Update: Barneys New York

Good looking CEO, if you ask me...

As we reported before, Mark Lee's new reign at Barney's New York has been a major story in the fashion retail world. In only 4 months Lee has shuffled some of the major roles of the company's executive panel. The moves are now being interpreted as a reinvention of Barneys itself. 


Since Lee took over as the company's CEO in September, Barneys which had been without a CEO for almost 2 years, has made some pretty controversial choices:

•  In November, the firing of Julie Gilhart, Senior Vice President and Women's Fashion Director,  and Judy Collinson, Executive Vice President overseeing all of womenswear and Barneys.com came as a shock to the retail industry. 
• They were succeeded by former Gucci colleagues Daniella Vitale, taking over as Executive Vice President, and Amanda Brooks, taking over as Vice President and Women's Fashion Director.
• A sign the Madison Avenue Flagship store will also receive a major face lift is the hiring of Dennis Freedman, former Creative Director of W Magazine, to be the new Creative Director of the Barneys store.  He succeeds Simon Doonan.

Simon Doonan (Left)  and Dennis Freedman (Right)

For years we have looked up to Barneys New York for its uniqueness, housing the collections of the latest and greatest talent in the fashion industry, now there seems to be some new priorities for the company.

In an attempt to regain it's profitability, Barneys new priorities now include:

• A reevaluation of it's stores for profitability.
• A reevaluation of it's merchandising mix, meaning we will probably be seeing less of the younger, fresher talent of the fashion industry and more of the commercial product. 
• An expansion of it's commercially successful Co-Op stores, along with more investment into it's e-commerce ability.

With all these changes one has to wonder, will Barneys still hold that specialness that attracts us there for the newest in fashion design talent?

Personally, I hope their gallery-esque atmosphere doesn't change too much!

No matter what though as participants in this fashion world we MUST remember, in the end , FASHION IS A BUSINESS! And though the reign of Mark Lee may seem harsh to some, to the owners of the company, he is hoped to be a savior. Lee will most likely be able to pull it all off with his incredible experiences in luxury fashion retail, we will just have to continue reading up on our WWD! 

WWD- Mark Lee Seen as Man to Bring New Era to Barneys