You'll have to excuse the terrible pun, but we're just not ourselves right now; we had a terrible scare when we read a tweet from Vogue.co.uk yesterday announcing that Karl Lagerfeld had canceled his show in Paris, and we've been swooning ever since. The very thought of Uncle Karl throwing in the workaholic towel and - if we may regress to our schooldays for a minute - 'skiving off' seemed as unthinkable as, say, Peaches Geldof appearing articulate, or Julien Macdonald designing a demure woolen two-piece.

Thankfully, this stern, teutonic cloud has a silvery, CC-embossed lining, as Lagerfeld has announced he'll be using the time he's saved by binning the show on developing a new ready-to-wear line, set to go on sale in time for A/W 2011. "I wanted this for a long time," the be-ponytailed maverick told WWD, probably while organising his extensive iPod collection. "I prefer to work in another way. I can't compete with Chanel. I don't want to be the poor child of myself."

The slightly jarring image of the venerable Karl being anything approaching either 'poor' or a 'child' aside, this sounds like it can only be good news, especially given his assertion that "it will be something affordable for lots of people." We're loathe to pay a premium for our pre-stiffened collars.

Posted on September 08, 2010 at 5:25:04 by Philippa Snow