Musical chairs: David Beckham at Kent & Curwen and Simon Spurr at Gieves & Hawkes

By

Dominique Muret

Published
October 19, 2015

A game of musical chairs is seemingly going on at Trinity. The Hong Kong-listed Chinese menswear company, whose majority shareholder is the Li & Fung group, has reorganised the creative directorships of its leading brands, Kent & Curwen, Cerruti 1881 and Gieves & Hawkes.

The reshuffle follows the recent deal struck between Kent & Curwen and David Beckham for the label's relaunch.

The former football star will have a multi-faceted role, taking charge of product development, market expansion and advertising, as well as supervising store concepts and location. Beckham will be supported by a creative director whose appointment is expected for early 2016.

It's an exclusive five-year partnership, the first between Seven Global, the joint venture created in 2014 by David Beckham and Simon Fuller, and Global Brands, the corporate entity supervising Li & Fung's brand and licensing activities. Fuller is a long-standing advisor to the Beckham family and a former manager of the Spice Girls.

The deal includes the creation of new collections for Kent & Curwen, with marketing campaigns inspired and influenced by David Beckham, as well as the opening of flagship stores in China and elsewhere, and the launch of an e-commerce site.

David Beckham will work alongside Kent & Curwen's design department to develop a collection in his name for Autumn/Winter 2016, to be priced lower than Kent & Curwen's main line.

In this context Simon Spurr, recruited in 2014 to take charge of design at Kent & Curwen, has just changed fashion label and taken over the creative direction of Gieves & Hawkes, a historic Savile Row tailor now owned by Trinity.

Simon Spurr, who worked for Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein and Yves Saint Laurent, succeeds Jason Basmajian. The latter, after remaining in charge of style at Gieves & Hawkes for three years, was recently appointed Creative Director at Cerruti 1881, Trinity's other major brand.