until he left), then I loved Celine cos of Hedi - his distinctive style, and the attitude of the clothes. BUT, for like the last 3 seasons, it's felt like Groundhog Day - I've been bored. I stopped watching his shows cos I knew exactly what it would be - the same thing we got 4 seasons ago. It felt like he was a bit stuck creatively.
His clothes are super wearable, cool, sexy etc. But £180 for boxers is wild.
The BoF Article - www.businessoffashion.com/articles/luxury/can-celine-work-without-hedi-slimane/
Their bags are not doing really well in the reseller’s market, which means that the bags don’t hold much ‘investment’ values. Another reason is that the brand clearly wants to go back to ‘luxury luxury’ styles, catering to high-income clientele instead of ‘aspiring customers’ .
Parisian Here, in France we have a very strong work rules at the government level. All these back and forth to saint Tropez can easily affect well being of workers at Lvmh. And I can swear you that nobody want to have issue with the prudhomme in France. If you add the very strong turnover of employee in Fashion, Luxury group fight a lot to keep good profiles. And as you know, our generation don't want to spend all our lives at work. So even if it's Hedi Slimane, no one want to bring collections at saint tropez every weeks. So many just resign and take another position in other company. And all this affect the company. There are a lot a lot of turn over at Celine. You see all the time work offer from Celine. Sometime, the same position for 8 months. So I think Bernard Arnault ( who inspect all his companies himself or with his children) is tired to deal with this kind of shenanigans.
The hq in st-tropez makes sense the same way that the ysl hq did in LA. It makes a distance between the executives and the creatives. Part of it I think that they hate when the creative director knows better how to run a brand than the executive. At LVMH I have the impression that all the ceo have some ego trip. And also at this point they knew how he works when they hired him at Celine, and hiring Hedi Slimane is like having a brand in brand; it’s like a hosting thing.
AYO! did u see the recent cut article which said that the current met gala exhibition was a last-minute backup plan? anna originally wanted to stage a galliano retrospective but the museum stepped in and said they weren't ready. i think this gives credence to some of the givenchy rumours...
I think the museum is waiting until the film documentary about Galliano comes out, to see how it’s received, before staging a full on “He’s redeemed!!” exhibit. Just a matter of time though bc AW has always been his biggest supporter.
Going to check out the article now! Haven’t seen it yet. Anna Wintour really loves Galliano though so it doesn’t surprise me. For some reason the industry insiders I know personally are so adamant that Galliano isn’t going to Givenchy. I feel like they know something they don’t because they’re so sure.
I would love Hedi to stay at Celine 😍
As a designer working for myself. I will tell you why they want to cut him. Bc he is a pioneer under the thumb. This would mean every other designer under these conglomerates can follow suit. Which is exactly what they don’t want. To give their power away. This is not about money . This is about domination and power
as a celine model, pls don’t leave Hedi😢
Whoa which collection did u model for? U worked with hedi?
@@fixed63548 men’s seasons, n yeah
Interesting
some noise say he is going to Chanel 🤔🤔🤔
Cali is in Colombia and is hardly expensive haha :)
men of culture
always thought he should depart after the garbage “the dancing kid” collection. he picks some gorgeous environments for his show though.
Wasn’t a huge fan of the dancing kid collection but most of the other stuff I’ve seen from Hedi Slimane at Celine I really liked. This is everything from the collections to how he changed the stores to the perfume line etc. I think everything is very well done by him. The quality is also good which is a huge plus
@@FashionRoadman The Dancing Kid saved Celine.I think he would have been out long before this if it wasn't for that collection.
@@rv6984 maybe it did financially I just didn’t personally like that collection is all, I did do a review on the collection on the channel though. I was making the argument it would age a lot better than people think
now that virginie is leaving chanel i know why hedi is leaving celine 💁♀️
I smell corporae resentment.
I wont miss him.
In this copy & paste fashion Era. Of Course 😆 🤣 😂
It’s so annoying that LVMH execs get mad because a designer is doing something different and successful doing the same thing. Maybe they need to do for the designer they can “control” so Celine flops and they learn their lesson
HE BETTER NOT LEAVE‼️