Is This The End Of Marc by Marc Jacobs?

There are big changes afoot at Marc Jacobs HQ: production of the designer’s Marc by Marc Jacobs line shall now cease production as a separate entity and it will instead be assimilated into one Marc Jacobs super-brand. WWD have suggested that this is perhaps one of the first customer-facing steps in moving towards a potential IPO; a process that has apparently been in the works for quite some time. This focus has been in motion, in fact, since Jacobs’ departure from Louis Vuitton in 2013.

Don’t fret. The price point spectrum that Marc has so carefully crafted over the years will very much still be in existence, just not segregated out into a separate range. Plugged into pop culture and switched onto the power of entry-level goods way before many of his peers, Jacobs has always been a strong believer in the fact that Marc by Marc wasn’t ‘a second line or the poor-relative-of’. It would surely add gravitas to each and every shop-floor item to be part of a high fashion whole.

For the past three seasons Marc by Marc Jacobs has been driven by a duo – Katie Hillier (focusing on accessories) and Luella Bartley (ready-to-wear). This talented twosome have pushed the label forward into more adventurous contemporary territory and skillfully highlighted the street-cool culture of the girls who wear and love MBMJ. Despite the critical success of this move, Jacobs admits to WWD: ‘We’ve gone through many different ways looking at what it was initially and how it had gotten away from that, and I think again we’re back to that same thing… The way to do it is that this is under one label.’

With talk of a possible rolling out of the NYC Bleecker Street Bookmarc store, could a fully immersive World of Marc shopping experience not be so far away? Crossing fingers and toes