MCQUEEN STARTS AGAIN
ALEXANDER MCQUEEN will be all the more accessible by next June. The British designer is launching a second ready-to-wear line, McQ, for autumn/winter 2006. The collection, which will go on sale in 600 shops worldwide next summer, will feature both men`s and womenswear and include denim jeans, jackets, trenches, miniskirts, knitwear and T-shirts. Prices are expected to start at ?0 for a T, going up to ?95 for knitwear. "The focus of this collection will be younger and more renegade, but always signature McQueen," the designer said in a statement on Friday. "This partnership will add a new and inspiring dimension to the McQueen world." The Gucci Group, which holds McQueen, Stella McCartney and Balenciaga among its crop of smaller brands, encourages them to make deals with outside companies in order to make themselves profitable by an imposed 2007 deadline, hence the line of Puma footwear that McQueen launched in September and Stella`s much hyped collection for H&M. And the McQ line is bound to bring in the money, too, as it will be produced and distributed by SINV which boasts an annual turnover of ?2 million as well as labels like See by Chloe, DKNY Jeans, Krizia Jeans and Moschino Jeans. "This new license integrates perfectly with the SINV portfolio and boosts our presence in the high quality pr皻-a-porter industry," said Massimo Braglia, chief executive of SINV. (November 7 2005, AM)