London calling Macy’s for first designer collaboration

Kinder Aggugini, who shows at London Fashion Week, brought his edgy design to the States through department store Macy’s. The limited-edition collection launched Feb. 15 in New York. (photo by Yuan-Kwan Chan / Meniscus Magazine)

One of my favorite shows from the London Fashion Week Spring 2010 collections was the whimsical, yet sinister, Alice in Wonderland-inspired offering by Kinder Aggugini. Hoping to snag a piece for myself, I stopped by his special pop-up shop set up during Fashion Week only to find the store…to be closed for the day.

So it was with much surprise that Aggugini’s name came up again during, of all times, a New York subway commute when his name was plastered across poster advertisements in one of the stations. It turned out that the edgy Italian-born, London-based Aggugini was chosen for the very first Impulse designer collaboration with conservative department store Macy’s. On Feb. 15, during the New York Fashion Week Fall 2010 collections, the Manhattan flagship store celebrated the launch with sets spun by The Misshapes, hors d’oeuvres, complimentary issues of NYLON Magazine and, of course, the clothes, with many pieces running below $100.

The collection – a wide assortment of looks from shorts to dresses to leather jackets – manages to find some middle ground between Aggugini’s ready-to-wear approach and Macy’s commercial sensibility. One of the pieces that stood out was a black sleeveless asymmetrical layered dress (style KA-26), reminiscent of the styling from the designer’s Spring 2010 collection. Not to be outdone by Target or H&M’s forays into capsule collections, Macy’s has Matthew Williamson and Karl Lagerfeld lined up next.

Video: Kinder Aggugini for Impulse – Macy’s Launch, New York, Feb. 15, 2010

video by Yuan-Kwan Chan