The sale of the fashion collection belonging to Paris socialite, filmmaker, and former runway star Farida Khelfa has raised €330,000 at auction, half of it for charity, confirming how buoyant the vintage market remains.
Pieces by Azzedine Alaïa and the prices they fetched at the auction – Maurice Auction
Organised by Maurice Auction, a Paris firm focusing on art and luxury, the sale, entitled Garde-Robe Iconique de Farida Khelfa, raked in €332,343.
A notably elegant figure, Khelfa ran away from her family in Lyons at 15 to begin a career in modelling in Paris, where she walked in shows by such legends as Azzedine Alaïa and Jean-Paul Gaultier. In later life she was named brand ambassador for Schiaparelli. Designs by all three fashion houses made up the majority of the auction which also included creations by Saint Laurent, Jean Charles de Castelbajac, Prada, Pierre Cardin, and Christian Louboutin.
Sold online, these personal archives of Farida came to approximately 200 pieces, comprising outfits, shoes, and accessories worn by the model in her storied career. During this, Khelfa was also the witness at the 2008 wedding of Carla Bruni to then French president Nicolas Sarkozy.
“I thank the buyers: their gesture shows as much elegance as generosity. These resonate particularly well with RIACE, and I am sincerely grateful to them,” said Farida after the auction, half of whose profits will be donated to the RIACE Fund, engaged in solidarity actions.
The Alaïa lots sparked intense competition, achieving a world record for an Alaïa piece from a private collection. A 1996 ensemble of a flared skirt and gilet by Alaïa reached €50,700, while an epic calfskin Alaïa trench printed in leopard went for €27,300.
The sale attracted international collectors, another confirmation of Farida Khelfa’s status and the market’s interest in these archives.
Francesco Murano, My Style Bags and Acbc were among the winners of the ninth edition of the Young Businesses awards by Italian luxury industry association Altagamma.
The 2025 edition’s winners
Two emerging labels were recognised in the Fashion category. The first was Francesco Murano, founded in 2020 by the eponymous designer, an award winner with CNMI, Altaroma and LVMH. Francesco Murano has been a regular at Milan Fashion Week since February. The second was My Style Bags, a brand founded in 2008 in Milan by Giuseppe Bellora, Lorenza Bellora and Stefano Donadel Campbell, specialised in travel bags and accessories made with fine fabrics.
The award for the Innovation category went to green solutions specialist Acbc, founded in 2017 and now a partner of over 150 international names, including Corneliani, Gucci Watch, Kering Eyewear, Max Mara, Missoni and Versace. Acbc helps them develop green strategies and design sustainable products and environmentally friendly collections.
The other prize-winners were Slalom for object design, Pola Grande Gioielli for jewellery, Portrait Milano for the hotel business, Lávika for wellness and beauty, Ice Yachts for the nautical design and automotive category, and Molino Pasini for food.
The awards, introduced by Altagamma in 2015 in collaboration with Borsa Italiana, Elite-Gruppo Euronext and SDA Bocconi, recognise emerging brands within Italy’s luxury sectors. The winning companies join Altagamma for a year, and will be able to take part in exclusive training and networking sessions, focusing on business strategy and consultancy.
“In the last nine years, Altagamma has created and pursued with dedication this project set up with Franca Sozzani, aimed at spotlighting the stars of the future, the emerging companies that will be the new protagonists of Italian luxury,” said Stefania Lazzaroni, managing director of Altagamma. “These brands have all it takes to become paradigms of Italian excellence in seven different sectors. Since 2015, 64 companies have been recognised by the awards. Many have become established, some have joined Altagamma, and they have all been part of our community for some time,” concluded Lazzaroni.
In the run-up to Christmas Boots is stepping up its gift-delivered-direct-to-the-door offer with delivery partners Uber Eats, Deliveroo and Just Eat, offering a within-30-minutes target.
Boots
The upgrade follows a surge of on-demand orders from “thousands of customers” on Christmas Eve last year. And it pointed to research that shows 56% leave some of their Christmas shopping to the very last day, so “the retailer is primed for another busy Christmas Eve”.
The health & beauty giant’s on-demand deliveries are now available from 500 stores across the UK, and in selected locations across the country, very-last-minute customers can order up until midnight on Christmas Eve “and will still receive their shopping in time for the big day”.
Boots said last-minute shoppers can choose from over 10,000 products with over 1,600 Christmas gifts available. Customers can also order up until Monday 22 December for Click & Collect in-store, and 23 December for next-day home delivery.
Paula Bobbett, chief Data and Digital officer at Boots, said: “We want to make it even easier for our customers who find themselves shopping right up to the last moment. Boots on-demand can help change that final dash into an easy delivery. We’re here to make shopping feel joyful, not stressful, helping shoppers find thoughtful gifts quickly and easily, even if they’ve missed online order cut-offs or store opening hours.”
The brand, founded in 2010 by Mathieu and Nicolas Gourdikian, who retain a minority stake, has faced a succession of crises that now threaten its very existence. The challenge is no longer simply to finance growth, but to ensure operational survival.
According to documents reviewed by FashionNetwork.com, JOTT’s commercial engine has stalled, leaving the brand with large volumes of stock to clear, eroding its brand image despite significant work on its stylistic proposition. For several seasons, substantial volumes of its down jackets have been offered at knock-down prices, and even sold off on markets.
After a sharp decline in activity at its logistics and distribution company JOTT Opérations in 2023, revenue collapsed again last year by more than 28% to 54.7 million euros. The company attributes this dramatic fall directly to the bankruptcy of its logistics provider at the beginning of 2024- an event that necessitated the urgent relocation of stock and a complex recovery of operations.
The cost of this logistical setback contributed to a deficit of 30 million euros at JOTT Opérations and an operating loss of more than 4 million euros for JOTT France, the company’s own distribution entity. The activities of entities in other markets are also suffering, implying that it remains to be proven that the brand concept can be exported profitably.
Faced with these accumulated losses, the operational companies’ equity turned negative, weakening the company’s structure just as significant instalments were falling due. In 2024, shareholder support helped address this situation, with 18 million euros injected in two tranches. However, this appears to have merely contained the damage, without preventing the massive depreciation of the group’s assets.
Thus, in 2025, the rescue plan faced an impossible equation: operating losses had made the enormous debt contracted at the time of the LBO unsustainable. Specifically, this debt- concentrated in a holding company called Jaguar Bidco- amounts to nearly 156 million euros. Negotiations with creditors, in particular Idinvest Partners and Eurazeo, were, understandably, extremely tight. The shareholder recapitalisation, approved last April, is clearly a vital step forward for the future of JOTT.
A tight agreement with creditors
This 99 million euro injection is not merely about plugging an accounting gap; it is an essential condition demanded by the company’s bondholders to give the business breathing space. In exchange for this major financial effort, creditors have agreed to pause certain financial obligations through a mechanism known as a waiver. However, this breathing space is not a blank cheque. In return for their patience, the creditors attached particularly strict covenants to the agreement. These contractual commitments oblige the company’s management to meet performance ratios quarter after quarter. For the brand, this means advancing under close scrutiny: any failure to meet the trajectory could break the waiver agreement and give creditors the right to demand immediate repayment of their claims, or even to take control of the equity.
If management keeps its commitments, this translates into crucial relief for cash flow: the suspension of interest payments on the debt until the end of 2027, turning immediate cash pressure into future debt. This should enable JOTT to concentrate its resources on the only thing that matters now: selling products.
This reprieve, coupled with agreements with banking partners, gives management, now led by Thierry Miremont, a two-year window to reinvent JOTT’s business model. According to the available information, the strategic plan includes an in-depth transformation of retail.
This transformation involves a painful but necessary rationalisation: the company has already begun closing shops deemed unprofitable, notably in Paris and Bordeaux and across various European markets. At the same time, JOTT is betting on technological modernisation to regain efficiency, accelerating the roll-out of performance initiatives such as an automatic replenishment tool, according to the company’s management. As the brand seeks to increase its share of full-price products, investment appears key: it must ensure that stock- already subject to significant write-downs- is managed as tightly as possible to reduce product obsolescence and maximise margins. One piece of good news? Despite the difficulties, the tax audits carried out in 2024 on Jaguar Topco, the ultimate parent company, and JOTT France concluded without any reassessments in 2025.
The challenge, however, is considerable. The company will have to return rapidly to profitability- probably requiring an annual improvement of several tens of millions of euros- in order to make up the deficit. It will also have to prove to its partners the group’s future viability. Without this operational performance, the brand will not be able to cope with the resumption of debt repayments in 2028.
Management did not wish to answer our questions about the company’s situation. Nevertheless, its teams are hard at work optimising store performance (with a network that has already shrunk to 140 points of sale), strengthening the desirability of the collections and attracting new retailers, notably by preparing to exhibit at the Pitti Uomo trade fair in Florence and Who’s Next in Paris. But despite this operational proactivity, the challenge remains major: to turn the brand around by making it more agile and efficient within a compressed timeframe and against an unfavourable backdrop in both the French and international markets.
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Politics8 years ago