PARIS — For Pharrell Williams, the future of luxury is “freedom.” Not a bag, not a logo. Freedom.Pharrell enters a small, quiet room in the Louis Vuitton headquarters. He is zen-like and greets me with a head bow, his hands clasped together, a bit like an Indian namaste. He’s more subdued than the last time we met at a ‘Friendsgiving’ dinner in London last November to mark the UK launch of Humanrace, the skincare line he launched in 2020. That night, he spoke passionately about US politics, his life in Miami and Kanye West. But that was a conversation from another time, before Pharrell’s appointment as Louis Vuitton’s men’s creative director changed his life, turning the multi-hyphenate celebrity singer, producer and entrepreneur from the American South into one of the most visible figures in the global luxury industry. So what is luxury according to Pharrell? And what does it all mean for his vision for Louis Vuitton, the world’s first €20-billion luxury brand? #BoF500 cover star Pharrell Williams shares his long-term vision for the future of Louis Vuitton, and luxury itself, with BoF’s @ImranAmed at the #linkinbio Photographer: Lea Colombo @leacolombo Photographer assistant: Margaux Jouanneau Art Director: SJT Studio @sarahjaynetodd_ Production: BoF Studio & Rokas Kam @picnic_productions Production Runner: Ibrahima Diallo Hair: Talent’s own Make Up: Talent’s own Stylist: Matthew Henson Words: Imran Amed @imranamed

Chloé has officially named Chemena Kamali (@chemena) its next creative director. As previously reported in BoF, the Richemont-owned label had tapped Kamali to lead a parallel studio at Chloé as it prepared for the departure of former creative director Gabriela Hearst, who staged her last show for the brand on September 28th at Paris Fashion Week. Kamali joined Chloé from Saint Laurent, where she was a key deputy of Anthony Vaccarello, serving as design director for women’s ready to wear, but has a history at Chloé, where she worked under designer Phoebe Philo and again as design director to Clare Waight Keller. “Chemena’s vision, inspired by her love for the brand, will truly celebrate Chloé's unique DNA. Chemena is both the creative director of Chloé and the embodiment of the Chloé spirit,” said Chloé president and chief executive Riccardo Bellini in a statement. Read more in our #linkinbio ✍️ @vikramkansara 📷 Chloé

2023 is a year of milestones for Thom Browne (@thombrowne). On the first day of January, his tenure as the new chairman of the Council of Fashion Designers of America began. In July, he presented his first haute couture collection in Paris. October sees the publication of a weighty monograph on Browne’s career. But above all, 2023 marks the 20th anniversary of his business. “I started with something that nobody really liked, nobody thought was relevant and nobody could afford,” Browne reflects. “I wore the clothes myself in the city. Everybody laughed. So I kind of lived it and then it just became something that was interesting to people.” So interesting that, in 2018, Browne was able to sell 85 percent of his company to the Zegna group in a deal that valued Thom Browne Inc. at half a billion dollars. In his introduction to the monograph, Andrew Bolton (Browne’s longtime partner) calls the early days of the label “a Warholian experiment merging art and business.” Like Warhol, Browne was able to convey his essence with one now-iconic image, in his case a grey flannel suit with a shrunken silhouette rather than a Campbell’s soup can. Read the full piece, written by Tim Blanks, in our #linkinbio. ✍️ @timblanks 📷 @kevintrageser for BoF | Getty | Fairchild Archive | IMF Staff Photo Stephen Jaffe

This season, fashion month saw several highly-anticipated debuts (Sabato de Sarno at Gucci, and Peter Hawkings at Tom Ford) as well as goodbyes (Sarah Burton at Alexander McQueen, Fabio Zambernardi at Prada and Miu Miu, and Gabriela Hearst at Chloé). But, beyond those headline-making moments, the highlights included the slyness and humour at Prada where models walked down a runway against a backdrop of dripping slime, the spine-tingling soundtrack at Dries Van Noten and models at JW Anderson in plasticine-made hoodies. “The best shows make you think and make you feel a little uncomfortable or they evoke some kind of emotion — but they also make you want to shop,” says Imran Amed, BoF’s founder and editor-in-chief. Following the conclusion of Paris Fashion Week, Amed sat down with BoF’s editor-at-large Tim Blanks (@timblanks) to discuss the highlights of the Spring/Summer 2024 season and the hallmarks of a great fashion show. 🎙️ Listen to the full episode, or download wherever you get your podcasts. #linkinbio ✍️ @imranamed 📷 Spotlight/Launchmetrics #BoFPodcast

A week since our #BoF500 gala, where attendees @jaredleto, @emmachamberlain, @naomi, @davikah and many more walked the carpet. 🎥 @edward.berthelot

This week, when Kering appointed Seán McGirr as creative director of Alexander McQueen, the Paris-based luxury group must have hoped that tapping a protegé of star designer Jonathan Anderson would win swift approval from the fashion community. Instead, the company ended up on the receiving end of social media backlash as a composite image of their cast of creative directors across brands including Gucci and Balenciaga went viral: The group’s fashion brands are now all designed by white men. Fashion has managed to make some space for more diverse profiles in recent years: the spectacular success of Virgil Abloh, a Black American, at both Louis Vuitton and Off-White felt like a breakthrough, as has the acclaim and longevity of French designer Olivier Rousteing at the helm of Balmain. But racial diversity in top creative roles remains scarce: Among the biggest listed luxury groups — Kering, LVMH, and Richemont — the only Black designer is Pharrell Williams who was named Louis Vuitton’s menswear creative director in February. When it comes to gender, the lack of progress is almost as glaring. Luxury leaders have sometimes sought to explain the lack of racial diversity as a question of time. As European fashion companies were created with European customers in mind, many didn’t become global businesses with a global workforce before the 1990s. But if luxury groups’ creative director picks are hardly as racially diverse as the customers they serve, neither is the candidate pool. Read more on this at the #linkinbio ✍️@sheena.butler.young & Robert Williams

Diamonds are paying dividends for Sophie Bille Brahe. When the Danish fine jewellery label launched in 2011, it became best known for its sculptural pearl pieces, which were stocked by retailers like Net-a-Porter, Matches and Bergdorf Goodman. But since Covid-19, customers have clamoured for jewels that sparkle, gravitating heavily towards Sophie Bille Brahe’s diamond offering — and brand turnover has almost tripled compared to 2019. Sophie Bille Brahe isn’t the only brand benefitting from the consumer shift further upmarket. Since the start of the pandemic, shoppers have gone all-in on costly stones and fine metals. The boom is all the more remarkable because it has persisted long after other pandemic fads faded. Read more on how in response to heightened consumer desire for jewels that sparkle, small fine jewellery brands are finding success leaning into higher price points and more bespoke services catering to high-spending clientele. #linkinbio ✍️ @tamisonoconnor 📷 @sophiebillebrahe | @ileanamakri | @kimai_jewelry

@Nike’s virtual studio is getting physical. The sneaker behemoth announced the first physical product to come out of .Swoosh, the digital-goods platform it introduced late last year. It’s a black-and-white, low-top version of Nike’s Air Force 1 with .Swoosh branding and details, dubbed the TINAJ, as in “This Is Not a JPEG,” a slogan that also appears on the shoe. When it drops in Nike’s SNKRS app on Oct. 20, instead of having to compete against countless shoppers and bots, only those who previously purchased and virtually unboxed one of the digital Our Force 1s Nike released earlier this year will have the chance to purchase it. Nike hasn’t said exactly how many people that amounts to, but nearly 53,000 .Swoosh members bought at least one of the tokens when they first went on sale. How valuable a prize members will consider it remains to be seen, given a minimal Air Force 1 isn’t the sort of hyped shoe that hordes of customers clamour to get. And it’s not Nike’s first time granting exclusive access to a shoe, though it typically uses factors like a shopper’s location, activity in SNKRS and earlier purchase attempts. Read the full story in our #linkinbio ✍️ @marcbain_ 📷 Nike #FashionTechnology

The breakout girl group — made up of surprise BoF 500 cover stars Minji, Hanni, Danielle, Haerin and Hyein — has high potential for fashion brands looking to leverage the powerful fandoms that follow South Korea’s pop stars. Now, some insiders predict that NewJeans will be the next South Korean act to become a major force in fashion. The girl group’s five members have already inked high-profile contracts with top luxury houses: Minji with Chanel, Hanni with Gucci, Danielle with Burberry, Haerin with Dior and Hyein with Louis Vuitton. NewJeans’s rapid ascent has been unlike anything the K-pop industry has seen before. When the group debuted in July 2022 with its single “Attention,” the track was successful in getting the group exactly that. Alongside their deals with luxury brands, the members of NewJeans have also been tapped by household names like Apple, Coca-Cola and McDonald’s, and taken turns doing solo covers for the South Korean editions of major fashion titles, from Vogue to Harper’s Bazaar. Nearly 10 million people follow the group on Instagram, up from 3 million just five months earlier. “No K-pop group has had this momentum,” said Paul Jeong, co-founder of Altm Group, a company that advises fashion brands on celebrity partnerships in Asia. “Part of that is [other Korean bands like] BTS and Blackpink starting the conversation for them but in terms of endorsements even Blackpink didn’t have this many endorsements this early on.” Read the full cover story by Tiffany Ap. #linkinbio Images: @newjeans_official Art Director: SJT Studio @sarahjaynetodd_ Words: Tiffany Ap @TiffanyAp #NewJeans #BoF500

BoF’s editors have followed the Spring/Summer 2024 fashion weeks from New York to London, Milan to Paris. September’s womenswear shows offered newsworthy moments (like Sabato de Sarno’s Gucci debut and Sarah Burton’s final bow at Alexander McQueen), strong statements (like Maria Grazia Chiuri’s meditation on women’s rights at Dior), and no shortage of desirable wardrobe options from Chanel to Saint Laurent to Courrèges. But a few runway moments stood out from the pack. #linkinbio Which was your favourite? Let us know in the comments below. 1. @prada – Collection, soundtrack and set conspired to create an ultra-memorable show by Miuccia Prada and co-creative director Raf Simons. 2. @undercover_lab – Undercover’s glowing, terrarium-style gowns, filled with flowers and live butterflies, made for a true fashion moment. 3. @maisonmargiela – John Galliano returned to the Paris ready-to-wear calendar with a theatrical, yet wearable outing. 4. @driesvannoten – These languid looks from Antwerp-based Dries Van Noten lingered in our editors’ memories. 5. @yproject_official – Glenn Marten’s favoured motifs like twisted jersey, ruched gowns and deconstructed denim were particularly striking this season. 6. @jw_anderson – Sculptural, intelligent, desirable: J.W. Anderson was the highlight of London Fashion Week. 7. Bottega Veneta – A collage of global references, including silhouettes, materials and craft techniques, were twisted and sublimated in Mathieu Blazy’s Milan show. 8. @rickowensonline – Rick Owens’ signature brand of post-apocalyptic chic was pushed to new heights of theatricality and reinvigorated by an infusion of colour. 9. @miumiu – Campus co-eds were the theme at Miu Miu again this season, backdropped by a cheeky art installation and punctuated by novel silhouettes including pleated and ruffled jacquard gowns in white and black. 10. @muglerofficial – They may not have a big budget, but they had the biggest fans: both the kind that sent veils flying through the air and the kind whose cheers amped up the energy at the memorable show by Casey Cadwallader. #NYFW #LFW #MFW #PFW #SS24

Last day of the show season, and Miuccia Prada’s Miu Miu gave a fabulous sendoff to Spring ‘24. She said she usually has a theory about fashion — the collection was called “A Rationale of Beauties” — but this time she worked without a theoretical safety net and showed “what I really, personally like.” The reference in her show manifesto to “the joy of life” came straight to the point of clothes that were, in fact, joyous. Inclusive too, not only for the co-ed spirit, but also for the ease with which Miuccia mixed genders, decades, cultures high and low. As twisted/straightforward as a polo shirt and a pair of jeans accessorised with a big sparkly necklace (they’d be real diamonds if she was wearing them), or a black brocade coat with a little back bow, classic couture, thrown over a speedo and a tiny pelmet skirt, or a schoolboy blazer over bermudas. Mocassins! Monkstraps! Combinations which looked they’d been casually, spontaneously thrown together from a whole pile of swimsuits, uniforms, underwear, sportwear, evening wear and vintage (or “touches of history” in manifesto-speak), all of it revolving around the hip-slung silhouette that has turned Miu Miu into a sales sensation. Read the full report by Tim Blanks in our #linkinbio. ✍️ @timblanks 📷 Spotlight/Launchmetrics #ParisFashionWeek #PFW

Italian luxury group @Prada and Texas-based startup @Axiom.Space will collaborate to design #NASA’s lunar spacesuits for the Artemis III mission planned for 2025, the two companies said. Prada’s engineers will work alongside the Axiom Space systems team throughout the design process, developing solutions for materials and design features to protect astronauts against the challenge of space and the lunar environment, they said in a joint statement. Axiom has a contract with US space agency NASA to develop spacesuits for use on the moon and other space programmes. #linkinbio ✍️ Reuters 📷 Axiom Space