Italian luxury brand's innovation in fur fashion

By Tiffany Tan | China Daily USA | Updated: 2013-11-04 08:11

Who knew you could make a coat out of fur and plastic, or that a bag can come in 24-carat gold fur? In its traveling exhibition Another Kind of Art, Fendi shows these can be done - and that for decades the Italian brand has been at the forefront of fur fashion innovations.

As the company celebrates its 88th year, it chose the Chinese capital as one of the places to recount its history of art and craftsmanship. For one thing, eight is a highly auspicious number in China, being a homonym for "good fortune" in Mandarin. (In 2007, Fendi staged a fashion show on the Great Wall, presenting 88 models on a catwalk 88 meters long.)

For another, the mainland Chinese are now the world's biggest group of luxury shoppers and are quickly developing sophisticated tastes.

"As consumers mature, they like to buy not only a product but they like to buy a beautiful story," says Pietro Beccari, Fendi's chairman and chief executive officer, in an interview at its Beijing exhibition hall, itself constructed in the shape of an eight.

"An engagement with the brand and a sharing of a set of values is very important - the passion for beauty, the passion for art or the passion for the savoir faire. I think this emotional tie to a brand is more and more important today." Seeing up close the quality of the materials, as well as the skills, which go into creating pricey luxury goods also appeals to consumers' rational side, he says.

Another Kind of Art, staged in Beijing for a week and a half till Nov 3, featured 24 fur garments and 16 fur handbags made as early as 1970. The pieces were complemented by interactive screens, artisan demonstrations and video presentations.

In one interview clip, the brand's creative director Karl Lagerfeld talked about proposing to Fendi the idea of "fun fur" after joining the Rome-based fashion house in 1965. Until then, fur garments were conventionally stiff and heavy, relegated to fall and summer wear. The exhibition showcased samples of Lagerfeld's consequent designs, which Vogue has described as "inventive, freewheeling, extravagant": a red suede and Mongolian fur dress (1979), a black tulle kimono with decorations in weasel fur (1997) and a mink coat coated in 24-carat gold (2008).

In the bag section were Fendi's classic baguette, Peekaboo and 2Jours, designed by Silvia Fendi, the granddaughter of the brand's founders Edoardo and Adele Fendi.

Because of Chinese luxury consumers' fast-growing size and sophistication, the Italian company sees them as emerging opinion leaders and not just trend followers.

Industry insiders worldwide take note of what Chinese fashion editors and bloggers write, its CEO Beccari says. "They think this awareness of luxury goes beyond just being potential customers which is an acknowledgment of the Chinese way of living luxuriously."

To mark its anniversary celebration in China, Fendi produced for the domestic market a limited-edition Peekaboo in white mink. The handbag, which comes in only seven pieces, is sold solely at Fendi's store at the Shin Kong Place in Beijing. Its price: 88,000 yuan ($14,430).

tiffany@chinadaily.com.cn