Research file
THE PRADA DAILY
THE happy ordinary. Isabella Cortier x prada
Introduction
Prada has entered a new era; it is evolving with the help of Raf Simons. In this portfolio of research, I will be showing my process of getting to my final installation. It will show visually my journey of development alongside my written research to help strengthen my knowledge of my chosen idea. In my previous research book, I covered the past and present of Prada and Raf Simons, so this book will mainly focus on my ideas for a campaign whilst also discussing how Prada and other brands have successfully or unsuccessfully created campaigns.
PRADA Spring Summer 2019
My initial idea for a campaign for Prada inovoled bringing it back to basics, and enjoying the simple things of life. Fashion now is so focused on the future and whilst moving forward is important, sometimes all we need is to be grounded. It is true that Raf Simons is an innovator and is often looking to the future for ideas, but with his collaborative relationship with Prada he has had to apply Miuccia’s way of thinking. In the everchanging world of fashion, I think it is time we slow down and appreciate the smaller details instead of chasing the next quick fad.
Let’s slow down, lets laugh, lets
cry, lets live in The Happy
Ordinary.
Isabella Cotier born in London but was bought up in Florence, where she stayed until she was ready to go to university. Isabella attended London College of Fashion and first started studying Pattern Cutting before being persuaded by a teacher to switch to Illustration. During her degree she worked as a freelance illustrator and that is what she continues to do up until this day. She mainly does live drawings as she feels it makes her work less rigid. Also looking at her work it is apparent that she takes inspiration from daily life and from normal people. She says she feels the most inspired by “real people doing ordinary things”. Her work captures the true simpleness of life but makes it beautiful. Her style is very noticeable as she always uses very bright colours to enhance her illustrations. The vivid colours bring to life the characters that she draws.
To help me develop my campaign further I want to research previous companies collabs with artists to see how and why they were successful.
An obvious one to research first was the recent Louis Vuitton and Yayoi Kusama collaboration. Whilst there were mixed reviews about the collection, there is no denying that this collaboration bought a lot of press attention to it. Louis Vuitton named the collection “Creating Infinity”. They truly left no stone unturned in the marketing campaign for the collection. In every flag ship store they had an installation of a robot of Yayoi Kusama painting spots with the whole store covered in stores. They had top models in their photoshoots such as Bella Hadid, Gisele Bündchen, Karlie Kloss, Devon Aoki and Christy Turlington. They also took over Instagram by creating filters and their campaign images as adverts over the home page.
Another recent collab that garnered a lot of attention was the Loewe and Studio Ghibli collab a Japanese animation studio. Loewe had previously done collaborations based around the films ‘Spirited Away’ and ‘My Neighbor Totoro’. But now in their final collection together they have created accessories and ready to wear items based on the film ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’. The campaign involved a complete takeover of Selfridges London, with “a once-in-a-lifetime dining experience based on the film” and full installation where you can view the collection
Both collaborations were very successful, and I believe it was down to the campaigns that they had. They created a strong connection between the brand and the art as the two become one. Also, in both of these collections they have a pop-up store with some sort of installation in to bring press attention. I will take these examples into consideration as I move forward with my campaign.
Store activations
More and more brands are doing store activations as it they create a more immersive experience for the buyer. Forbes have said that 98% of consumer are more likely to purchase products after a brand activation. Brand activations can create more buzz around the products that they want to promote. Having a creative store activation can also cause a lot of social media buzz which in turn gives more press and attention to the products you want to sell.
Jacquemus seems to always have immersive experiences that acquire a lot of social media attention. Their store activations are very immersive and create great Instagram and Tik-Tok content, this helps especially when marketing to Gen-Z. In May 2022 they had a creative retail space named Le Bleu, which was a recreation of Porte Jacquemus’s bathroom. It was an imitation of a locker room with each locker cubicle having its own image or product. Tik-Toks related to this Jacquemus pop up gathered over 2.6 million views.
For my campaign I would be having a store activation as I believe this is a way to gain more attention to the collaboration and therefore have more sales.
The main idea for this campaign was to replicate the vibe of Isabella Cotier’s illustrations. To me she had two main types of images. The first were her portraits of people, mainly elderly people. These were based of people being sat in a studio and Isabella drawing them close including personal details in the illustration. Her other type of image is the one where she is drawing at a place such as a park or café and she captures real interactions from people. So, I believe to capture the energy that she creates I need to have some images in a studio, with a solid-coloured background, and some at a location. My locations that I want to shoot at include a café, a park and just on the street. It is just down to trying them all and seeing which ones create the best images.
MODELS MODELS MODELS
When it comes to picking models for my photos, I wanted to keep it fresh and youthful whilst also choosing people that Isabella would have chosen as her subjects in her illustrations. So, an obvious choice was the replicate her older models when she does her portraits. So, I found someone over 50 to do a location shoot in cafes and parks. I wanted some photos to feel natural and so I walked around Kensington in London to find people or situations to photograph. The people there are eccentric and so it was easy to find subjects
that were just casually going about their day. My most successful natural photo was one of an elderly couple walking down the street which matched one of Isabella’s illustrations that she did for Vogue. For my studio images I chose a younger model so that I could bring the youthful side in that I wanted to.
Styling ideas Styling ideas
Behind the scenes
scenes
References
Batchelor, M. (2021, September 14). How brand collaborations with zine: https://www.theceomagazine.com/business/news/brand-collaborations-artists/
Cotier, I. (2019, January 9). The Unrestricted Line. (J. Boni-Ball, Interviewer)
Cotier, I. (n.d.). Isabella Cotier. Retrieved from Isabella Cotier: https://isabellacotier.com
Hughes, N. (2022, October 17). When fashion meets art: the most www.harpersbazaar.com/uk/fashion/a41645278/art-fashion-collaborations/
Isabella Cotier. (n.d.). Retrieved from We Folk: https://www.wefolk.com/artists/isabella-cotier/information
MORRIS, L. G. (2022, May 24). SELFRIDGES AND JACQUEMUS HAVE trieved from FRAME: https://www.frameweb.com/article/selfridges-and-jacquemus-have-teamed-up-the-result-is-gen-z-retailheaven
with artists can add or diminish value. Retrieved from CEO Magahttps://www.theceomagazine.com/business/news/brand-collaborations-artists/ Interviewer)
https://isabellacotier.com
most iconic collaborations of all time. Retrieved from Bazaar: https:// www.harpersbazaar.com/uk/fashion/a41645278/art-fashion-collaborations/
https://www.wefolk.com/artists/isabella-cotier/information
HAVE TEAMED UP. THE RESULT IS GEN-Z RETAIL HEAVEN. Rehttps://www.frameweb.com/article/selfridges-and-jacquemus-have-teamed-up-the-result-is-gen-z-retail-
References
Prada. (2021). Holiday 2021 A Midwinter’s Night Dream. Retrieved dasphere/campaigns/2021/holiday.html
Prada. (2022). Prada FW22 Menswear Campaign . Retrieved from dasphere/campaigns/2022/fw-man.html
Selfridges. (2023, Febuary). LOEWE x Howl’s Moving Castle has selfridges.com/GB/en/features/articles/corner-shop/loewe-howls-moving-castle/
Wertz, J. (2019, September 30). Experiential Marketing Is The Future
forbes.com/sites/jiawertz/2019/09/30/experiential-marketing-is-the-future-of-retail/?sh=2ba0191f3101
Retrieved from Prada: https://www.prada.com/gb/en/prafrom Prada Stories: https://www.prada.com/gb/en/pralanded. Retrieved from Selfridges&Co: https://www. selfridges.com/GB/en/features/articles/corner-shop/loewe-howls-moving-castle/
Future Of Retail. Retrieved from Forbes: https://www. forbes.com/sites/jiawertz/2019/09/30/experiential-marketing-is-the-future-of-retail/?sh=2ba0191f3101