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In a recent interview in the Los Angeles Times, the German supermodel acknowledged that she no longer does her jewelry line with Mouawad USA Inc. In the interview, Klum gives a few reasons for abandoning the line, which was called simply “Heidi Klum,” including the rademark-infringment lawsuit filed against Klum and Mouawad by high-end jewelry house Van Cleef and Arpels Inc. in 2007. Van Cleef, which is owned by luxury goods giant Richemont, claimed in the suit that Klum’s lines copied the vintage clover design featured in its “Alhambra” line. Last year, a federal judge dismissed the suit without prejudice (meaning it could be brought again in the future) after the two jewelry houses opted to settle the controversy themselves without any admission of liability. “I think when you’re a small company, which we are, we’re not a Van Cleef–they have a thousand lawyers. I’m a small fry next to that,” Klum said in the interview. |
Model and reality TV star Heidi Klum is crossing one item off of her loaded resume: jewelry entrepreneur.
Los Angeles–While fashion designers showing their Fall 2009 apparel collections on runways this year tended to focus their jewelry wardrobing on the necks and wrists, stars on the red carpet at the 36th annual Daytime Emmy Awards showed ears the love, favoring drop and hoop styles as the accessories of the night.One of the evening’s biggest winners, bubbly television host Rachael Ray, snagged her “Entertainment Talk Show” nod while wearing a pair of yellow gold hoops that matched the beaded necklace detail of her gown.
Fine Jewelry: The current economic downturn has proven to be extremely challenging to most industries, and the diamond industry is no exception. The demand for diamonds hit its highest levels in early 2008 and mining operations increased their productivity to keep up with this demand; the recent downturn hit the diamond community right in the face.The first six to seven months of the crisis were the most difficult for the wholesale industry. Diamond dealers delayed or stopped all orders from diamond manufactures (diamond cutting firms). Diamond manufactures stopped purchases of rough diamonds from mining corporations. Diamond miners stopped digging and the wholesale community sat in limbo and watched prices fall sharply. Without continuous cash flow the goods are too expensive to mine, too expensive to cut and too expensive to hold. Some of the weaker, or more highly leveraged, firms were forced to pay down loans and liquidate inventory. However, some firms found themselves in a great situation, those with strong cash positions, were able to exploit this opportunity and buy diamonds at greatly reduced prices.Although most wholesalers stopped purchasing goods, the retail public did not stop buying. Young men and women were, and still are, getting engaged. Men are still telling women they love them, and women still love diamonds. The continued retail support and the lack of new diamonds in the pipeline have led to a nice bounce in the wholesale price of diamonds. Prices are stabilizing and cash flow is improving; in turn diamond-cutting factories are back in operation, mines are coming back online and the diamond community is moving again. This past month, a magnificent 7cts blue diamond sold for almost $9.5 million at auction set a new price record. I am not suggesting that the industry is yet able to run, but it is back on its feet and moving at a reasonable pace.Though the bubble has broken and prices were effected sharply, demand and market realities have helped diamonds bounce back.
