In the Spring of 1968, a 25-year-old Calvin Klein wheeled a rail of samples to a meeting with the head of NYC department store Bonwit Teller & Co. By Christmas, Klein and his partner businessman Barry K. Schwartz had reached one million dollars in sales, for the brand’s sophisticated, timeless designs. Last week, almost 50 years later, Veronica Leoni took over the American heritage brand’s reins, and—as we predicted—stayed loyal to its signature minimalism. “My goal is to define an ultimate and definitive expression of monumental minimalism and pureness through shape and craft, bringing Mr. Klein’s original vision and distinctive approach into the current day,” said Leoni in the collection’s press release.
Back in the day, Klein’s recipe was as simple as his clothes: timeless appeal with a modern edge, and viral (or water cooler gossip-inciting, as the internet didn't exist) advertising. The brand sold equal parts simplicity and sex. Who could forget Cher in Clueless, getting chastised by her father: “What the hell is that? ‘It’s a dress, daddy.’ ‘Says who?’ ‘Calvin Klein!’” (The dress was later recreated under Francisco Costa in 2010.)
Climbing the fashion ranks at a time when women were taking up their rightful place in the professional world and becoming sexually liberated post-free love movement, Klein emerged as the brand to power suit them for day and dress them up for night. Fittingly, as the brand’s first-ever female Creative Director, Leoni’s first collection screamed ‘70s female empowerment via sharply tailored suits and power shoulders.
Over the years, minimalist menswear-inspired trousers, tailored jackets, and silk dresses (despite a brief fall in sales in the ‘70s) remained Calvin Klein staples, even after Klein stepped down from the brand in 2004. Throughout that time, minimalist fashion has come in and out of style, and been covered under many monikers: non-core; timeless; wearable; conservative (which Klein, with its infamous underwear ads, was not); clean. But bar a brief Raf Simmons stint, which saw the brand renamed from Calvin Klein Collection to 205W39NYC and some eye-catching stunts (think Mark Wahlberg dropping his jeans on stage to show off his Calvins) paired-back elegance has always been the American house’s raisin-detre— however you dress it up (or down). “I never thought I was a minimalist but a reductionist. My commitment was to keep the collection relevant. I was experimental and playful: always looking forward though respecting the brand ethos, which was singularly the reason I was there,” Francisco Costa, who was Creative Director of Calvin Klein between 2004 and 2016, tells Culted.
But now, at a time when capsule dressing is becoming more popular and consumers are trying to buy less in the face of a scorching planet, timeless, high-quality pieces are back. Further, research has found that minimalism tends to come into fashion in times of economic strife, so it makes sense that Klein would make its return now— and who better to sit at its helm than minimalist GOAT Victoria Leoni? Judging by 82-year-old Klein, who smiled on from the FROW, Calvin approves.
Featured image via Getty and Calvin Klein©
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