I may be too drastic, but, in my opinion, when a designer dies or decides to retire his or her house should simply close down, possibly leaving a good memory behind it.
It's indeed impossible to replicate the ideas and innovations introduced by specific designers even when they are followed by talented Creative Directors or clever family members.
In the case of Pierre Cardin's house the situation is probably slightly different: 88-year-old Pierre Cardin is still alive and, as it was revealed in the last few days, he wants to sell his business while still remaining at its helm as Creative Director.
The price quoted by Cardin - €1 billion - sounds exceedingly high, though it must be considered that the company's revenue currently comes from the 600 worldwide licenses for products ranging from furniture to fragrances. Indeed there hasn't been any striking and coherent proper collection for quite a while now.
Born in San Biagio di Callalta, near Venice, Pietro Cardin rose to fame after launching in 1953 his first collection. The latter also featured a pleated coat that sold very well in the United States and helped him getting noticed by fashion editors such as Carmel Snow and Diana Vreeland.
His fame quickly spread all over the world: in 1957 he went to Japan with news photographer Yoshi Takata and spent a month teaching three-dimensional cutting at Bunka Fashion College.
In the following years he introduced experimental shapes and was very influenced by Space Age designs and technology, coming up with dresses and body suits that seemed to echo Star Trek's style, hologram dresses, bubble dresses, and kinetic tunics.
The designer also invented a synthetic fabric dubbed "Cardine" that featured a three-dimensional pattern.
As the decades passed, Cardin licensed too many products, selling out in extreme ways: at some point in the early '80s, you could easily find in many Italian houses pencil holders, alarm clocks and other assorted small objects branded Cardin.
While wild licensing meant money in terms of royalties, it also implied the maison sold out in a rather undesirable way. This is essentially why there aren't probably too many companies ready to seriously invest in the brand.
There would actually be a way to sell the maison and re-launch it in style: stopping the licences and reinvent some of the most avant-garde designs Cardin did in exclusive collaborations with architects and scientists or look at ways to develop new three-dimensional fabrics and innovative cutting techniques.
Yet there would be another solution to save Cardin's most original designs from being totally forgotten, buying the house and turning it into an educational institution.
Companies always dream of trying and resurrect defunct fashion houses and transform them into modern money-making machines. Yet, in this case, rather than seeing Cardin producing anything, it would be much more interesting to use it to carry out further researches, train young designers and fashion design students.
We can all do without the umpteenth alarm clock, but we can't do without carrying out innovative researches that may give a new life and value to a historical company.
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