The children’s apparel brand Poesia aims to answer the question of where a four-year-old fashionista might score designer looks on a par with mom’s Marni and Miu Miu.
The Taiwan company takes its cues from runways, not playrooms — manufacturing shrunken-down versions of trend-right women’s apparel in decadent fabrics.
Designer Chris Chang first glimpsed a void in the children’s apparel market during her tenure as a general manager for Prada in Taiwan, where she helped expand the number of retail units to 12 from two. “I didn’t have much time for myself while I was at Prada,” she said, “but when I did go out, I shopped for my daughter. I realized that something that was the equivalent of a Prada in kids’ wear was almost nonexistent.”
Costly silks and furs are used in the line as they would be at Dior or Dolce & Gabbana, despite the potential for grass stains and dinner-table mishaps. “I believe in children dressing like little grown-ups,” Chang said. “Poesia is for the fashion elitist. It’s a new phase in children’s wear.”
The pieces are finely detailed. A silk and velvet dress is hand-trimmed with rhinestones; another bears a repetitive pattern borrowed from Gustav Klimt and is trimmed with forest green rabbit. There are sequined necklines and off-the-body geometric silhouettes in heavy brocade fabrics, reminiscent of early Balenciaga. Wholesale prices range from around $40 for a simple cardigan to about $180 for intricately wrought frocks and coats.
Chang, who studied design at Parsons the New School of Design, said that after leaving Prada, “I knew I wanted to start a global brand, and I knew it would be difficult with a women’s brand. There are so many out there. It’s much easier to break into children’s apparel and get recognition. There isn’t much out there that’s not baby-like or toddler-like.”
Still, Chang said Poesia may prove to be “a means to getting back to women’s wear.”
She marketed the first Poesia collection, spring-summer 2006, exclusively to Barneys New York.
“It was about 40 pieces, and the only store I had in mind was Barneys,” she said. “My background is in New York. I know the people who shop there…and the prices they’re willing to pay.”
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Barneys picked up 12 pieces from the initial collection. “I got to sell to Barneys, but it’s a money-losing thing,” Chang said. “A size four-year-old dress would be cut with four to five yards of fabric, so you can imagine that this is a tough business for me.”
Chang recently decided to try her luck in Los Angeles, where $100 jeans for toddlers are becoming common. The line was picked up by Bramasole, a showroom for upscale children’s apparel at the California Market Center.
“Dresses are one of the strongest styles in children’s wear, but no one’s doing something as beautiful as Poesia,” said Marian Lee, owner of Bramasole, adding that sales have been steady.
New accounts for the line include Lisa Kline on Roberston Boulevard in Los Angeles; Grasshoppers in Newport Beach, Calif.; La La Ling in Los Angeles, and Garage in Scottsdale, Ariz.
“It’s a diamond in the rough right now,” Lee said. “But all the best stores have found it.”