British designer Jonathan Anderson has been announced as the creative director of Christian Dior womenswear, finally confirming the worst kept secret in fashion and ending its longest game of musical chairs.
Although if you want to have a seat at fashion’s top table, you need more than a chair. Increasingly, it seems, you also need to be a man.
Already head of Dior menswear since April, Anderson replaces outgoing designer Maria Grazia Chiuri as head of womenswear – leaving British designer Sarah Burton, creative director at Givenchy, as the only female heading up one of the 14 couture houses.
After Virginie Viard left her position as head of Chanel last year, she was replaced by Matthieu Blazy, and only last month Dario Vitale took over Versace after Donatella stepped down.
Of more concern than Anderson’s gender, however, is whether he’s man enough to rise to the challenge of designing 18 collections a year.
As creative director, he will oversee four Dior womenswear collections per year, as well as four more for menswear.
He’s also charged with designing two haute couture collections a year, his first time at turning his hand to fashion’s most demanding level of craftsmanship.
But Anderson, 40, also helms his own label, JW Anderson, which demands six collections a year, as well as the two collections he’s contracted to design for Uniqlo. Only Karl Lagerfeld has managed such a prolific output.
Talent: Jonathan Anderson with actress Cate Blanchett
Clearly Bernard Arnault, chairman and CEO of luxury behemoth LVMH, which owns Dior, has faith in Anderson.
In Monday’s statement announcing the move, Arnault described the softly spoken Northern Irishman with a prodigious work ethic as ‘one of the greatest creative talents of his generation’.
Indeed, not since Christian Dior himself has the house been united under one creative vision.
Unusually for a fashion designer, Anderson is as good at marketing as he is at making clothes.
Like Lagerfeld, he is a polymath, as interested in art, literature and film as fashion. It’s this cross-cultural pollination that makes Anderson so valuable.
During 11 years at Loewe, the house he helmed before Dior, revenues soared from around 200million euros (£169million) to more than 1.5billion euros (£1.27billion).
British fashion designer Sarah Burton during the British Fashion Awards 2014 in London
Thanks to a knack for creating a buzz on social media, Anderson ensured a cultural reach that went far beyond fashion.
With sales at LVMH down 5 per cent, a lot is resting on Anderson’s midas touch. But he has some loyal teams to help him.
It’s just as well: his first Dior menswear collection is to be unveiled in just 24 days’ time on June 27. His first womenswear show follows on October 1 at Paris Fashion Week.
Forget cracking open the champagne: it might be time to open the Red Bull.
