Numerous tastemakers exist in and between fashion production and consumption, from designers and stylists to trend forecasters, buyers, and journalists. How and why are each of these players bound up in the creation and dispersion of trends? In what ways are consumers' relations to trends constructed by these individuals and organizations? This book explores the social significance of trends in the global fashion industry through interviews with these 'fashion intermediaries', offering new insights into their influential roles in the setting and shaping of trends. The Trendmakers contains exclusive interviews with financial analysts, creative directors from high street stores like H&M to designer brands such as Erdem, trend forecasters at WGSN, buyers from Harvey Nichols, and major fashion names like The Telegraph fashion critic Hilary Alexander. In contrast to existing research, Lantz offers an international understanding of the trend landscape, engaging with industry professionals from fashion capitals like London, Paris, and New York, as well as BRIC countries and the new, emerging fashion nations. The fashion media may have declared that 'trends are dead' in the light of digital dissemination, but Lantz argues that trends still not only serve as a significant organizing principle for the fashion industry as a whole but also as a source for legitimacy. Engaging with classic fashion thinkers like Veblen, Simmel, and Bourdieu, as well as contemporary scholars like Entwistle and Steele, this book considers trends from an economic and cultural perspective to add to our knowledge of the complexities of the business of fashion.

Product Description: Just step out your door today and you will notice that poise is a rarity in our wired, fast-paced, and unmannerly world. As uncivil behaviors like flip-flops at Broadway shows and digital oversharing proliferate, this timely book reminds us of the quiet power of behaving with dignity, kindness, and grace...read more

Since posting her first makeup tutorial in 2008, Dulce Candy has become one of the top beauty stars on YouTube, boasting more than 2 million subscribers, and garnering hundreds of millions of views for her bright and energetic how-to videos. But before she became a style icon and a role model to millions of young women, Dulce struggled to make her way in the world. Having emigrated from Mexico to the United States when she was six years old, Dulce battled depression and low self-esteem as a teenager and eventually enlisted in the army in an attempt to turn her life around. It was here, on the battlefields of Iraq, that she finally uncovered and embraced her true passion-fashion and beauty-and gained the confidence to move on from her past, follow her dream, and launch what would become her wildly successful brand. Part memoir, part manifesto, The Sweet Life is a fun, inspirational guide for any woman who wants to find success without compromising who she is.

Product Description: The YouTube star and beauty guru shares her hard-won lessons on success, style, and finding the sweetness in all aspects of your life. Since posting her first makeup tutorial in 2008, Dulce Candy has become one of the top beauty stars on YouTube, boasting more than 2 million subscribers and garnering hundreds of millions of views of her bright and energetic videos...read more

By the Year 2000: BABY!What have you resolved to do by the year 2000?Susan Kennedy's going to have a baby…by the time she turns forty. Which is in the year 2000. It's something she's wanted—planned—for the past decade. Now she's got everything she needs to go ahead. A nice home, a successful career, a loving family. Everything except for a husband.She used to have a husband—Michael Kennedy—and that's the man she wants for her baby's father. She only needs Michael's "biological" contribution, though.But then, when Susan's pregnant, she discovers two unexpected complications:1. She loves Michael more than ever and wants him to be her husband again—and a father to his child.2. There isn't goin to be one baby, but two—she's having twins!