RIP Bob Mackie. The delightful documentary about his life and work, Bob Mackie: Naked Illusion, is available on many streaming services. When I saw the movie at the 92Y a few years ago (Mackie was interviewed on the stage after the screening and was charming. Unfortunately, I can’t find a recording), I learned Mackie had remained relevant to fashion icons, including Beyonce and Zendaya, decades past the Carol Burnett Show and Sonny and Cher era. Looking around the auditorium, I saw adoring Mackie fans who were likely born in this century. Veteran fashion journalist Hal Rubinstein captured Mackie’s appeal in a Facebook post, saying:
“Ralph Lauren showed America how to dress as if our parents had a summer residence in Newport, a winter one in Palm Beach and we rode horses on the weekend. Calvin Klein convinced us we could all be sexy wearing jeans and a T-shirt or just in our underwear. But no American designer ever opened our eyes wider to the allure and authority of looking drop-jawed spectacular than Bob Mackie.
It wasn’t simply the ubiquity of all those sequins and bugle beads, though you could probably pave a two-lane highway that stretches from Ann-Margret’s house in Benedict Canyon to Bernadette Peters’ co-op on the Upper West Side with the millions he stitched onto every woman who ever deserved a follow spot. They were merely Bob’s chosen tools to deliver what he knew how to project better than anyone — the theatricality of glamour.
Women didn’t seek Mackie out to be tastefully dressed at lunch, or when a busy workday required something suitably pragmatic to go from day to night. He was your infallible go-to guy when the moment demanded a memorable entrance, be it on a stage, in a cabaret, or walking into the Met Gala…before it descended into a perversely off-putting parade of ‘can-you-top this?’”
Separately, at some point, but not today, as I just got off a very long flight and am bleary-eyed (greetings from Jerusalem!), I may elaborate on the complicated issue of TikTok and Instagram likely being less efficient marketing vehicles than they once were. For now, the article on Shein below will, I hope, suffice. The stock is down over 20% from its recent IPO, but that might just reflect original mispricing. It does, though, feel like the shine is off Shein. There is definitely something going on in fashion that makes Shein less appealing to consumers than it once was, as per this pull quote:
“Shein’s rise to cultural prominence is irrevocably intertwined with tech. The company was founded in 2008, finding customers through influencer collabs and giveaways on Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest. But the brand really took off as an early adopter of TikTok. When the shortform-video wormhole opened up, Shein quickly became the world’s largest online fashion retailer…
…[Now] Digital culture has also changed. Shein was a major player in bringing about microtrends online, with one item hitting virality for a week or two until it was so saturated on our feeds that people threw it out within one menstrual cycle. The cropped sleeveless knit vest, the cow-patterned jeans, and the sheer mesh tops dotted with pictures of cherubs were all Shein-fueled viral pieces that rose to and fell from popularity within months. Briefly, everyone would look the same in a very specific way—decidedly uncool. Culture shifted again: Now the status item is to have something so unique that it would be impossible to re-create with a simple Google search.”
Faye Landes advises emerging consumer companies, including footwear, apparel and accessories brands, on-line retailers, and fitness concepts on general strategy, hiring, scaling and fundraising. Faye’s work is informed by her career as an analyst at Cowen & Company and Consumer Edge Research as well as her time as a guest lecturer at Princeton’s undergraduate course in entrepreneurship. To join her Weekend Reading mailing list, sign up at faye@landesadvisors.com.
