Patrick Robinson

fashion designer

Personal Information

Born September 8, 1966, in Memphis, TN.
Education: Received degree from Parsons School of Design; also attended the American College in Paris.

Career

Worked at Nordstrom department store, Cerritos, CA, mid-1980s; affiliated with designer Patrick Kelly, Paris, and with design houses Albert Nippon and Herman Geist, all 1980s; Le Collezioni White Label by Giorgio Armani, Turin, Italy, design director, c. 1990-94; Anne Klein Collection, New York City, designer, 1994-96; launched own collection, 1997.

Life's Work

Before he turned 30, Patrick Robinson was designing collections for one of the premier names in American sportswear. When the line folded, however, Robinson found himself out of work but with a headful of ideas. The obvious talent that had helped him secure such a plum job in the first place also helped him land a deal with an apparel manufacturer to produce his own line; then the business-savvy designer worked out of his home for several months to produce and show a collection finally under his own name, which was met with positive reviews. "Watch this guy," declared Harper's Bazaar writers Jennifer Jackson and Andrea Linett. "He has the potential for first- name designer status."

Robinson was born in Memphis in 1966, but grew up southeast of Los Angeles in the affluent area of Orange County. His father was a doctor, and Robinson, one in a family of five, went to high school in Fullerton and worked at the Nordstrom department store at the Cerritos mall as a teen. It was a fashion-conscious family, he told Rose-Marie Turk of the Los Angeles Times--his parents, he said, "subscribed to every magazine in the world and we had a big library." In addition to working at the mall, Robinson also loved to surf, and began his own line of surferwear. He decided to pursue a career as a fashion designer in earnest when he saw a film that featured such homegrown American talent as Calvin Klein and Jeffrey Banks.

Robinson was accepted into the renowned Parsons School of Design in New York City, and also spent time at the American College in Paris. While there, he worked for an up-and-coming young African American designer named Patrick Kelly as his first assistant. After finishing school, Robinson worked for the design houses Albert Nippon and Herman Geist, and was hired by noted Italian designer Giorgio Armani for his bridge line, Le Collezioni. He got the job only when he agreed to start the next day, and had to fly to Italy on extremely short notice. He completed an entire season's worth of clothes just ten days after arriving. "I've done a lot at a young age, but I pushed myself hard, and I gave up a lot of my personal life for my work," Robinson admitted to Julia Chance in Essence.

Being associated with the Armani name, Robinson recognized, was an invaluable experience. "In the '90s, Robinson was responsible for many of the Giorgio Armani power suits that female big shots have relied upon when dealmaking and strong-arming," wrote the Washington Post's Robin Givhan. In late 1994, he was wooed away from Le Collezioni by the Japanese owners of the Anne Klein Collection. The New York-based design house was one of the top purveyors of classic executive gear for American women, but in the 1990s had fallen on hard times. Its image had suffered as its look grew to be considered a bit too staid. The company had hired a Hollywood designer, Richard Tyler, to revitalize it, but the move backfired and the collection was critiqued as too young, too sexy, for the true Anne Klein loyalist. Tyler was unceremoniously fired from the Collection in late 1994 after sales plummeted, and Robinson, still a relative unknown in the industry, was brought on board.

When he arrived back in New York to take over, Robinson found himself the head designer of a major collection at the age of only 28--yet among his predecessors at Anne Klein there had been equal novices: Donna Karan was just 26 when she took the same job in 1973. "This is the only company in America where you can become head designer and really be the designer," Robinson told Chance in Essence. The first few weeks were rough, however: he was introduced to baffled staff in the company showroom in a private meeting, and as he recalled in an interview with Kim France in Harper's Bazaar, he faced "a bunch of frowning little monsters." One witness to the meeting, Virginia Smith, then head of public relations for the company, told France that the young designer "looked slightly mortified to be in front of this group of people, and I thought, I feel kind of sorry for him."

Just before the debut of his first collection for Anne Klein, Robinson termed himself "28 going on 50" in an interview with Turk in the Los Angeles Times. But he loved being back on familiar territory after years abroad. "This is the best country on Earth," he told Turk. "Everything works, I'm the only person, I think, walking around New York grinning." Yet some suspected that Anne Klein, after its Tyler debacle, was a sinking ship. Robinson recalled about this time "that it was almost more important for me to focus on bettering the name," as he told Harper's Bazaar, and because of this, he and Smith spent a great deal of time strategizing. A romance eventually blossomed, one that they kept secret for as long as they could.

Meanwhile, Robinson dedicated himself to making Anne Klein Collection a success: with his first collection of clothes, he visited several cities and held seminars with store executives and sales personnel that showed what Turk termed a return to the true Anne Klein look: "safe, sexy, understated, finely tailored day and evening wear in luxurious fabrics." Reviews were mixed: "There are some who think that Patrick Robinson is in way over his head," sniped Women's Wear Daily in a late 1995 issue that previewed the Spring 1996 designer lines. But Robinson's third collection for Anne Klein was not even shipped to stores when Japanese executives decided to close the Anne Klein Collection (its lower-priced line, Anne Klein II, was still commercially successful.)

Fortunately for Robinson, his paramour was still gainfully employed-- Smith had been offered a job at Calvin Klein shortly before the dark day of the announcement. Out of a job, Robinson traveled through Asia for several weeks as a tonic. Upon his return, he hired a staff and set up a design house in his New York City loft, and began courting backers. A line of clothing finally bearing his own name was launched for the fall/winter season of 1997 after Robinson signed a deal with an Italian manufacturer, Coba. He was rather fortunate in light of the terms of the agreement: Coba, based near Urbino, did not invest in his company and receive a controlling interest, but rather gave him a break on the costs of manufacturing the clothes in return for a promise that the designer would stay with their firm when his business grew successful. "We think Patrick is a very talented designer, even if he didn't have a brilliant experience at Anne Klein," Domenico Toselli, Coba's sole director, told Women's Wear Daily's Samantha Conti. "He's young and good, and we want to give him a hand," Toselli continued.

Robinson's first trunk show sold $65,000 the first day at Saks Jandel in Washington, D.C. He presented Asian-influenced sportswear carrying price tags ranging from $125 to $1000. Givhan praised the debut collection, and she noted the line was lacking the standard "high- concept theme" that most designers attempt, as she reported in the Washington Post. "He simply has created beautiful garments in brushed alpaca, nubuck, python and pony....The clothes have shelf life and relevance," she wrote.

The Asian mood of his first collection fit in perfectly with a late nineties vibe. His catalysts, Robinson told Givhan, would always be global. Theorizing about his "signature look," he said it would always reflect "something about adventure, something with lots of cultures mixed in," he said in the Washington Post interview. "I'm looking not only to America for inspiration, but the world....I'm a black man and I love being that. I love being different than other people. That's part of it, too." Early in 1998 Robinson was able to move out of his Soho loft into a separate workspace on Wooster Street. Smith was working for Calvin Klein, and the pair chatted on the phone several times a day. They dine out evenings--often after a very long workday for both--and have no plans to join forces again professionally. "Coming home and seeing her is the highlight of my whole day," Robinson told France in the Harper's Bazaar interview. "It's the one thing I cherish. Besides, I couldn't afford her," he added.

Further Reading

Sources

• Essence, September 1995, p. 22.
• Harper's Bazaar, March 1998; June 1998.
• Los Angeles Times, June 29, 1995, p. E1.
• Washington Post, August 21, 1997, p. F3.
• Women's Wear Daily, December 21, 1994, p. 8; March 1, 1995, p, 8;
• August 8, 1995, p. G8; November 2, 1995, p. 6; January 7, 1997, p. 2;
• January 28, 1997, p. 6;

— Carol Brennan