Question about mani and le collezione lines

I know that Collezioni is. I still haven't ever seen mani and don't know where it fits in...

If Mani is then I am disappointed by Zegna. Mani is the same as most soots that you can get at dillards except this a name. A lot of the salesmen there try to sell it to people as genuine armani stuff. The quality is nowhere near even Collezioni. Just my opinion after trying a few of them on.

How about the Collezioni shirts ? Are they made by Zegna as well ? Do you have opinion on them ? I've had my eye on one Collezioni shirt but I'm wondering if I'll just be buying marketing, not quality... Bjorn

I'm sure it has to be done, but I can't stand it when designers "stoop". As in, knowingly making an absolutely terrible and inferior product and relying on the name to sucker in people. Armani is one of the biggest offenders of this. There are plenty of companies that don't do this and are big, albeit not as big as Armani, Lauren, etc.

While Armani is definatly a terrible offender to using his name to sucker in customers; the worst example being Armani Exchange. But how bad is Calvin Klein. The differences in quality and pricing from his Black Lable line to the crap they sell in Macy's is tremendous. CK has gotten so bad that the name dosn't even have the cache that can be associated with such marquees as Armani. At least if you buy Collezioni, people will think it's top quality ARMANI, but with CK if you buy a Black Lable suit, people will just think it's cheap crap. Before long this same ruined brand image will no doubt happen to Aramani, mostly due to the A/X stores.

I can't imagine leasing out my name to another company knowing everything they made was horribly overpriced JUNK...

The problem with some of these labels is licensing. Giorgio Armani has nothing to do with Armani Exchange, beyond his name, to which he licensed the rights for that one line. Likewise, Calvin Klein licensed his name for a whole slew of mass-market products, notably his jeans. (This is not unlike what Christian Dior, Pierre Cardin and Yves St. Laurent did back in the '60s and '70s, resulting in boatloads of sweatshop-made crap with a fancy French name on the label. Whatever we may think of Galliano, Slimane, Ford, et al., they've certainly come a long way in restoring the good name to these labels' prêt-à-porter lines.) Bridge lines overseen by the actual designers and/or their hand-picked associates are another matter. Giorgio Armani really is responsible for Emporio Armani, Mani, and Armani Collezioni to at least some degree. Considering the premium charged for these labels, the quality of construction should definitely be better, but the cuts reflect Armani's eye, which is still worth something. (I've never been displeased with the workmanship on Armani Black Label, courtesy of Vestimenta, though others may disagree, considering the stratospheric prices.)

I understand that the main purpose of a business is make money, but I don't consider that to be the driving force behind designer lables. Don't designers such as Armani, CK, RL should have other motives, mainly along the lines of personal pride. I find it comparatable to Picasso licensing his name to a first grader who will produce paitings of stick figures under his name. People will thus spend $5 on a "picasso," though those in the know will think differently. I give much credit and respect to the designers who keep their names sacred; such as Yamamoto (although his whole sneaker ordeal is rediculous), Prada, Slimane, ect...

But that does happen in the art world. Dali was famous for signing piles of blank white sheets, while some printers added afterwards photographic, mechanical reproductions. What about perfumes? Every designer has a few scents with his/her name floating around. They do not produce nor design those fragrances. (Designers know about fragrances as much as you or I: they like or dislike something) The designer just holds a licence with a perfum house. (More or less all the scents are produced by maybe six houses in the world.)

Picasso got a lot more for a painting than the cost of an Armani suit. His work has also been licensed for reproduction in a variety of forms, albeit by his estate and not the artist himself. More important, though, is that"”unlike Picasso"”Armani, et al., create works in order for them to be reproduced and sold in quantity. We know Armani doesn't make any of the clothes we can buy with his own two hands: at some point, he delegates. Given the huge volume of products that come out with the Armani name on them, he probably delegates designing chores for some. Well, y'know, even in Henry Ford's lifetime, he didn't design every car with the Ford name on it, let alone build them by hand. And I think that cars are much more analagous to clothes than are paintings. That said, A|X is sort of like Ford slapping its logo on Yugos. The "purity" of most other designers may have as much to do with lack of ability to parlay their names into lucrative global licensing deals as with a lack of interest. Empire-building requires a whole different set of skills from designing.

I think I was a little over the top with this comment. What I meant was; It ruins a designers status that they have worked hard to get by licensing their names out, especially when it's crap that being produced. For example; a few years ago, saying "This shirt is Armani," actually meant something. Now, everyone associates that with A/X, thus devaluing the name.

I don't think Armani will ever achieve the low CK has. CK is sold in every crappy department store in the world, AX is at least pretty much limited to A/X stores (i think). The other thing Armani has going for him is that he dresses more stars than any other designer and he has awesome product placement for his high-end stuff (every second movie made has someone wearing armani something heh). This is a huge boon to the prestige of the label. When someone goes in to A/X, I don't htink they're under the illusion that they're buying "real" armani, cause they know what real armani costs from movies or tv; they know it's really expensive. Conversely, before I knew anything about clothes, I took the CK Jeans stuff to be Calvin Klein. I didn't know the difference... If I had come across an "armani" piece (I really mean a/x) for 60 bucks or whatever, even though I didn't know anything about clothes in general, I'd know that something didn't fit. Aside from the price, even an ignoramus would be able to figure out that the main armani line probably isn't t-shirts with a/x on the front. Armani and Ralph Lauren are a lot better at keeping their different lines separate from each other. Calvin Klein failed in this respect because as you said, most people don't know the difference between one line and the other, the consequence of which is a lot of peopel think very little of the label since everyone has it and it's nothing special.

You'd be surprised how ignorant to fashion some people really are. For example a few years back in High School, a friend of mine (who was making lots of quick cash at the time ), started shoping at A/X. Another friend of mine remarked, "He's loaded, he buys Armani clothes." And I swear so many people think their wearing Armani because of A/X. But whatever... as long as I don't wear that crap I could care less. Damn, between this thread and the logo thread I'm really an a rampage tonite... oh well.

A/X is also sold online, which makes it easy for anyone to get their hands on it. It's also priced in a range where it's not super expensive, but not cheap either (at least to the age range they're going for), so it has some measure of cachet to the uninformed. I'm not a big fan of Armani precisely because it's so overexposed in the media, and I was in an "anti-" phase in my formative years. The various lines still produce some fine pieces, but when I hear "Armani" I don't think ultra high end anymore. Sounds snobbish, but that's the A/X/Collezioni effect I also get the idea that's where Prada will end up in ten year's time if they're not careful - spread out with one too many licensees.