Loewe had a bumper harvest.
The Fashion Awards, an annual event organised by The British Fashion Council, ended Monday at The iconic London Royal Albert Hall, according to business news, jonathan Anderson, Creative Director of Spanish luxury label Loewe, beat out Sarah Burton, Daniel Lee, Matthieu Blazy and a host of other stars, including Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons, to win the designer of the Year award.
Just last month, he won the 2023 International Designer of the Year award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America in New York. That means the 39-year-old designer from Northern Ireland has taken two of the biggest fashion industry honours this year.
Recognition does not come only from professional review. Loewe's Anagram Logo became the most influential Logo of the year, according to a 2023 fashion report released last month by fashion search engine Lyst.
Back in the second quarter of this year, the Anagram-emblazoned vest was Lyst's most popular item, with a 132% year-on-year increase in search volume, and led Loewe to top Lyst's most popular brand list for the first time, surpassing Prada, which has been in the running for two seasons.
Not only that, but searches for the Anagram handbag have increased 170% this year, and the high-waisted, wide-legged jeans with the Logo peaked in June.
Against the backdrop of a complete return to luxury, it's no surprise that Loewe Anagram has shot to fame.
The Loewe Anagram, which was created in 1970, is a four-letter squiggly letter L that distinguishes itself from other brands with a plain sans serif English Logo, the Logo's usual flamboyance is undermined by its symmetrical and artistic design.
Although the eye-catching Logo is no longer the mainstream of the industry, but the Logo brought by the commercial effect is difficult to be cut off by the brand. Consumer market has gradually formed a consensus that only through symbols can achieve large-scale communication, which as one of the tentacles of creativity repeatedly link brands and consumers.
Some in the industry point out that Loewe Anagram's restrained and subtle expression, while responding to today's consumers' desire for low-key luxury, reinforces the market's perception with recognizable symbols.
As a result, Loewe has become a dark horse in the luxury industry this year.
Founded in 1846, Loewe focused on leather goods, and gradually developed into a comprehensive luxury brand, and in 1996 joined the world’s largest luxury giant LVMH group.
Loewe has had four different creative directors, but it wasn’t until 2013, when Jonathan Anderson, then a 31-year-old upstart designer, took over, that Loewe saw a turnaround.
He led a landmark revival of the brand with hits like Puzzle, Flamenco and Gate.
According to the data, Loewe’s sales grew by as much as 40 per cent in 2015.
But as the luxury industry has become more competitive, Loewe has fallen into a lull in the past few years after its explosion.
As a result, Loewe had been out of the top 10 on Lyst’s brand list for several years.
Since the fourth quarter of last year, Loewe has climbed from 14 to the top 10, and finally topped the list this year, overtaking popular brands such as Prada and Balenciaga.
While this may be influenced by objective factors such as market trends, Loewe’s contrarian growth is essentially a triumph of creativity.
Combing through the actions of Loewe in recent years, it is not difficult to find that it has been relying on a number of dimensions of creativity, quietly exported to the market a clear and three-dimensional brand image.
The first is the most visible fashion expression. In some ways, it is rare to find a brand as anti-aesthetic as Loewe in a large, commercial fashion house.
Even in the brand’s latest, seemingly more everyday spring/summer 2024 collection, Jonathan Anderson’s quest for misplaced segmentation and fun contours is evident. In recent years, Loewe runway modeling, the discussion of the highest heat is undoubtedly the brand’s spring and summer 2023 series.
Whether it’s the tension of the Anthurium on the model’s chest, or the exaggerated propping up of the hem of the dress, which seems to be lifted up in many places like a series of mountain versions of the sling design and the fabric at the waist to create the illusion of being pulled by the air, and two-dimensional clothing that routinely bends and folds clothing in pixels and contortions has been a hit on social media, with celebrities including a $AP Rocky and Marc Jacobs.
The other side of the same year debut of the spring and summer 2023 Men’s wear series with clothes covered with plants of special shape, but also become the object of heated discussion netizens.
Jonathan Anderson seeded coats, jeans, shoes and other items with Chia seeds and catnip grown in tunnels outside Paris for more than 20 days, creating a perfect blend of fabric and plant, to illustrate the sustainable theme of the fusion of organic and man-made.
As for accessories, Jonathan Anderson’s designs are full of humor and surrealism.
They include Lipstick, an unusual heel shaped like a broken rose, pointy leather shoes with half-cut jeans, and high-heeled shoes that mimic the way a balloon explodes, shoes filled with uninflated balloons that display a floral illusion, as well as inflated-style heels like Barbie’s or Minnie’s, have garnered a lot of attention on social media.
There is no doubt that the expression of artistic pleasure has become a symbol of Loewe. In the years when ideas were generally suppressed by the epidemic, loewe instead for“Box show”, “Wall show”, “Book show”, “Clothes show” and“Newspaper show” a series of creative planning has received industry attention.
This visual vitality is also reflected in advertising films.
Unlike the mainstream aesthetic of photography, Loewe’s posters are good at using camera language to reveal the meaning of distortion of reality. In the early spring 2024 series, Jonathan Anderson teamed up with photographer Juergen Teller, the 90-year-old actress Maggie Smith, actress Greta Lee, artist Rachel Jones and model Sun Feifei were invited to join the group, in such as red brick walls, drained pool, worn-out sofa and other scenes of daily life interpretation of the latest series.
Not only that, but since the 2021, Loewe has also launched a joint Studio Ghibli series with Japanese cartoon IPS for Totoro, Spirited Away and Howl’s Moving Castle, add interest to the brand’s grotesque aesthetic with childlike colors.
To Be Sure, Loewe’s groundbreaking attempts are not the only ones at a time when brands are competing for the limited attention of the market, and the rise of uninspired ideas in the fashion industry has often been met with questions about whether they are hype.
But the power of Jonathan Anderson is that these unconventional creative expressions, far from being detached from Loewe’s brand heritage, are becoming embedded in the brand’s 100-year-old culture.
This aspect stems from Jonathan Anderson’s emphasis on craftsmanship in the Loewe heritage.
Since he took the helm, Loewe has worked with Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh, English Potter and Arts and Crafts movement William De Morgan to launch a series of special capsules that have helped establish a long-term approach to the craft.
Last year, Loewe launched the 2023 early spring collection, inspired by China’s monochrome glazes, with a selection of 10 traditional Chinese colours, including light cyan, white and carmine, from a clear glaze palette, its integration into the designs of the ready-to-wear brand and iconic bag Puzzle, Hammock, Flamenco and others, designed to pay homage to the minimalist ceramic aesthetics of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, has garnered almost overwhelming acclaim on social media. Jonathan Anderson also founded the Loewe Loewe Foundation award for craftsmanship in 2016, the world’s first international contemporary craftsmanship award. Jonathan Anderson admits, “In a sense, I see myself as a curator.”
Far from being a traditional fashion designer who specializes in“Clothes,” Anderson has expanded his reach into a variety of areas, continue to work with artists and creative talent.
It can be said that under Jonathan Anderson, Loewe is one of the few brands that mixes fun with classy, popular with profound, and these seemingly contradictory descriptions enrich Loewe’s brand personality, set It apart from other luxury brands that have only a single market image.
Although building a multi-dimensional brand world often does not see commercial returns in the short term, it gives Loewe more room for growth in the future.
Michael Kors, the us-based luxury brand, had previously admitted that Yang Mi’s role as the brand’s first global face had boosted sales of its range in China, sending Asian revenues soaring 42 per cent.
At present, the star effect has begun to take effect, some netizens revealed that a number of sets of the same Loewe Yang Mi wear tie-in has been sold out. In fact, Loewe has been aggressive in its endorsement strategy in recent years, and in addition to Yang Mi, the brand also announced actor Leo Wu as its spokesperson in May.
At the same time, to better communicate with young consumers, Loewe has also signed a new generation of Korean women nmixx, Korean men’s group NCT member Taeyong as brand ambassador, and custom-made for the former face close-up print dress. After years of building up momentum, Loewe’s leap lacked only one trigger.
So Loewe’s high-growth momentum is almost predictable, helped by Yang Mi, its spokesman. But it should be noted that the overall luxury mania has cooled, and Loewe, who has yet to hit the $1 billion threshold, is in the second tier of the most anxious competition.
Sales at LVMH, the world’s largest luxury goods group, rose just 1 percent year-on-year to 19.96 billion euros in the three months to September 30, according to the latest results from Loewe’s parent company, LVMH group, organic revenue growth in Loewe’s fashion and leather goods division plunged to 9 per cent from 21 per cent in the previous quarter to $9.75 bn, its worst performance in nearly two years.
In the face of a sudden increase in market pressure, Loewe only remain vigilant in order to achieve the accumulation of thin hair.
