Issue 42: On Stewardship
This week’s Long Read is a collection of thoughts on…well, collecting, grounded by fashion’s favorite collector, Kim Jones. It got me thinking about ownership vs. stewardship, originally as it pertains to art and objets d’art with significant cultural gravitas. To own a Chagall painting or a Chanel gown or a Cartier watch or a Le Corbusier chair is to take in hand the care and stewardship of a historical element of culture.
But what about with more nebulous things, like the publication of newspapers and magazines, or the direction of performing arts companies, or even political offices? I say that we could do with a fair bit more of the stewardship mindset over the ownership mindset. What say you?
Well, it’s High Noon. Let’s go sailing. 🌊
xoxo SCREMES (Shawn)
The Roundup
The stories you should be reading this week
Etsy buys Depop. • Kim Jong Un bans skinny jeans for promoting a capitalist lifestyle. • Naomi Osaka asked for a bit of grace from the Tennis community and was fined for it. • You know how Wikipedia is always panhandling for your donations? Turns out, they don’t really need it. • LARPing is the next play for Luxury. • And, in praise of the dinner party.
The Long Read
The week’s keynote story
Only going to read one thing? Read me.
Kim Jones: Collector | Shawn Cremer | High Noon Original
In the age of the curator, what has become of the collector? Perhaps I ought to amend that thought since the past year has seen an explosion in newly-minted collectors (of all stripes), but the question pertains to the collector as purveyor of taste. In other words, what is the role culturally for collectors? I mean outside of personal financial gain, as in collecting NFTs or Pokemon cards or even vintage Porsches. I mean a collector whose collecting makes some impact on the cultural trajectory.
Kim Jones is one such collector. Jones is the artistic director of Dior Menswear and the Fendi Womenswear and Couture collections. And Jones has given interview after interview on the same subject: his abiding love of (obsession with?) collecting. Jones collects and then translates that collecting into his work at Dior and Fendi.
For me, I always look at culture when it comes to fashion and art. Both are within culture, and I draw inspiration from each of them.1
Collecting on the surface seems like a selfish pursuit in many ways, but there is a sense one gets from a collector like Jones that it ought to be more about stewardship than ownership. That’s the exact thought behind the most exclusive luxury brands’ relationships with their customers…
You never actually own a Patek Philippe. You merely look after it for the next generation.
…but intergenerational stewardship is one thing. Stewardship of fine art, garments, furnishings, and other such collectibles for dissemination in reimagined forms is quite another. And that is what a collector like Jones does. And what makes him so desired by the top LVMH, Kering, and independent houses.
And though he has mastered the commercial art of juxtaposing opposites — tradition and novelty, niche and pop, East and West, Anglo and Continental, personal and institutional — it is his commitment to stewardship that has formed the basis of his decade-and-a-half-long ascent to the top of men’s fashion. Unlike most designers of his stature, he does not yearn to toil under his own logo.2
But he does want to work with everyone everywhere. Jones is certainly not the first artistic director in fashion to juggle multiple appointments, but for those appointments to be at two of fashion’s most iconic houses is a feat.
Watch
The Gossip Girl reboot trailer plays with Xs and Os in a cheeky fun way. Other than that, it revealed hardly anything about the direction the show will take.
Cheers
Did I make up the drink of the summer? Maybe… I call it the Vacation®