California Apparel News

Monica Wise, the designer and founder of Irvine, Calif.–based L*Space, has had her eye on new markets for some time. At the recent run of Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Swim in Miami Beach, she made her move with two new collections, The Collection, a ready-to-wear line with resort at its core, and Mäio Swim, a collection designed for her original L*Space customers who are looking for a more modest alternative to L*Space’s sexy, skimpy suits.

The designer has been expanding her coverups options under the L*Space brand for several seasons, but with the launch of The Collection, she dives into a broader look at resort and ready-to-wear with an eye to providing resortwear for her core swim retailers, as well as reaching new distribution beyond the swim market.

After showing all three collections on the runway in Miami Beach, Wise headed west to show at Swim Collective in Huntington Beach, Calif., and to Las Vegas, where she showed L*Space and Mäio Swim at CurveNV and The Collection at WWDMAGIC.

Waterwear Executive Editor Alison A. Nieder recently caught up with Wise to talk about the impetus for the new lines and what impact they will have on the L*Space collection.

Tell me about your new ready-to-wear line, The Collection.

It’s really exciting for me. I’ve been wanting to do this, but the timing had to be perfect. This was the time to do it.

There’s always been a desire for me to go heavy and deep into sportswear and apparel. I’ve always liked the idea of having ready-to-wear apparel for the resort season, but I didn’t want to be completely locked into coverups only. Gals want apparel that’s great on and off the beach. Gone are the days of one way to wear a coverup. It used to be a coverup worked for a lot of gals heading to the beach. Now they want a lot more for their money; they want to be wearing it on and off the beach from daytime to nighttime. It’s a whole different animal these days when it comes to resortwear.

I have the capabilities to do it now. I have the backing. I have enough doors to launch something like this, and I have the great accounts that can pick it up. We have it going into our top key accounts like Everything but Water and Diane’s, and we’re also picking up new accounts like Neiman Marcus and Shopbop.

I have it contemporary priced to keep it aligned with the swimwear. I knew we’d have a lot of accounts that would pick it up, but I knew we wouldn’t be selling all the surf doors with those price points. They can [sell a contemporary price point] with swim, but they get a little nervous with sportswear. But I think a lot of our surf accounts will test it and try it—and I think be really successful, and they’ll be back and heavy with it next year.

We took The Collection to MAGIC [in August], where we thought we’d have the best accounts looking at [the line]. We want new doors; we want doors that don’t even do swim. That’s our goal.

It’s all produced in Orange County. The initial offering is 22 pieces, ranging from caftans to ponchos to wide-leg pants and a lot of dresses—long maxi dresses that fit the resort mentality, with a very easy breezy and very versatile look. It hits the floors in November.

You also launched Mäio in Miami. Why a separate collection?

I’ve been doing the L*Space collection for years, and I’ve seen my [original] customer age gracefully. A lot of them look fabulous, but maybe they had a child or two and they don’t want to wear the skimpy little bottoms that L*Space is known for. There is a huge need for one-pieces and mid-kinis with the high-waisted bottoms. They have a little more coverage, but I didn’t want to go too conservative. It’s for my original customer who has aged a little, and she’s not quite able to wear the skimpy.

So it’s for the Orange County mommy?

It’s true—it is the Orange County mommy.She still looks great, and she just has become a little more modest. I always dreamed of filling the void of chic one-pieces, and this was the way to do it. It was about the girl that outgrew our skimpy bottoms.

Mäio is all about the beauty of the suit being very modest. We’re doing a lot of textured [fabrics] with contrast details and a lot of demi cups and underwires. We plugged in a few reversible. I’m known for reversibles in L*Space, and I brought it over into Mäio.

We have a total of 27 styles in multiple colors, and it’s all about the details. The inside [of the suit] is just as pretty as the outside. We’re dong branding on the interior [of the suit], and any hardware we use is 19-karat gold plate, which I love. I want to make sure we keep that high premiere look to it.

We have two deliveries on the Mäio—November and December. And we’ve [already] opened some new online stores who couldn’t pick up the L*Space line due to the skimpiness.

Now that you’re juggling three collections, does it change the core collection at all?

I feel like I need to bring in a little more skimpiness into the L*Space collection.

That’s my next plan—to inject a little more of that into the L*Space collection so that I don’t lose that customer.