Raf Simons shakes Calvin Klein, starts creative conflict with leadership

Raf Simons comes into conflict with PVH Corporation’s leadership. Two of the lines developed by the Belgium designer have not been well received by the group’s top executives, who regard them as extravagant, expensive and way too distant from Calvin Klein’s DNA.

Emanuel Chirico, chairman and CEO of PVH, owner of Calvin Klein, has shown his disagreement with the runway collection, baptised as 205W39NYC, and the Calvin Klein Jeans line, which he has addressed as too expensive for the public, according to WWD.

The executive pointed out that since that moment onwards, Calvin Klein is working on having a more commercial collection, especially regarding their jeans line, which will be released in autumn of 2019.

Calvin Klein signed Raf Simons as creative director in August 2016, who had previously worked at Dior

After those comments expressed by the CEO of PVH, rumours have started to spread around stating that Calvin Klein is not going to renew the Belgic designer’s contract, which expires in August.

Calvin Klein signed Raf Simons as creative director in August 2016, substituting Francisco Costa in the position, who previously was the chief officer for the woman’s line, as well as Italo Zucchelli, who carried out the role of creative director for the collection of men.

During the first nine months of 2019 which ended the 30^th of October, Calvin Klein increased its sales an 11%, reaching the figure of 2.77 billion dollars (2.44 billion euros). On the other hand, the PVH group in its whole reached a revenue of 7.17 billion dollars (6.3 billion euros), an 11.7% more.