LV Day (2)

So this was Louis Vuitton's great day in Taipei. The official opening of its "Maison" on Chungshan North Road took place under a miserable rain, as could be expected after the weather of the past few days.
The shop itself looks worth a visit from an architectural viewpoint, but according to the double-page ads in today's newspapers, the common folk will have to wait until after the weekend before they can replace the VIPs.
When I passed there tonight, there were crowds massing outside despite the rain, or I should say, because of Rain. I'm sure they must have been fans of the Korean pop star, rather than crazed shoppers looking for the latest purple monogram bags and jewelry. From a viewpoint of class and taste, which Louis Vuitton wants to project, I'm not so sure that Rain is the right choice to promote the brand. A man who styles himself as the "Michael Jackson of South Korea" and who passes through the airport only carrying his pass in a visibly Louis Vuitton product, that's not much of a stunt.
Much bigger and much more attractive was the "packaging" of the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall and its main gate in the shine of lights reflecting the brand's famous logo, and a floral design on a red background. That sight is much more memorable than the appearance of a flimsy pop star.
Tomorrow, no doubt the papers will have lots of pictures of today's fashion events, allowing people like me a closer look.

LV Day

Friday April 28 is LV Day for Taipei. The people at Louis Vuitton have finally completed their transformation work on their Chungshan North Road store next to the Regent, and tomorrow sees the grand opening.
The whole event starts with a news conference in the afternoon, continues with a flood of starlets arriving around 8 pm, and then surprisingly moves over to the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall for a party with the same starlets and celebrities at 9.
LVMH Group head Bernard Arnault will not be present, but Louis Vuitton brand CEO Yves Carcelle - who already visited Taiwan for the recent opening of the Taichung store - and Asia Pacific chief Francois Delage will be on hand for the ceremonies.
As is often the case on opening days for major stores, the public at large - you and me - is unlikely to be let into the shop on opening day. We will have to wait until Saturday.
For those of you who haven't been in the area lately, I can tell you the new shop looks like a white bunker, with few and narrow-slit windows, a huge LV logo, the name Louis Vuitton, and white perforated patterns reminiscent of the new Monogram Perfo product series, which coincidentally is now on sale at the brand's Taipei 101 and Fuhsing North Road outlets.
Oddly enough, in the same side street of Chungshan North Road, a large poster is announcing the coming this summer of a Coach store.
And on the subject of stores, the new building under construction right next to the massive Chunghsiao Fuhsing MRT station, is a new 11-story Sogo Department Store. Yes, that's the third Sogo in the Chunghsiao section 4 area. It sounds almost as ridiculous as if, say, Shin Kong Mitsukoshi were opening four of their department stores in the same Warner Village neighborhood. OK, you got me there, they did.

Local Talent

Fashion and arts departments of local schools in Taiwan have the custom of presenting their students' works at the end of the school year. This time, the catholic Fujen University in the Taipei suburb of Hsinchuang has raked in some heavy guns to lend their event more publicity. This Saturday evening after six, the students will put on their show at the Taipei County government building in Banqiao.
No idea what the reputation is of their school, but they did manage to catch three famous names from Taiwan's fashion establishment as members of their jury: model Sun Cheng-hua, also famous for her Sunday evening TV show Fashion Deluxe, and designers Shawn Pan and Chien Yu-feng, of the French-based brand ShawnYi, mentioned before on this blog.
As said above, all my information about this event comes from a fax sent by a PR company, so I do not vouch for the quality and the other details of this event. This is purely FYI.

There Comes the Neighborhood

At last, things are moving around the Grand Formosa Regent Hotel on Taipei's Chungshan North Road section 2. We told you how Gioia Pan needed months before opening her new boutique there.
This morning I passed by and what did I see? Workmen setting up a large Louis Vuitton suitcase mockup in the plaza in front of the hotel. I suspected either a preparation for the flagship store nearby - after more than a year of building work - or a separate commercial promotion, such as the company's recent luggage show at Taipei 101.
Well, going into the office an hour later, I spotted the United Daily News, and there it was, reporter Yuan Ching mentioning that the store would open on April 28. Last year, a fashion course I was taking was planning to give us a guided tour of the Louis Vuitton store, but then the conversion work just started. All that time, LV fans in the neighborhood were directed to a so-called temporary store just a block north.
No word yet about the scale of the event planned for the opening, and about who will be attending. LVMH Group top man Bernard Arnault didn't fly over for the recent launch of the Taichung store, but would he for the capital, Taipei? There is no word either about what the store will look like, and whether the building itself will be packaged as a piece of Louis Vuitton handicraft, such as the stores in Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai and of course Paris were for their grand openings.
On a smaller scale, Paris-based Taiwanese designers Chien Yu-feng and Shawn Pan - formerly known as YufengShawn - will be launching their first major Taipei store under their new brandname Shawnyi in the street next to the Regent tomorrow, Friday April 14. The shop - already mentioned in a previous posting - will emphasize the glamorous, the designers say, and will only sell one piece of each design.