Womenswear brand Jigsaw has announced that CEO Hash Ladha will be leaving the business as of the end of July. The exec — who previously led Oasis and Warehouse — has been at the helm of the premium brand since October 2023 when he took over from previous CEO Beth Butterwick.
Jigsaw
The company said he’ll be helping with the smooth transition and will continue to work with the board until the summer. It hasn’t named a replacement or said whether it expects a new CEO to be in place by the time of Ladha’s departure.
As mentioned, he was formerly group CEO at Oasis and Warehouse and was helping to drive a turnaround there before the pandemic dealt the business a crushing blow. It was then sold to Boohoo Group.
His career has also seen him holding senior positions at Dorothy Perkins, New Look and ASOS.
Jigsaw thanked Ladha for his contribution to its turnaround, saying he’s “re-established the product and brand proposition with success and leaves a great foundation on which to build upon”.
He’s also built a strong leadership team, which will clearly be crucial in the interim period.
Last October Jigsaw reported its results for the year to the end of January 2024 and while revenue rose, it swung to a pre-tax loss.
Ladha had been in change for just three months during that year and the company said it had been been seeing encouraging results from his initiatives in respect of autumn 2024 trading.
Phoebe Philo has shifted to a higher gear, opening its first physical store in France, a 50-square-metre space on the first floor of Galeries Lafayette Haussmann in Paris that was inaugurated on February 19. Last November, Phoebe Philo opened its first shop-in-shop in London at Dover Street Market. The Paris opening coincides with the recent launch on Phoebe Philo’s e-shop of the second drop of the B Collection, the label’s second collection.
A look from Phoebe Philo’s B Collection – Phoebe Philo
Just over a year after launching its first collection, the high-end ready-to-wear and accessories label distinctive for its chic minimalist style has reached a new milestone with this sizeable new Parisian shop-in-shop. It isn’t a fully-fledged monobrand store yet, but it looks very much like one.
Philo, the former creative director of Chloé and Céline, took her time to develop and prepare her project over the course of two years. She initially commercialised her label only through an e-shop in a handful of countries, presenting a limited number of items.
In April 2024, she made a first foray into physical retail by granting US department store Bergdorf Goodman, for a limited length of time, the exclusive opportunity to sell a selection of clothes and accessories in advance. A few months later, in September, she announced she had inked commercial deals with six other physical retailers: Dover Street Market in London and Paris, 10 Corso Como in Milan, Maxfield and Neiman Marcus in Los Angeles, and The Webster in Miami. For the retailers in question, it was guaranteed success.
Finally, last October, Phoebe Philo announced its entry into the Asian market through phoebephilo.com, as well as via various multibrand retailers that are commercialising its products adopting the same model deployed in Europe and the USA. The label established partnerships in Tokyo, Japan, with Dover Street Market Ginza and Isetan Shinjuku; in Sydney, Australia, with Parlour X; and in Seoul, South Korea, with Shinsegae International.
Philo founded her eponymous label in London in September 2020 with her husband, real estate entrepreneur Maximilian Wigram. The LVMH group has bought a minority stake in the label. In recent months, Phoebe Philo added to its staff by appointing, among others, Bruno Sialelli, former creative director of Lanvin, as head of ready-to-wear design.
On Thursday, France’s Parliament is set to definitively approve an environmental bill restricting the manufacture and sale of products containing perfluorinated alkylated substances (PFAS), a “ground-breaking” new piece of legislation for the European Union. PFAS, also known as ‘forever chemicals’, are ubiquitous in everyday life, and their impact on health is a concern for the general public and the authorities.
A demonstration calling for a PFAS ban held on May 26, 2024 in Oullins, France – JEAN-PHILIPPE KSIAZEK / AFP/Archives
The bill, which was approved in a first round at the National Assembly (the French parliament), and then redrafted by the Senate in May, should be approved as passed in the Senate, therefore coming into force.
The bill is top of the list in the so-called ‘ecologist slot’ — the day dedicated to the parliamentary activity regarding social and environmental legislation.
Agnès Pannier-Runacher, France’s Minister for ecological transition, introduced the debate by stating she supports the bill, while calling for a nuanced discussion, urging Parliament to “keep science firmly in mind” and “avoid generalised hostility to PFAS.”
“There are thousands of PFAS. Some are well-known, others less so. Some are dangerous, others are considered low-impact,” she said.
PFAS are virtually indestructible and are present in scores of objects and products. They accumulate over time in the air, soil, water, food and, ultimately, in the human body, especially in the blood and kidney and liver tissues.
Although knowledge of the health risks associated with the various types of PFAS is insufficient or in some cases absent, also according to the health authorities, several forever chemicals are said to cause adverse effects on the human metabolism.
The bill’s key article proposes to prohibit from January 1 2026 the production, import and sale of cosmetics, wax product (for skis) and clothes containing PFAS, with the exception of some industrial textiles or textiles that are “needed for essential use.”
The bill also includes a provision for taxing manufacturers whose activities result in PFAS discharge, following a ‘polluter pays’ principle.
Although the bill’s initial scope has been reduced – notably by excluding kitchen utensils from the proposed ban – rapporteur Nicolas Thierry (MP for Les Ecologistes party) claimed at the session that the bill is “a first response” that will make France “one of the best-equipped countries for protecting its population from the risks linked to forever chemicals.”
MP Cyrille Isaac-Sibille (of the MoDem party), author of a report on the subject a year ago, described the bill as a “foundation stone” in the fight against PFAS, one that will broadcast “a message to Europe saying that France is ready and that swift thinking is needed.”
“Markers”
Once the bill will have passed, MPs will turn to more divisive legislation, the “markers” that will allow ecologist politicians to “plant in the [political] landscape” the “elements of their future programme” for the next elections, said MP Pouria Amirshahi.
The debate is expected to turn lively in the case of the proposed ‘Zucman tax’, a flat 2% tax on the assets of the “ultra rich,” individuals with assets worth over €100 million.
The bill is the brainchild of economist Gabriel Zucman, who defended it on Sunday in a forum with other politicians, trade union members and citizens on French newspaper Le Monde, calling it a “common-sense measure” while noting that “billionaires pay almost no income tax.”
The governmental coalition opposed the bill in a parliamentary committee last week. “France is neither a tax haven nor an island,” and “we would be … the first country to implement this kind of taxation,” while France is already “the most highly taxed country,” argued Mathieu Lefèvre, speaking for Macron‘s party.
The other five bills proposed by the environmentalists aim to establish on an experimental basis “food security for all,” to “sustainably protect the quality of drinking water,” to “facilitate labour market access for asylum seekers,” to “prevent stock market-prompted redundancies,” and to guarantee daytime working hours for cleaners.
All of the bills were adopted at committee level, which does not automatically mean they will be passed by parliament. It is unlikely that all of them will be examined, as MPs will have to conclude their work at midnight, as provided by these parliamentary ‘slots’.
Italian group Fashion Box has stated that it has been the victim of a cyber attack resulting in a loss of confidential information contained within its IT systems. Fashion Box is a global leader in the denim segment, creating, promoting and distributing casual wear, accessories and footwear for men, women and children worldwide under the brands Replay, Replay & Sons and We Are Replay. The group is based in Asolo, Italy.
Replay’s Italian headquarters
Based on the findings of the initial checks immediately carried out by Fashion Box, the data reportedly stolen was saved in the company’s IT systems, and could relate not only to corporate information, but also to personal information of internal and external stakeholders.
Fashion Box has formally notified the relevant judicial and police authorities, as well as the supervisory bodies responsible for personal data protection in Italy and abroad. The company has also promptly alerted its employees, and deployed all the technical and organisational measures needed to strengthen its security systems and reduce the likelihood that similar events may occur in the future. Investigations to ensure the security and confidentiality of the personal data involved in the theft are still ongoing.
Entertainment8 years ago