Hi, welcome back to Line Sheet, and Happy Valentine’s Day 💝. For those of you attending the Puck-Netflix-Bradley Cooper-Maestro event tonight at the New York Philharmonic, I am very impressed you were able to get a ticket—they went fast—and I guarantee you are going to have the best, best time. What did you wear? Send pix.

Right now, I’m at the final show of New York Fashion Week, Thom Browne. More on that tomorrow. Until then, I’ve got the latest on our favorite model-turned-print mogul, plus some celebrity front-row math, and the best of the rest of the runway. For the main event, Rachel Strugatz is back with exclusive intel on what really happened with that Dr. Barbara Sturm/Puig deal. I’ve been following Sturm since she launched in the mid-2010s, and I love how Rachel frames her trajectory—the impressive and unimpressive—in the context of the industry.

Mentioned in this issue: Karlie Kloss, Lauren Bray, the WWD PDF, Pierre-Yves Roussel, Tory Burch, salad, Paul Arnhold’s velvet jacket, Hoda Kotb, Tina Knowles’ daughter, Matt Damon, Jenna Lyons and Cass Bird, Puig, Barbara Sturm, Oprah, Chemena Kamali, the Proenza Boys, Kristina O’Neill, Wendi Deng, Sotheby’s, Joseph Altuzarra, Coach, Gabriela Hearst, and many, many more…

• What in the world did that i-D announcement mean?: In today’s niche media news, we turn our attention to Bedford Media, Karlie Kloss’s stealth-ish startup that she formed with Lauren Bray, a former executive at Thrive Capital, the venture capital firm founded by Kloss’s husband, Josh Kushner. You may have seen, buried deep in the bowels of yesterday’s WWD PDF, that i-D magazine, which Kloss bought last year through this new holding company, is pausing pretty much everything (print, web) for a minute. In the meantime, the team behind i-D (including editor-in-chief Alastair Mckimm) will keep posting on social and launch a newsletter.
• What does this even mean?: Well, I talked to a couple of people with direct knowledge of the situation, ya know, and it sounds like Kloss is simply unwinding the business mess created by Vice Media, which owned i-D for the prior decade. Remember, i-D was based in the U.K., and restructuring an organization based there can be daunting. What I’m sure of: There will be print (probably four issues a year), there will be digital, and there will be a lot of other stuff, too, including commerce. Kloss, who owns “75 percent or more” of Bedford Media shares, according to a public filing with the British business register, is really in it, I hear. Sorry if that WWD article confused you.

  Speaking of Kloss, last night I stopped by a dinner she was co-hosting at Sotheby’s with the auction house’s new editor-in-chief, Kristina O’Neill. Kloss is the latest in a string of famous people (including Oprah) to participate in Sotheby’s biannual “Contemporary Curated” auction. It was also a sort of coming-out party for O’Neill, the former WSJ. editor-in-chief and connoisseur of the best blond highlights, whose first print issue of Sotheby’s magazine will be released in the fall.

  Many of Kloss and O’Neill’s mutual friends were there to support them, including some of Line Sheet’s favorite power couples, like Natalie Massenet and Erik Torstensson, and Pierre-Yves Roussel and Tory Burch (love your earrings, Tory). I also got to catch up with smug marrieds Paul Arnhold (great velvet jacket, Paul) and Wes Gordon, who showed his latest collection for Carolina Herrera on Monday. ​​Wendi Deng was there wearing some gorgeous emerald earrings that looked like they cost at least $300,000. I left before the main course was served to get to Bushwick for the Luar show, but the dressing on the salad was very nice. (People were eating!)

• Best celebrity sighting at New York Fashion Week: You know, these big luxury houses spend a fortune to bring the biggest stars in the world out for their shows, and it often pays back dividends in media mentions, etcetera. But designer Raul Lopez hit the jackpot when Beyoncé (and Tina Knowles) showed up to Luar, presumably unpaid, to support her nephew (and grandson), Julez Smith, who walked the show. In that moment, Beyoncé and her mother did not seem to be wearing Luar clothing, but they were carrying Lopez’s bags with conviction and the audience noticed. It was such a fab, spontaneous fashion moment: a rarity these days.
• Most unexpected celebrity sighting at New York Fashion Week: I can almost 1,000 percent guarantee that Matt Damon and his wife, Luciana Barroso, were also not paid to attend the Naeem Khan show, and that this was just a friend-stopping-by situation. (Khan designed Barroso’s vow-renewal dress some years ago.) Some real normal-guy behavior on Damon’s part.

• Busiest celebrities at New York Fashion Week: Jenna Lyons and her girlfriend Cass Bird were everywhere. At Tommy. At the Maria Cornejo dinner. At Monse. At the Sotheby’s dinner. At Thom Browne. Scott Campbell also gave them matching tattoos, according to Instagram Stories. Being in love takes a lot of work!

Barneys first opened in the space in 1923, but at some point moved uptown, only to return in the early 2010s for that spendy, ill-fated iteration. For nearly two decades in between, the building housed the discounter Loehmann’s. (The two stores shared an owner at one point, and all the leftovers from Madison Avenue Barneys would get shipped down there.) Was Kors ever even sold by Barneys? Not sure, but I loved the sentiment of his models walking down the famed spiral staircase either way.

This in-between moment in fashion, as one retailer described it to me the other day, is great for someone like Kors, who is best when his appetite for pure elegance is shared by an otherwise emaciated audience. After the show, I walked down to the 14th Street Party City with a friend, who needed to buy some Valentine’s Day supplies for her grade school son. We talked about how spot-on the Kors collection looked: the hourglass jacket shape, the not-too-prissy black patent pointy kitten heel. This season, everyone did a big, furry coat, and so did Kors.

At times, like many of the generally good collections I saw this past week, it also felt a little A.I.-generated: One can’t help but feel targeted, like a cookie chasing you around the internet, by certain trends. Having parameters that force you to work against the grain at least a bit can be a saving grace. Wes Gordon, for instance, could turn out a Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy homage with his eyes closed, but the Carolina Herrera codes forced him in a more exuberant, tiered-cake direction, mostly for the better. Sergio Hudson, dresser of wearers of jewel-toned suits like Hoda Kotb, who sat in his front row, also seems free of any sort of obligation to hit certain marks.

Many words have been written about the Toryssance, but as I was reminded on Monday night at the New York Public Library, this evolution has been nearly 10 years in the making, even if we can trace the turning point to that Claire McCardell-inspired collection. (For me, I felt the sea change in the collection after the McCardell one.)

If you step back and analyze the situation, you’ll notice that Burch has assembled the exactly right team around her. There’s her husband, the gifted executive Pierre-Yves Roussel, who knows that a brand needs a singular identity no matter the suggested retail price. There’s Pookie Burch, Tory’s stepdaughter and design right-hand, who encourages her to embrace the odd and uncomfortable. Then there’s Brian Molloy, a stylist who knows how to sell it. Everyone should be trying to copy this oh-so-very modern formula, even though they are almost guaranteed to fail.

Tory Burch, which turns 20 years old this year, may be an anomaly, but there are plenty of designers who are still trying to make a business out of fashion. I loved seeing the return of Derek Lam with Câllas, the line his husband, Jan-Hendrik Schlottmann, started with an Italian factory owner. You can see Lam’s talent (and experience) in the cut of his wares: He’s just better than almost everyone.

I thought the Proenza Schouler collection, which Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez said was a stripped-down version of their original vision, was also very good, especially the hooded coats. Eckhaus Latta, too, made something worth wearing: slinky cords and fly-away knits. I revel in their secret sophistication.

Another mid-career designer, Joseph Altuzarra, celebrated his 15th anniversary in business. As with this whole crew, he’s been through a lot—a stint under Kering’s ownership that ended right before the pandemic, most memorably. But instead of looking back this season, he made clothes that fell right into the pillbox-hatted moment. I find it charming that Altuzarra, known first for conventionally sexy silhouettes, has made money in hefty, wintry sweaters. Two young knitwear designers, Henry Zankov and Diotima’s Rachel Scott, also had good showings. They both have the potential to be bigger if they want to be.

Coach and Gabriela Hearst are different sizes, and different businesses, and yet they both benefit from solid financial backing. Coach, well… it is what it is, and I admire designer Stuart Vevers’ dedication to the cause of youth culture and trinkets. (This time, he piled on the New York City souvenirs, such as a yellow taxi ornament masquerading as an earring.) I’d say it’s almost subversive, or punk, to defend these collections a decade in—go with God, is my feeling with Vevers. He’s obviously doing something right.

As for Hearst, like many of her peers, there weren’t many new ideas in here, but it was a much more focused, clear expression of what she wants her brand to be. Without the distraction of that Chloé gig, she can do what she is good at—making clothes and accessories with the best materials in the world. Does she have what it takes to be one of the American greats? Well, she has time, and that’s probably the most important thing.

And now a little palate cleanser from Super Bowl beauty ads and New York Fashion Week: some undisclosed details on Puig’s investment in the eponymous skincare line of Dr. Barbara Sturm, one of beauty’s most fascinating founders.

Sturm’s cultish MC1 “Blood Cream”—the slightly less invasive, take-home successor to her so-called “vampire facial” treatment, immortalized when Sturm stuck Kim Kardashian—was never sold in stores, but its very mythology helped fuel the supernatural rise of her brand. In the years since our initial meeting, Sturm transformed her eponymous line, Dr. Barbara Sturm, into a legitimate competitor in the luxury skincare category once dominated by heritage brands like La Mer, La Prairie, and Sisley, which were all rich on origin stories or unique ingredients and also, Frenchness.

Acquisition rumors began to circulate around that time, and in early January, it was announced that Sturm’s company had sold a majority stake to Spanish fashion and fragrance conglomerate Puig in a two step-acquisition, similar to the structure that Estée Lauder used to acquire The Ordinary. The financial terms were not disclosed, which hinted at a complex structure or perhaps a modest price—or, in this case, both. A banker with knowledge of the deal told me that Sturm “went to market earlier in 2023 but everyone passed. It wasn’t profitable and apparently not all that attractive.” This person continued: “They ended up going back to Puig in what was not a very attractive value.”

Puig, I’m told, paid about $240 million for 60 percent of the company at a ~$400 million valuation. The beauty giant is locked in to buy the remaining 40 percent at a later date for an adjustable price that’s based on whichever multiple is higher—5x the brand’s revenue or Puig’s public market trading multiple. (Puig is private, obviously, but many expect an I.P.O. this year.)

So, was this a good deal for Sturm, the brand, and Sturm, herself? Puig has made some of the bets in beauty the last several years, acquiring both Byredo and Charlotte Tilbury for over $1 billion each in 2022 and 2020, respectively. Comparatively, this transaction is much smaller to start, but there’s potential for enormous upside if Puig is able to ramp up Dr. Barbara Sturm’s sales and an I.P.O. goes down this year, as planned. So, it appears to be a great deal for Puig and a good deal for Sturm, who is taking money off the table, and whose business was actually much smaller than many in the industry realized. (Representatives for Puig and RBC, Sturm’s banker, declined to comment.)

I always figured that Sturm’s business was as big as her brand, but according to a confidential brand deck from April 2023 that I viewed around the time of the sale, Dr. Barbara Sturm’s revenue was only $63 million in 2022. Net sales in 2023, I heard, were only about 10 percent higher than that, less than the projected $83.5 million in the deck. Targeted sales for 2024 and 2025 are $115 million and $164 million, respectively. I would imagine those projections benefit from Puig’s economy of scale and infrastructure. Many of the other prestige and luxury brands in market now are about twice as large as Sturm—and came out more recently.

But Sturm got her vampire money and Puig scored, too. The deal structure minimizes the risk and offers the Spanish conglomerate a chance to “try before you buy.” To be clear, majority stake transactions are not acquisitions; they’re a way for strategics to get ahold of usually fast-growing businesses, but not have to fully commit to buying the whole thing. Founders definitely do not desire this, but they don’t have a choice, either.

Until tomorrow,
Lauren