© Rhoda

Branding Styles: How did the Rhoda adventure start?

Ruth Yiampouranis: The shop was created in 1998 and at the beginning it was just two rails of womenswear! Before being Rhoda, it was a dress factory belonging to my parents. In the 1990′s, they had to close their business but the space was still theirs… so I decided to transform it into a fashion shop a bit by accident. It came to me one day while reading Drapers Records so I started to go to some professional exhibitions with one of my sisters and buy some clothes. It went so well that soon I quit my job in the civil service and worked full-time here. I had no previous background in fashion, just a passion really and I knew what I wanted to sell, some clothes that I could not find anywhere else.

How would you describe the shop?

It is a family business, now selling both menswear and womenswear. We offer a mix of independent labels with strong graphics, designers who do something good with a twist. For men, I choose international and established brands (like Penguin Footwear, Fred Perry, Carhatt) but also some T-shirt brands with a more original and graphic aesthetics.

Tee-shirt Will Sing for honey

The graphic prints seems central to your work, can you tell us why?

It is hard to say. I just don’t want to sell something boring. And I think it has to do with the clients as well. Most of my clients work in the media: they are journalists, TV actors, celebrities…For example, Simon Pegg bought a T-shirt here that he wore for the Cannes Festival! We have a few celebrities: Clive Owen, Emma Bunton… and also some young mums who search for some edgier clothes.

What are the main trends for Spring/Summer 2012?

After doing some researchs and readings, I knew that, for men, “cornflour blue “was going to be THE colour of the season and that chinos were going to be big. I also bet on speckled tees and pocket tee-shirts.

For women, it is all about animal prints and speckled tops. In general, my selection for women is a bit more edgy and different from menswear.

It is also very important for me to offer mid-range prices so that people can enjoy fashion without spending too much money.

Can you talk to us more precisely about the way you select a brand?

It is important to move forward, to introduce new brands and to learn what is appealing to our clients or not. I work differently when choosing collections for men. I will focus on keeping good basics and good quality. Only the tee-shirts will be more experimental. For women, I try a lot of different brands (Nümph, Louche,St Martins, Brat & Suzie and Glamourous). My last discovery was Louche, a British brand that I handpicked during Pure, an exhibition in Earl’s Court.

To choose a new brand, I have to feel very strongly about it, to bear in mind what customers will think about it and to be convinced that the brand is original and creative in its approach to fashion. I don’t have a particular vision of what I want for the shop, I stay open-minded and I try. Last season, I wasn’t sure about a skeleton and old man tee-shirts that I bought but they ended up flying of the shelves! I strongly believe there is a market for graphic designs.

Did you travel to find new talents?

Yes, I traveled in the past outside England to find new products. I went to Paris to see the Who’s Next exhibition but I made the most interesting discoveries in Denmark (including the brand Nümph) during the CPH and CIFF. I also went to Bread & Butter in Barcelona.

Where to find Rhoda?

25 Park Road
London
N8 8TE

Tel: 020 8348 7963

Twitter: @rhodacrouchend

Belstaff a/w 2012-2013 © Branding Styles

Entering in a dark room covered with fake grass, it was easy to guess what the inspiration for the collection: going back to the roots. There was a strong accent on superior quality fabrics and leather, nature-inspired colour schemes and a vision of strong silhouettes. Women’s and men’s collections were presented at the same time but both reflected the same fashion statement:  elegance with a rough edge.

For women, ladylike skirts were mixed with utilitarian fitted leather jackets. It gave the overall impression of a trendy hunting trip, whether that’s game-shooting or stalking the latest pair of shoes on the high street. The leather – raw, quilted or coated- gave a powerful allure to the silhouettes while adding a modern twist to the outfits thanks to some clever details: a waist-cinching belt, some breast pockets and a python print.

For men, the collection was more eclectic, ranging from the aviator style to the biker chic without forgetting, the city smart. The common themes seemed to be elegance and cosiness. Fitted trousers, chunky-knit jumpers and maxi-bags were combined with wool coats or leather biker jackets in black or brown.

It was a debut collection worth discovering which seemed to take the best of the brand’s heritage while giving it a more contemporary and edgy style.

Exhibition Pringle of Scotland

Clare Waight Keller, who previously worked with Calvin Klein, achieved this tour de force once again by cleverly drawing her inspiration from the 70s. The aesthetic was minimalist and the real focus was put on fabrics and autumnal, warm colours – red, brown, brick red, burgundy and caramel.

The key element of the collection wass undoubtedly the quality of prints and of the striped and lozenge-shaped patterns on the dresses and the jackets. The last outfit of the show – a woollen dark and red jacket , which was somewhere between a poncho, a shawl and a coat – will surely please connoisseurs of such designs.

Overall, the collection sometimes lacked coherence but  it was wonderfully successful in being contemporary without renouncing to its roots.

Being part of the audience was not an affair to be taken lightly because after you passed through the security control, you had to face the suspicious looks of one of the member of the public relations team towards people he didn’t know.

The arrival of the other guests, especially the front rows, proved to be a distraction much more amusing given the variety of personalities in attendance: from the fully-botoxed modern geisha to the drag queen wearing just some leather underwear, passing by the artists with a total bohemian look showing how close they were to Nature, the show was clearly on before the models even started to hit the runway. Nevertheless, the prize went to a woman who took her baby to the show and after he was a bit moved around, he simply barfed on a second-row Japanese buyer… So much for the glamorous image of fashion. The whole scene was completely surreal.

And in the midst of all this madness, a man with a serious look suddenly appeared, probably between 50 or 60 years old, and he sat next to me. Of course, I had absolutely no idea who he was but his presence aroused my curiosity: was he a journalist? A buyer like many of the people around me? He started talking to me and I was surprised to have a fashion companion who was both interesting and affable.

As I still could not find any clues that could have helped me to guess his role, I simply asked (and I must admit not without a dose of naivety) the awkward question: “For which company are you working?” I instantly understood with the amused look he had on his face that it was not the best question I had asked that night. With a lot of elegance, he took some time to answer and it is with great stupefaction that he explained to me he was involved in the launch of www.fashionwiredaily.com.

Needless to say I was a bit amazed and it proved difficult for me to find something sensible to say after that. Fortunetaly, the show started and it enabled me to concentrate on something else for a while. By the way, review of the catwalk show is here.

Once the show was finished, he politely asked for my opinion and invited me to go to the Richard Nicoll show with his ticket. To thank him and show some gratitude, I didn’t find anything better to do than to give him my business card before he disappeared as he arrived, discretely, in the crowd.

Thanks to this invitation, I discovered his identity. His name was Marshall Lester.

I am well aware that this story is offering only a very limited perspective on the fashion industry but I decided to talk about it anyway because beyond my simple personal experience, it is a testimony of what fashion can accomplish: making possible the encounter of two individuals who are living in completely different spheres. But sometimes those worlds collide for a few moments – when it all becomes fascinating.

Dear Mr Lester, if one day you happen to read this, I would like to thank you for this unlikely encounter and I hope that in the future, I will have the pleasure to meet you again and maybe, this time, ask the right questions… perhaps in an interview, who knows?

The crowd of London Fashion Week