Banana Republic’s Spring 2023 March campaign drop takes us to Taos, New Mexico, with photographer Richard Phibbs [IG] bringing his deep understanding of humanity, nature and ancestral roots to the campaign.
A currently incomplete model list includes Ella Eckerson, Louise de Chevigny, and Maria Borges. We will fill out the rest over the weekend, with other pieces of this Banana Republic Spring 2023 campaign.
Personally, I feel that Banana Republic is back on the right track, and I don’t want them to mess up. And a part of me was wondering how Phibbs could go to Taos and not have adobe buildings or any shots connected to Georgia O’Keeffe in the imagery. How about an indigenous model or two?
The photographer did all of the above in the Banana Republic Spring 2023 campaign. But it’s a compliment to Richard Phibbs that I refused to believe that this sequence of images constituted the campaign.
They’re lovely but also a very incomplete story for him. Not for 80-90% of the photographers I can name, but not Phibbs. What matters to me also matters to him. ~ Anne
A‘Spirited Romance’ swept through global cyberspace this week, as Zara Studio launched its S/S 2023 Campaign. The limited-edition, top tier of Zara’s spring offering inspires a spiritual pause on sleepless nights and digital frenzy.
Do you still remember the smell of fresh grass? Did you ever eat clover? How about just lying on on a blanket and seeing a sky so beautiful, it seems impossible that a climate emergency is at hand?
Models Annemary Aderbrigbe, Ava Christian, He Cong and Ida Heiner are the spring muses lensed by Steven Meisel. Frequent collaborator Fabien Baron acts as creative director in a moment where fashion swings back to sensual elegance and beautiful clothes, styled here by another Meisel-Baron collaborator Karl Templer.
There will always be contrived fashion around us, but the trend to clothes that we wear as honest pleasure — as opposed to them wearing us as artifice, an IG photo op and to feed some designer’s ego is real.
One of fashion’s nicest women Lily Aldridge joins forces with Weekend Max Mara in a smile-generating, warm-weather, global traveler collaboration “From Lily With Love.”
Photographer Zoey Grossman [IG] captures the California vibe collection that uses organic cotton and linen blends and other sustainable materials. AOC believes the denim is organic cotton denim, which uses less water, energy, and toxic chemicals than conventionally grown cotton. Rating groups also say workers are treated better.
The Lily Aldridge AOC knows divides her time between New York City and Nashville, nurturing her daughter Dixie Pearl. Lily is well known for her philanthropy, partnering with causes close to her heart including St. Jude Children's Hospital and humanitarian initiatives such as No Kid Hungry, World of Children and Everytown for Gun Safety.
There are givers in fashion. And there are takers. Lily Aldridge is a giver in every part of her beautiful spirit.
Louis Vuitton releases a Ramadan capsule, available on their ME website and select Louis Vuitton stores in the region. Model Malika El Maslouhi poses with precious handbags and classic ready-to-wear pieces styled by Victoria Sekrier.
Carlijn Jacobs [IG]photographs the campaign with Axel Morin on film with Tony Romero as art director; Ryan Chappell as choreographer; Vincent Olivieri on set design.
Daniel Lee’s Burberry debut is gaining momentum, as he charts a new course for the brand. This part 2 drop of the new ad campaign called ‘The New Creative Expression’ delivers new personalities to help define the Burberry ‘family’.
The Burberry Family Expands
South Korean football star Son Heung-min became a Burberry ambassador in June 2022. The brand devotes major online presence to a serious interview with the Premier League player, now living in the UK.
Entering the Burberry fam is Georgia May Jagger, who delivers near British royalty as the daughter of The Rolling Stones singer Sir Mick Jagger and model Jerry Hall. Jagger also delivers a sensual jolt to the emerging Burberry narrative.
The star of the campaign is the Equestrian Knight logo, revived from the brand’s archives and oh so Burberry. Add him to a corgi image, and the Brits are swooning. I adore its presence everywhere — in an almost off-kilter manner. The knight is also ubiquituous in the fall 2023 collection — on labels in unexpected places. ‘Off-kilter’ is a Burberry theme on my mind.
Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen fronts the Winter 2023 campaign for footwear brand Arezzo, lensed by Fernando Tomaz [IG]. Pedro Sales styles the campaign with creative direction by Giovanni Bianco and set design by Jean Labanca.
Arezzo & Co. the 50-year-old Brazilian conglomerate behind Arezzo, Gisele’s ad campaign featured here, Schutz and Alexandre Birman acquired 65 percent of Paris Texas footwear brand two weeks ago.
Arezzo Acquires Majority Stake in Paris Texas Footwear
The question is: will Gisele next be stepping out in buzzy Milan, Italy-based Paris Texas boots? That could happen.
It was Emily Ratajkowski who put Paris Texas knee-high leather boots on the map in 2018 via Instagram. The brand was founded in 2015 by sisters Annamaria and Margherita Brivio.
Models Adit Priscilla, Barbara Valente, Louise Robert and Sherry Shi take the stage in Missoni’s Spring/Summer 2023 Campaign. Missoni’s new creative director, Filippo Grazioli introduces us to his vision of Missoni, taking a more reductionist approach to a sexy body-con silhouette.
In truth, the new designer has already jazzed things up for the fall 2023 collection, based on the recent show. Returning to the spring campaign, Lorenzo Posocco styles the shoot, photographed by Theo Wenner [IG].
Zara’s [IG] commitment to sophisticated marketing delivers a beauty story that does as much for Zara fashion as for Zara Spring 2023 makeup trends.
Makeup artist Sam Visser brings sky and earth tones to top model SashaPivovarova’s smoky aquamarine and peacock blue eyes and sandy-neutrals face. The visual undercurrent is not only bold but complex, as the setting sun on the horizon drenches water, waves and Sasha in increasingly inky darkness.
There is female mystery in Carlijn Jocobs’ [IG] images, with Sasha rising from the ocean depths as a full-dressed, boss lady sea goddess styled by Imruh Asha. Sasha’s blonde hair bob by Mustafa Yanaz co-exists with her ivory head-helmet bathing cap.
New mother and good friend to photographer Elizaveta Porodina [IG], model Maggie Maurer fronts the ‘Euphoria’ collection of eyewear from Los Angeles-based Jacques Marie Mage [IG]. Vittoria Cerciello styles the campaign with set design by Afra Zamara.
The artisan brand has an incredibly beautiful website with equally inspiring products that include eyeglasses as the lead product, supplemented with select jewelry pieces, gifts and home products.
Chanel’s Coco Mademoiselle Fragrance has a new ambassador — 20-year-old actor Whitney Peak [IG], who now follows in the footsteps of Kate Moss and Keira Knightly.
The Ugandian-Canadian actor has an existing relationship with Chanel. Peak had a major role in the 2021 HBO Max reboot of the Gossip Girl series, the Apple TV+ series Home Before Dark, the Netflix series Chilling Adventures of Sabrina and the Disney+ film Hocus Pocus 2.
The Coco Mademoiselle fragrance and Whitney Peak are a perfect match. Whitney Peak isn’t a shy femme; rather she embraces her bold and carefree side, as expressed in her natural, 2023 Diana Ross hairdo.
When savvy shoppers spend hours on trusted consignment platforms like 1stdibs, The RealReal and Vestiaire Collective looking for a beloved handbag, it’s time for a designer like Marc Jacobs to look to his archives.
The Jessica Stam bag is back, with Stam herself leading the campaign. Paris Hilton, Ashlee Simpson, Ashanti, and Selma Blair deliver big support in images styled by Alastair McKimm and shot by Harley Weir.
Following sister Kim Kardashian’sfantastic Dolce & Gabbana Spring 2023 campaign released last week, Kylie Jenner goes to bat for Dolce & Gabbana Eyewear in a new campaign lensed by Mert & Marcus [IG].
As for the Kardashian women being cheap, I’m sure that Stefano Gabbana and Domenico Dolce have paid a premium price for their prior insults against the family. Given the full range of their business savvy, the Kardashian women know their worth.
It wouldn’t surprised me if Mama Bear Kris Jenner added a 3-5 years, 5-10% penalty to the contract, right before their disbelieving eyes.
Cuz that’s how the Kardashian women roll, and AOC admires them for their moxie.
H&M invites us on a stylish Spring 2023 getaway to Isla Hennes. The perfect island in Azure waters welcomes us with wildflowers and a vivid color palette of hot pinks, spring green and yellow anchored with bold black and white graphic prints and embroideries.
Amelia Gray Hamlin, Mica Arganaraz, Paloma Elsesser and Rebecca Leigh Longendyke lead us into the new season.
South Korean ‘Squid Game’ actor and Louis Vuitton ambassador Hoyeon Jung plays with scale in the Spring 2023 campaign.
Jung just booked another very important beauty ambassador role with Lancôme.
The campaign is fast and young — more than usual. The playhouse structure is modeled after Louis Vuitton’s historic home in Asnieres, located on the left bank of the river Seine, some eight kilometres from the center of Paris.
Today the home is called ‘La Galerie’, and it functions as a permanent exhibition space for Louis Vuitton.
The rest of the cast includes Elio Berenett, Franzisla Jetzek, Greta Oberwalleney, Killian Smits, Sarah Brown and Samile Bermannelli.
Frequent LV photographer David Sims [IG] is behind the lens, with styling by Marie-Amelie Sauve.
The LOEWE Spring Summer 2023 women's campaign, shot by David Sims [IG], features LOEWE Global Brand Ambassador Taylor Russell posing as a form of acting.
A theme throughout the LOEWE Spring 2023 season, beginning with the late September 30, 2022 fashion show is artifice and provocation.
LOEWE’s enormously-talented creative director Jonathan Anderson took his audience on a modern, almost clinical journey into the natural world, with anthurium flowers as his guide.
Enter the Anthuriums
This ‘non-threatening’majority-view flower is the perfect hospitality gift, even for someone you don’t know well.
These modern flowers look like an erect phallus penetrating a flower that is in fact poisonous. Not only with pets but in the human mouth, you will experience a painful burning sensation with blisters and swelling if you eat an anthurium.
In this LOEWE Spring 2023 Campaign, Taylor Russell wears anthuriums as a breast plate. There’s a lot of human psychology going on here.
Croation model Lucy Markovic, Australian Riahn Griffiths and Sweden’s Vilma Sjöberg front the Versace Spring/Summer 2023 Campaign Part II. Donatella Versace’s edgy and rebellious women have turned up the volume, lensed by Vito Fernicola [IG]./ Makeup by Luca Cianciolo
With all the talk about celebrity fashion sightings replacing models, it’s worth remembering that it was Gianni Versace, who founded the luxury house in 1978, who had a big passion for grandiose spectacles with marketing campaigns to match.
Adut Akech, Imaan Hammam, Candice Huffine, Devyn Garcia, Jill Kortleve, Paloma Elsesser, and Taylor Hill pose against the eternally sensual landscape of Italy in one half of the Victoria’s Secret Bras, That’s Our Thing 2023 campaign.
The campaign crosses the entire range of VS bras including the Very Sexy Bombshell Push-Up, Dream Angels Demi Bra, VS Bare Sexy Illusions Uplift Strapless Bra, and VS Bare Infinity Flex Full Coverage Bra.
Photographer Angelo Pennetta captures the true beauty of VS lingerie [IG] styled by Alex White.
Max Mara’s Spring-Summer 2023 campaign has sophisticated swagger. Models trio Adut Akech, Annemary Aderibigbe and Dara Allen step it up to remind us that they are far more than muses or mannequins. Fashion editor Tonne Goodman styles the shoot — a collection of sophisticated essentials with discreet details that she herself would wear — in images photographed by Ethan James Green.
Looking at the images immediately took me back to December 2018, when former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi exited a tough meeting with then president Donald Trump.
The shot of Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer leaving a hard-as-nails meeting with Trump went viral, generating such digital heat that Max Mara creative director Ian Griffiths responded that the coat would be reissued.
AOC has always liked Ian Griffiths because he’s a male designer willing to explore his own contradictions. He does just that in speaking about the 2023 campaign inspired by the French Riviera. Griffiths has not been caught up in trying to make women ‘its’ or ‘theys’, degendering us in such a way that the very concept of women’s rights is no longer necessary. We’re all humans, no need to discuss the failure of mostly — but not exclusively — men to acknowledge women’s inequality.
Dior Men’s Kim Jones once again joined France and England in a celebration of flowers and gardening in his Summer 2023 campaign.
Jones united his beloved, Bloomsbury, free-spirit artists with their equally free-spirit lifestyles on the English side of the channel to Christian Dior’s seaside childhood home in Granville, Normandy.
In choosing the work and life of Duncan Grant, a British post-impressionist, Bloomsbury painter who shares a birthday with Christian Dior, the artistic synergy is further intertwined between England and France.
These campaign images by Rafael Pavarotti [IG] are like fine champagne. The talented photographer is at ease swinging from a highly-stylized, Erdem-inspired, vintage garden with dark undertones campaign to these images that are crisp and modern, imbued with a cleaner and lighter garden vibe.
