David Neville

Style

Rag & Bone Spring 2012: '70s Surfer California Cool Girls

Rag & Bone is always cool, and their spring 2012 collection was no exception. See: a soundtrack created specially for the show by Thom Yorke; a runway that actually rose before the first model walked out to become a ceiling of lightbulbs; an A-list model casting that included Arizona Muse, Karmen Pedaru and Joan Smalls; a front row that included Dwyane Wade (sitting next to Anna Wintour) La La Vasquez with hubby Carmelo Anthony, and Mary J. Blige; and quirky '70s California surfer inspired clothes from designers David Neville and Marcus Wainwright in cobalt, orange sherbet and lemon yellow, layered to perfection.

Style

Rag & Bone Women's Fall 2011: Superhero Snow Day

Over the past two years, there's been noticeable expansion at Rag & Bone. Along with more stand-alone stores, an e-commerce site, and an increasingly prominent presence at major department stores, the name itself has gotten bigger. After Fall 2010's perfect wintry collection, inspired by hunting gear and alpine ski slopes, the design team of David Neville and Marcus Wainwright won the CFDA award for menswear. And just-launched last week, their new advertising campaign features models snapping themselves in Rag & Bone looks. It's plastered all over New York City. Which brings us, one wordy paragraph later, to our point: With all this broadening, you'd except the runway collection to maybe become less focused. After all, Rag & Bone is partially-owned by Andrew Rosen, the CEO of Theory and current king of contemporary retail. Neville and Wainwright need to design clothes that not only look good, but also sell well.

Style

Rag and Bone Men's Fall 2011: "How to Dress Like an Englishman"

I don’t envy Marcus Wainwright and David Neville, the designers of Rag and Bone. What do you do when heritage, your thing, is the trend of the moment? And then isn’t. Last season, their approach was to out-heritage everyone, with masses of chambray and denim, in what felt like the closeted football player on Glee constantly targeting the gay kids for abuse, aka, the lady protesting a little too much. Their solution for next fall is to go British. “English gamekeepers, stalking in Scotland and the Duke of Windsor. Exemplary demonstration of how to dress like an Englishman” read their press materials.

Business

Fashion Forward at the New Yorker Festival: What Maria Cornejo Said When She Wasn't Dissing Carla Bruni

On Saturday, The New Yorker Festival presented Fashion Forward, a panel that included Maria Cornejo, Phillip Lim, Naeem Khan and David Neville and Marcus Wainwright from Rag & Bone. As you may have heard, Maria Cornejo expressed her not so high opinion ofCarla Bruni-Sarkozy at said panel. We were there, and surrounding that brief and hilarious moment, was a very thoughtful and open discussion about the business of fashion. The New Yorker labeled these designers “The New Guard.” They have all established measurable success and are probably on their way to becoming household names. Cornejo and Khan have designed dresses for the first lady. Phillip, David and Marcus have won CFDA awards. All of them have impressively withstood the shaky economy and none of them were born in the U.S.

Fashion Week

Rag & Bone Perfect the Cargo Pant

My first assignment post-CFDAs was to visit the studio of winners Marcus Wainwright and David Neville. The occasion? Rag & Bone's Resort and Holiday collections. Unsurprisingly, there was plenty to love. The designers carried on with the wooly, layered military theme from Fall 2010, featuring lots of gorgeous knitted sweaters, exaggerated boyfriend blazers in plaid and tweed, a pair of tweed cargo sweatpants that looked too comfortable to resist, and a red silk work shirt that could be dressed up or down, much like the rest of the collection.