Fashion editor, super-stylist and general guru of the elegantly deshabille, Carine Roitfeld is to collaborate with Uniqlo on a 40-piece womenswear collection this autumn. Uniqlo has great form with designer collaborations, having previously worked with designers including Jil Sander and Helmut Lang.
Roitfeld’s style pedigree is impeccable, too: having edited French Vogue for 10 years, she is currently global fashion director of Harper’s Bazaar internationally and editor-in-chief of her own publication, CR Fashion Book. Over the years she has also been muse and stylist to some of the past decade’s most influential designers, working with Tom Ford on his sexy, celebrated, work at Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent.
Roitfeld has described her own look as having a touch of Iggy Pop about it, and there are parallels — messy hair, smudged khohl eyeliner, sinuous limbs — although her trademark caged high heels, understated grey T-shirts and louche silk blouses tucked in to expensive leather pencil skirts are all her own.
How Roitfeld will apply her uber-French, very fashion aesthetic to Uniqlo — a Japanese company famed for high-quality basics and technical outerwear — remains to be seen. Today’s announcement does suggest that she will not be covering the company’s quilted jackets in faux fur and leopard print, however, given that the Roitfeld collaboration will be part of Uniqlo’s LifeWear offering — a collection that focuses on classic pieces that are subtly tweaked each season rather than outlandish design and fast trends. It will probably involve a lot of black, Roitfeld’s signature colour and it will be in on sale from the end of October 2015.
Also this autumn, Uniqlo is collaborating with Christophe Lemaire, the former Hermes creative director, on a menswear and womenswear capsule collection. What’s Japanese for “tres chic”?
