NEW YORK — Confirming market reports that C. Itoh & Co. Ltd. was no longer involved in the American designer market and had pulled its backing from designer Byron Lars, Mary Ann Wheaton, president of Wheaton International, said Wednesday that she and Lars have taken over his business.
Wheaton International is the marketing and consulting firm that negotiated Lars’s deal two years ago with C. Itoh. Mary Ann Wheaton, who also manages the Lars business, stressed that the designer’s signature collection is continuing through an independent financing arrangement.
Itochu, C. Itoh’s parent company, maintains a minority share with a small financial investment in the firm, she said.
Wheaton said Lars’s agreement with C. Itoh, a giant Japanese trading firm, was terminated last September, but because of contractual obligations, she had not been allowed to talk about it. No reason was given.
Sources said that Kathryn Dianos had similar backing with C. Itoh, which ended at the same time as the Lars deal. George Furlan, president of the Dianos firm, said he could not comment on the situation. He did emphasize, though, that the company is continuing to do business.
According to market reports, Prominent Apparel (America) Inc., the U.S. subsidiary of C. Itoh that announced its agreement with Lars in March 1992, had been closed, with Junji Togawa, president of the firm, returning to Japan. A division of C. Itoh under the Prominent Apparel name still exists here, but handles only the import and export business of nondesigner merchandise, said one source.
Executives at Prominent here would not comment, but it was learned that Togawa was, in fact, no longer in the New York office but had returned to Japan.
Regarding Lars’s business, Wheaton said she will continue to look for joint ventures for secondary collections, and added that announcements were imminent on joint ventures for Lars to design a leather and suede collection and hosiery and bodywear.