Favourite Brands

My two favourite brands are Balmain and Sass and Bide.

Although Balmain is no where near within my price range, the design aesthetic Christophe Decarnin applies to each of his collections is very much to my taste.

I am very attracted to over-the-top embellishments, and also a 'badass' / rock kind of style, and I think Balmain and Sass and Bide are some of the few brands that I have seen combine the two looks successfully.

I consistently like the styles produced by Sass and Bide and Balmain from season to season.

Sass and Bide

I started liking Sass and Bide a few years ago when the brand was first introduced in Wellington at Area 51. I like the status associated with the brand, and how they have a reputation of high quality, high fashion garments.

Although Sass and Bide is quite an expensive brand, I have found that some garments, like t-shirts and singlets, can be reasonably priced, and other garments when they're on sale. I particularly like their jeans as they happen to fit my body shape, as most brands don't tend to, and when compared to other jean brands they are quite competitively priced.

Sass and Bide are very successful at targeting customers as they have developed a very strong reputation of producing high fashion, high quality, classy clothing. This reputation means that customers will buy their products because of the status associated with them, and as Sass and Bide garments are quite recognisable, this is easily shown.

I'm not sure if I could pick a particular Sass and Bide campaign that was the most successful as the style aesthetic seems to progress / flow quite smoothly from collection to collection. The only thing I can think of is the collection released in around 2009 where the design aesthetic changed from the bright colourful designs they had done in the past to mainly use black, white, grays and metallics with lots of embellishments and hardware. I noticed quite an increase in popularity in Sass and Bide after this, and this kind of style is still being used in their collections today.

Balmain

I started liking Balmain in 2009 when I saw a some of photographs of Balmain clothing including a highly embellished green dress and military jacket in Vogue Magazine. What I was really drawn to was the heavily embellished garments, the unique colours and textures used, as well as the big shoulder pads in the dresses and jackets at the time. Most of these styles are still being used throughout Balmain collections today.

I think Balmain is very effective at targeting their customer. As the garments produced are very expensive, this limits their potential clientele. Luckily, Balmain produces many 'show pieces' that are very effective for standing out on a red carpet or on stage - and I have noticed many celebrities wearing Balmain to this effect.

I think that their most successful campaign was the Spring 2009 RTW as it kind of relaunched Balmain as a high fashion brand that was consistent with trends with an edgier / vintage look. I think it was then Balmain become popular with more celebrities and put it back in the public eye again. This edgy look has been kept up in the seasons since.

The style of these two brands fits really well with my own personal tastes and the kind of aesthetic I would usually design myself. However, I had to change my usual design aesthetic for the first assignment in order to address my concept properly.

For this topic, not only do I want to continue the child like look from my first assignment but I hope to design my collection for kids, and I do not think styling influences from these brands would be entirely appropriate.