HANG TEN: A decade has passed since Karl Lagerfeld did a one-off collaboration for H&M — and the fashion industry has never been the same. “Inexpensive is not ‘cheap’ anymore, that’s why the luxury industry has to make an even bigger effort. I think all that is very healthy,” Lagerfeld muses in “The First Ten Years,” a commemorative book H&M is releasing Nov. 6 in tandem with its latest holiday tie-up, Alexander Wang for H&M.
Available in about 250 stores, it’s priced at 9.90 euros, or $11.50 at current exchange, with 25 percent of proceeds going to UNICEF.
H&M dug out unseen imagery and solicited contributions from each of its participating designers, including Donatella Versace, Alber Elbaz and Roberto Cavalli. The Swedish retailer is also mounting a retrospective exhibition of its annual collaborations at its Fifth Avenue flagship in New York from Oct. 27.
Said Lagerfeld: “I never expected it to make such a splash.”