“Somebody who is building community and is building awareness and doing cool things, that’s whose supporting HomoCo. That’s who our followers are.” – Daniel DuGoff
On this episode of The Laws of Style, Fashion Lawyer Douglas Hand, sits down with Daniel Doguff, the Founder of CFDA Incubator and menswear brand D Dugoff, and the current CEO of the gay friendly men’s swimwear line HOMOCO. Daniel shares his penchant for architecture, experiences with Marc Jacobs, and his thoughts on the current state of fashion, the DTC model, and what’s in store for unisex brands of the future.
Hosted by Cardozo’s FAME Center for Fashion, Arts, Media and Entertainment law, in conjunction with the Fashion Law Society, Cardozo’s Fashion Law Symposium event on February 26, 2019 attracted over 165 attendees and included 18 speakers. Attorneys, fashion industry figures and law students joined the Symposium to discuss several pertinent topics in the fashion industry and determine how to address these topics from a legal perspective.
Following the topic of wearable tech, Douglas Hand moderated the 3rd panel of the day, dedicated to the Retail Revolution and how to utilize real estate in the digital age of shopping. One of the most influential lawyers in the field of fashion, Douglas also sits in the Business Advisory Committee of the CFDA and is an adjunct professor of Fashion Law at NYU School of Law and Cardozo School of Law.Can the stores win back the allegiance of customers by a tech revolution led by smart mirrors and connected dressing rooms? Can online shopping provide an answer to the famous try-before-you-buy weapon?
With leaders of the front lines of fashion law, panelists Scott A. Klion, Of Counsel to HBA in the area of commercial leasing, Maryann Lawrence, Associate General Counsel at Chanel and Rory Tahari, Founder of the State of Mind Partners, discussed how to capture the customer of the future.
The panel began with one of the main concerns of the fashion and retail industry, the closing of stores and malls everywhere across the country and the stores struggling to compete with online retailers. “We don’t look at stores as a profit center but as a marketing expense,” explained Rory Tahari. Her insight as director of Elie Tahari, Ltd. for 20 years, with stores located throughout the world foresees the end of the typical provisions in leases and rental agreements. For most landlords, the 10 year regular lease agreement is now becoming shorter and shorter as only a limited amount of brands are able to commit themselves to these agreements.
However, according to Maryann Lawrence, the success and the visibility of a luxury brand like Chanel benefits from an incredible leverage when negotiating a lease with landlords.
As previous Associate General Counsel for Tiffany & Co., Scott Kilon agreed with Lawrence’s analysis, adding that a landlord needs these brands in order to increase the value of the mall or the shopping area. In sum, retail is not dead. In order to revitalize an area of a city, stores are still installed as a way to attract customer traffic.
In addition, customers will always enjoy the physical experience of shopping. A customer buying at Chanel enjoys the “human touch” given by the sales persons and the luxury service of being able to have a cocktail in the salon whilst shopping. The shopping experience in a luxury brand like Chanel has to be “fluid but thoughtful,” added Lawrence.
In a unanimous decision authored by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Supreme Court held that a lawsuit may not be brought for copyright infringement until the U.S. Copyright Office has acted – either granting or refusing an application for registration. As this blog noted last year, there was a circuit split as to whether a plaintiff could sue once the application was filed. The courts that held that filing an application was sufficient reasoned that the plaintiff would ultimately be entitled to sue after the Copyright Office weighed in, no matter the decision, so there was no reason to wait. The Supreme Court disagreed, holding that the registration requirement means what it says and that a registration must be granted or refused by the Copyright Office before a lawsuit may be brought.
As we have previously suggested, the Court’s decision will likely make bringing an infringement suit more difficult because applicants will have to wait for the Copyright Office to respond to their application, a process that could take nine months or more. Alternatively, potential copyright owners who want to sue might feel the need to register their works immediately through the Copyright Office’s five-day expedited process, which costs $800, and could get prohibitively expensive when registering multiple works.
Due to this long wait time, we generally encourage potential owners of copyrighted works to register their works promptly to ensure that they hold a copyright in the event an infringement does occur. The relatively small copyright registration fee of $55 allows for copyright owners to register more works and the availability of generous statutory damages and attorneys fees awards also incentivizes the registration of works before infringement begins. Read Supreme Court decision here: Copyright registration decision
On this episode of The Laws of Style, Fashion Lawyer Douglas Hand is joined by John Bartlett. John is a NYC based CFDA award-winning fashion designer, vegan, animal lover/activist, yoga devotee, gay rights enthusiast and good midwestern boy! On the episode they discuss the current state of unisex fashion, the continual relevance of preppy style and the wisdom of never selling your trademark what it happens to also be your name We hope you’ll tune in, listen and watch this latest episode of The Laws of Style.
“It’s interior ‘design.’ It’s not called interior ‘great chair.'” – Christiane Lemieux
On this episode of The Medium Rules, host Alan Baldachin sits down with Christiane Lemieux, founder and CEO of The Inside, the direct-to-consumer home furnishings brand focused on made-to-order, customizable, affordable furniture with a high design, contemporary aesthetic. Prior to starting The Inside, Christiane founded the extremely popular home furnishings/lifestyle brand Dwell Studios, sold to Wayfair in 2013. READ MORE
HBA’s Alan Baldachin joined a panel of great lawyers, including Scott Schirick, Jeff Laretto, Agatha Kluk, and Lilya Tessler at the Do’s and Don’ts Panel presented by Genesis Block.
A special thanks to Cathy Yoon of Genesis Block for organizing a great panel of lawyers who have worked with a variety of startup clients on a variety of issues. It was a great conversation, and hopefully helpful and informative!
