Since John Galliano's fall from grace, the design team at Dior has gone unhelmed. Alexander Wang, Marc Jacobs and, more recently, Raf Simons, have each had a stint as rumoured successor, but it’s still unclear who will take over the top job. This we know with certainty, though: Mila Kunis is the new face of Dior. She’s the second
Black Swan cast member to be appointed brand ambassador — Natalie Portman, the star to Kunis’ shadowself, starred in last year’s hugely successful Miss Dior Cherie fragrance campaign.
The Dior spring ad campaign, is set to debut in glossies around the globe on January 15. Shot in New York by Mikael Jansson, it sees the Ukrainian-born actress, dressed in black, elegantly clasping a Miss Dior handbag. Soft lighting and gentle framing gives the images an ethereal quality, which contrasts nicely with the structured lines of the bag. This is Kunis’ first foray into the world of fashion; she told WWD that she’s a “t-shirt and jeans kind of girl”. But the girl's got selling power: she was
one of the most bankable magazine cover stars of 2011.
More in
Black Swan-related news: the designers behind the film’s elaborate ballet costumes — Rodarte’s Laura and Kate Mulleavy — are now set to design costumes for the L.A. Philharmonic's production of Don Giovanni, an opera by Mozart and Lorenzo da Ponte. "Opera has always been a part of us; our grandmother was from Rome and studied it as a young girl," the sisters told
WWD. Although it’s early days, it’s been revealed that the costumes will be “abstract”, as opposed to historically accurate — not surprising, given who we’re dealing with.
Operas aren’t the only side project the Mulleavys have been dabbling in — between designing always-amazing collections, they’ve found time to
DJ at LA’s KCRW , contribute
a list of their favourite movies to Criterion and try their hand at print publishing . The editorial they styled for
A Magazine starring Elle Fanning has gone viral, and for good reason — inspired by Californian summers, it features surfboards, Pearl Jam tees and daisy-chain crowns.
Rumours have been confirmed this week that Louis Vuitton is teaming up with master perfumer Jacques Cavallier-Belletrud — the nose behind Issey Miyake L'Eau d'Issey, Dior Addict and Stella by Stella McCartney — to create its first ever signature scent. Cavallier-Belletrud is renown for sourcing hard-to-find and unique essences, so the collaboration has a lot of fragrance enthusiasts very excited. We’re curious to see (and smell) if he comes up with some sort of sickly sweet concoction to match
Louis Vuitton’s recently released campaign .
This week has also seen the debut of a number of fashion videos. If you overindulged during the Christmas break, avoid this one:
The Victoria’s Secret girls — Miranda Kerr, Candice Swanepoel, Lily Aldridge, et al — look illegally hot whilst frolicking, scantily clad, on the beaches of Tahiti. Phillip Lim’s new video
3.1 Phillip Lim "Improv-isualists" Men's SS12 Collection from 3.1PhillipLim on Vimeo.
coincides with the release of his Spring 2012 men’s collection. Called Improv-isualists, it features trench coats flailing in artificially created wind, furry-looking creeper shoes and dip-dyed denim. Tavi Gevision of Style Rookie fame stars in the clip for Wilco’s track ‘Whole Love’.
Whole Love from Spencer Tweedy on Vimeo.
Fellow underage blogging sensation (and Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy’s son) Spencer Tweedy directed the video. It’s a whole lot of cute, and an interesting example of the worlds of fashion and music colliding.
Which brings us to our last piece of news for the week: indie songstress Lana Del Rey has signed a contract with Next Models. And her modeling career prospects look promising — she already has herself some fashionable fans (both Christopher Kane and Emilio de la Morena played her song ‘Video Games’ at their S/S 2012 shows), and she’s starred in
a convincing parody Prada ad . If she can perfect that pillowy-lipped pout it won’t be long until she’s a fixture at Fashion Week.