It was only a matter of time

Tom Ford International, the luxury line from the former creative head of Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent, is seeking funding to expand into women’s apparel. Currently, Tom Ford designs menswear in addition to a sunglass collection and a fragrance collaboration with Estee Lauder. The design house is said to be looking for an investment of $50 million or more.

Tom Ford launched his company in 2004 after a hugely successful turnaround effort at Italian luxury brand Gucci, owned by French retailer PPR. He served as creative director at Gucci and also at Yves Saint-Laurent after the company’s acquisition of that brand. His campaigns for Gucci were often racy, with some ads even deemed too inappropriate to publish such as the photo of the woman with a “G” Gucci logo shaved into her pubic hair.

The luxury goods market has been challenging in the global downturn, but experts believe shoppers are still willing to spend if products are unique and exclusive. I am certain that if Tom Ford was to come back to womenswear, the ladies would line up.

When Tom Ford first came to Gucci it was a faltering luxury goods company that was seeking to strengthen its women’s ready-to-wear presence as a part of its brand overhaul. At the time, “no one would dream of wearing Gucci,” said Dawn Mello, then the company’s creative director. Mello hired Ford as the brand’s chief women’s ready-to-wear designer in 1990.

In 1994 Ford was promoted to creative director and in his first year he was credited with putting the glamour back into fashion introducing Halston-style velvet hipsters, skinny satin shirts and car-finish metallic patent boots. In 1995, he brought in French stylist Carine Roitfeld (now Editor-in-Chief of Italian Vogue) and photographer Mario Testino to create a series of new, modern ad campaigns for the company. Between 1995 and 1996, sales at Gucci increased by 90%. By 1999, the house, which had been almost bankrupt when Ford joined, was valued at about $4.3 billion.

When Gucci acquired the house of Yves Saint-Laurent, Ford was named the creative director of that label as well. Like his work at Gucci, Ford was able to catapult the classic fashion house back into the mainstream.

What Ford did for fashion, season after season, was constantly bring up sex and remind everyone just how well it sells. Subtly wasn’t his specialty and his advertising campaigns for the YSL fragrances Opium (with a red-haired Sophie Dahl completely naked wearing only a necklace and stiletto heels in a sexually suggestive pose) and YSL M7 (with martial arts champion Samuel de Cubber in complete full-frontal nudity) have been famous and provocative by pushing fragrance ads to a new level of creativity in artistic expression and commercial impact.

In April 2004, Ford shocked the fashion world when he parted company with the Gucci group after him and CEO Domenico de Sole, who is credited as Ford’s partner in the success story that is Gucci, failed to agree with PPR bosses over creative control of the Group. Fans said it was the end of glamour.

Ford’s impact on the womenswear industry was earth shattering and every season at Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent he created an “It” piece, a must-have, a season-defining trend. There were jersey dresses in 1996, beaded jeans, sheer baby-doll tops, the silk-charmeuse peasant blouse, velvet tuxedos, voluminous caftans, mod minidresses and $75 condom cases. And who can forget the accessories as his signatures became horn-handled bags like the Mombasa and he brought back Gucci’s signature horsebit detail as well as the iconic “Jackie bag.”

Whatever he touched turned to gold and I am praying to the fashion Gods that he’ll return to us very soon.