French Connection Clothing
French Connection clothing – three decades of fashion forward style
Beginning life in 1972, French Connection founder Stephen Marks has carefully crafted a reputation for clean cut, smart styling at affordable prices. Now established as an instantly recognisable high street brand, such success has been driven by a promise of design led ideals combined with unique presentation.The range of Men’s designer clothing has two distinct and powerful brand identities. Clothing falling under the French Connection banner is considered more reserved, yet smart and is aimed at an aspirational audience for who style rules over branding. FCUK, however offers a more youthful approach to style, with bolder branding and more visual style cues.
FCUK – French Connection brand causes controversy
In the spring of 97’ the FCUK brand was born. The name was born out of chance following a fax from Hong Kong to the United Kingdom labelled ‘from FCHK to FCUK’. The somewhat risky nature of the title caused a stir within the world of Men’s fashion. T shirts with titles such as ‘lucky fcuk’ and ‘mile high fcuk’ became a major success and source of controversy in equal measure.Despite record levels of sales and exposure, all did not go perfectly. When French Connection clothing attempted to protect its trademark they were unsuccessful. Mr Justice Rattee described the brand identity as tasteless. Furthermore, the public began to see the campaign as over exposed and the novelty began to wear off.
As a result the image of the brand became tarnished with certain members of the fashion community and sales slowed. A rethink and a time for a fresh plan of attack became evident.
French Connection – affordable quality and style lead latest success
A return to core French Connection values of distinctive and original fashion has seen the brand ignite once more as a key leader of Menswear trends. An extensive range of shirting, knitwear and polo shirts, all carrying these philosophies, have allowed French Connection to enjoy renewed success the world over.Success has been added to further by recent marketing campaigns. These have included the use of high impact projections and light motion banners as a point of difference. When this is combined with conventional methods such as fashion press and tv, it’s not hard to realise why French Connection now enjoys such a lofty status among the fashion savvy.
