Demna Gets Crowned while the Market Frowns
Demna has been the creative director for Balenciaga for a full decade. He stood firm despite weathering multiple scandals and faltering sales performance, and after arguably showing his laziest collection of his tenure, Kering announced Demna will advance to the group’s failing crown jewel–Gucci.
Gucci has been in bad shape since the end of Alessandro Michele’s tenure. Kering had hopes in Sabato de Sarno, who succeeded Michele, but his performance was nothing short of lackluster. Under de Sarno’s leadership, Gucci’s sales continued to plummet and after three seasons, he was ousted. The in-house design team took responsibility for the most recent fashion show, which was not striking but arguably better than anything de Sarno could have imagined. Maybe it was a sign that a design figurehead wasn’t a necessity. However, the fashion world is a conservative one. Kering had to pick someone to fill the creative director seat, and the group chose its favorite child: Demna.
The Georgian designer, Demna Gvasalia, started his career back at Maison Martin Margiela, having graduated from Margiela’s alma mater, the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. He left the Maison in 2013 for Louis Vuitton and worked under both Marc Jacobs and Nicolas Ghesquiere. What truly caught the industry’s eye was his own label, Vetements, created with his brother Guram Gvasalia. The brand had one ethos—anti-fashion—which was achieved by a large use of ugly prints and oversized blazers. This design language followed Demna to Balenciaga in 2015 when he was officially appointed creative director of the brand, succeeding Alexander Wang.
Demna undoubtedly left a mark with his version of Balenciaga. Many loved him for his subversive work at the brand: from ridiculously large sneakers to leather trash bags, he continuously tried to redefine what fashion meant. He also garnered many haters for repeating the same tricks and using irony to cover his lack of talent. I think it’s unfair to call him untalented, after all he did create his own cult of fashion that rejected glamour. He was also an amazing accessories designer, generating incredible profit for the company with products like hourglass bags and his infamous boots that look like socks. I must also commend his first couture show at Balenciaga, where he perfectly blended his quirks with the operatic gestures of traditional couture.
Now that Demna is moving on to Gucci, I must wonder what his version of the Italian luxury house will look like. Looking back at his career, he was never able to escape the aesthetics of oversized garments and the excessive use of irony. His inability to reinvent is also what made Balenciaga extremely banal in recent years. His design was exciting a decade ago, but no longer. The market seems to dislike his appointment at Gucci, with Kering’s stock dropping by 11% immediately after the announcement. Considering that Kering’s stock price was already at a low, this was certainly a bad omen for the start of Demna’s new tenure at Gucci. The market’s negative sentiment is probably stemming from the fact that Balenciaga under Demna was in decline; thus, placing a declining design lead at a house in desperate need of revival seems illogical. To this I must disagree—not because I think Demna is a fantastic designer, but because he is quite skilled at making accessories.
Most fashion houses make the majority of their revenue through accessories, which mostly consist of bags and shoes. Gucci’s sales continued to falter under de Sarno because no one cared to buy either their bags or their shoes. The brand definitely made an effort to market its existing bag. They tried to make their bamboo handle bag their version of the Hermes Kelly by making it available in person only, which no one cared about. De Sarno also made numerous renditions of the Jackie bag, but again with no success. Partially, it was due to bad products, considering those bags were all recycling old designs. Another failure was Gucci’s inability to create a cohesive brand. His quiet, luxury-esque design captured no audience; he hollowed out Gucci’s identity, which was weak to begin with, by placating trends. No one understood what the brand stood for or what a Gucci woman should look and feel like. Thus, the products were just bags without a story, and to sell luxury items without a convincing narrative is a challenge, to say the least.
Demna, on the other hand, is quite the narrative spinner. He amassed loyal customers through his anti-fashion ethos. Even though he spins the same story about how he thinks fashion shouldn’t just be about pretty dresses and sucking up to the establishment (ironic), his followers still can’t get enough of it. Combined with decent product designs, he achieved great success in terms of sales.
Kering is definitely making a bet that Demna is able to create the same effect at Gucci as he did initially at Balenciaga. They are hoping that the Georgian designer can create the Gucci version of the Triple S sneakers. It’s still hard to say whether that might come true, since it’s quite hard to imagine Demna’s aesthetic mixing with the Italian brand. The market certainly thinks this new union is set to fail.
Featured Image Courtesy of Vogue