Brands are taking their best and most current offerings to the first Project Las Vegas kids’ area. The result is children’s fashion that looks like a scaled-down version of what their parents would wear.
“We’re doing a lot of dark washes in slim cuts and casual, trendy, fashion-forward styles,” said Christhl Gabel, sales manager for kids at Diesel USA in New York. “We’ve taken the men’s and women’s styles down to boys and girls.”
The Diesel collection, which is for children aged three months to 16 years, offers shades of coral, blue and green in nondenim pieces and soft cotton dresses.
“There is an interest from people who like to have more mature styles for their kids, so we are doing kids’ versions of our line,” said a spokeswoman for Los Angeles-based Chip & Pepper. Kids’ denim now uses fabrics from Italy and Japan that allow for more tailoring and better fits. Other elements culled from the adult collection include vintage university logos on onesies and T-shirts, distressed bohemian fabrics and hand-designed hardware.
Amber Hernandez, president of Woodland Hills, Calif.-based Sky Rockstars, said she wanted to veer away from the skull-and-crossbones looks that have been so prevalent in children’s clothing and infuse pieces with more positive messages.
“We can still be cool and edgy and hip without the skulls,” she said, adding that graphics on her line of knit hoodies, T-shirts, thermals and tank tops include winged stars and the Chinese characters for earth, fire, water and air. “These are adult clothes for kids.”
The miniaturization approach doesn’t always work, said Heidi Davis, co-founder of the Playground Showroom in New York, which specializes in high-end children’s clothing lines such as C&C California, Harajuku Lovers, Made U Look and Kingsley Aarons, the Costa Mesa, Calif., designer who shot to fame when one of his T-shirts was worn by Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt in her first photo shoot.
“Most manufacturers believe that if they have a great contemporary product, they can just shrink it down,” said Davis. “But what you learn in the children’s business is that doesn’t actually work in reality. Fits have to be adjusted, and it’s a matter of finding a correct formula to have appropriate fashion at the right age.”