Marc Bain

The numbers: Weak. PVH, the parent company of Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger, posted revenue growth of just 0.7% to $8.24 billion for fiscal 2014. Tommy Hilfiger’s overall sales increased 6% on a constant currency basis, but even though Calvin Klein performed well in the US, with pop star Justin Bieber as the face (and torso) of its underwear business, a 5% drop in Calvin Klein’s international comparable-store sales still hurt PVH’s bottom line.

Fran Lebowitz, the New York author, humorist, and natty dresser, is a master of the sardonic one-liner.

Lee Kuan Yew, the founding prime minister of the city-state of Singapore and the man responsible for making the nation into an economic powerhouse, was known as a tireless worker even in his final years. Never far from his side was a burgundy-colored briefcase, about 14 cm wide, containing papers, letters, memos, manuscripts, and anything else he may have been working on at the time. As his former principal private secretary, Heng Swee Keat, noted in a moving essay about Lee’s “red box,” Lee used it every day until his hospitalization on Feb. 5.

Nike is currently embroiled in three legal struggles, one over copyright and two over intellectual property, with massive implications for the brand’s reputation and bottom line.

Style.com, the popular site that’s a mix of online fashion magazine and clearinghouse for runway images, released its list of the most-viewed shows from fall-winter 2015 this week. Perennial powerhouse Chanel, which frequently captures the top spot, was unseated by a newcomer: Kanye West.

Think about how often you check e-commerce or flash sales sites on your phone, shop while watching TV, or buy an article of clothing just because it’s cheap. Even if you don’t do it incessantly, odds are good you know someone who does.

Nike really loves its sports metaphors. On a March 19 call with investors, executives including CEO Mark Parker talked frequently about the company’s “category offense.”

J.Crew has been having a hard time lately. At the end of last year, the company posted a steep loss in its third quarter thanks to what CEO and Chairman Mickey Drexler called “a significant slowdown” in its women’s business. Foot traffic was down in J.Crew’s brick-and-mortar stores, and the company was suffering from the constant markdowns it offered to get customers to shop.

Courtesy of 007’s Twitter account, the world has finally seen the official teaser poster for the new James Bond movie, Spectre. It shows Daniel Craig clad in a slim-fitting black turtleneck, the strap of a brown leather holster skirting his left pectoral.

Chanel’s customers in Europe and Asia are about to get either some good or bad news. The French luxury company will align the prices of three of its most popular bags—the 11.12, the 2.55, and the Boy Bag—across global markets. The changes are set to take effect on April 8.

In a couple years, America’s professional basketball players will no longer be wearing Adidas jerseys. The German sportswear giant announced today that it won’t bid to renew its National Basketball Association (NBA) sponsorship once it expires in 2017.

The singer Elton John and LGBT groups are calling for a boycott of the Italian fashion brand Dolce & Gabbana following comments (link in Italian) the brand’s designers made about gay parenting and children created through in-vitro fertilization.

Fashion brands have become increasingly adept at manufacturing their instagrammable runway moments, so while the shows rolled through New York to London, Milan, and Paris in the past month, the social network was where much of the action unfolded.

Adidas could be facing yet another threat from its rivals. Both Nike and Under Armour are in a good position to steal Adidas’ NBA sponsorship contract when that deal expires in 2017, say Citigroup analysts Kate McShane and Corinna Van der Ghinst. 

Say you’re in the market for a new TV or some $800 sweatpants. Right now, if you live in most of the US, buying them at the nearby brick-and-mortar store means you have to pay state and local sales tax on them. But if you get them online from a shop in another state, one with no physical presence in your state, you don’t have to pay those taxes. Even if you’re paying for shipping, that option can be substantially cheaper.

In fashion, there’s always a tension between fantasy and reality, art and commerce. At Paris Fashion Week so far, Japan’s top designers have dominated when it comes to high art, showing conceptual collections that perfectly embody their ideas. On top of that, their more commercial offerings have been standouts—smart updates of classic items. It’s a season in which the country’s fashion stars all seem to be working at the peak of their abilities.

A decade ago it would’ve been unimaginable for a pair of sweatpants to be as expensive as an iPod, let alone rival a MacBook. Sure, premium denim brands such as APC were convincing people to lay down serious cash for jeans. But sweatpants were meant for a jog, or perhaps a lazy Sunday.

Olivier Rousteing, creative director of French fashion house Balmain, which showed at Paris Fashion Week today, just hit a milestone. The number of followers on his Instagram account ticked over the succinct and significant “1m.” That means a million people on phones across the world see every gym video, celebrity snap, and selfie the designer posts. It also makes him the most followed French designer on the platform.

For brick-and-mortar fashion boutiques around the world, capitalizing on the opportunity presented by e-commerce wasn’t always easy. While the Internet could hypothetically allow a small shop in Antwerp to reach a potential customer in Hong Kong, there were the pesky hurdles of building an e-commerce site, shooting merchandise, publishing and maintaining content, and making the potential customer aware that the e-commerce shop even existed.

It’s still something of a surprise to humanity that men are shopping for clothes more than ever before. But, as a recent e-commerce report from the research firm IbisWorld found, that’s exactly what’s happening.

There’s a variety of French chic that’s all about understated elegance and restrained luxury. One of its greatest practitioners, Céline, you probably know, but you’d be forgiven if you haven’t heard of another label that’s been doing it for years.

The conventional view of the world’s fashion weeks is that Paris is refined creativity, London is experimentation, New York is populism, and Milan is about the money. The Italian shows are seen as less willing to take risks—and have the reputation of being a bit old and stodgy.

Unless you’re in the fashion industry, the name Charles James probably doesn’t have the same cachet as Christian Dior. But Dior himself called the Anglo-American couturier ”the greatest talent of my generation.”

Americans can’t stop buying yoga-wear and sweatpants. According to the research firm NPD Group, US consumers spent $2 billion more on clothes, shoes, and accessories in 2014 than they did the previous year, and women’s activewear drove that growth.