Paris-based Spanish designer Arturo Obegero launched his eponymous brand in 2020 and counts Beyoncé, Adele, Lady Gaga and Harry Styles among his clients. But last year, Obegero hit a wall. He had a healthy order book and worldwide stockists, but cash was not flowing. He started to feel like the system was rigged.
“The margins we work with as designers become incredibly slim, not to mention all of the advance payments I have to make to my suppliers and ateliers once I receive an order from a retailer,” he says. “Some retailers pay as little as 20 per cent upfront before delivery, and if you are a small designer, that can cripple your cash flow.”
Last year, he decided it was time to try something new. He pulled the brand out of all of its 22 worldwide stockists and transitioned the business to a made-to-order model. “Throughout those four years, we were profitable enough to survive and produce the next collections; however, at some point it became very difficult to grow without external investment,” he recalls. “This is when I started to see clients coming to us with custom order requests, and decided to turn my attention solely to the made-to-order market.” Obegero’s strategy proved the right decision, as cash flow improved. “This year marks the first year where we are not only profitable because of our higher margins and lower costs, but we can grow the brand and invest in additional projects.”
As the costs of doing business rise, a number of designer-led brands are shifting towards the made-to-order model, including Robert Wun, Steve O Smith and Standing Ground. This enables them to hone in on their craft and elevate the brand and product, while retaining tight control of production and drastically reducing waste.
But the shift doesn’t come without challenges. The couture-adjacent made-to-order model also inevitably works better for occasion and eveningwear, and such clients can be hard to find and harder still to retain. And designers need to have built reach for their work to be discovered — whether through celebrity placements, runway shows or a previously developed ready-to-wear network of retail. As wholesale falters, is it worth the switch?
Control and creative freedom
This business tug of war we’re witnessing across many independent and small designers is rooted in the ongoing implosion of the wholesale model as we know it. Department stores, boutiques and international online buying groups were once discovery platforms for skyrocketing independent brands such as JW Anderson, Erdem and Kiko Kostadinov. Retailers like Ssense, Luisaviaroma, Matches and Net-a-Porter were key benefactors in a young designer’s development, making a single season’s order a highly coveted golden ticket.
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Today, the landscape looks drastically different. Matches has gone (a comeback in some form is anticipated, but it’s unlikely to operate a wholesale model); Ssense is restructuring after it filed for bankruptcy protection after struggling with the Trump administration’s new import tariffs into the US; Luisaviaroma is teetering on the brink of collapse, citing similar tariff problems (the US is one of its top three markets); and Net-a-Porter is under new ownership, which has brought a change in leadership and strategy.
The exact Covid-19 aftermath further accelerated Wun to re-think his entire strategy, and look deeper into his own meaning as a designer. “During the pandemic, I couldn’t go to Paris to meet the buyers for my ready-to-wear collection, which got me thinking about the longevity of it all if we ever lost this process,” he says.
The retailer now has a chance to stabilise while maintaining operations with the executive leadership team intact. The company has $371 million in debt, according to the filing.
Wun transitioned his namesake label to a made-to-order business model and joined the Paris Couture Week schedule in 2023, stopping the production of ready-to-wear entirely. “We had an influx of so many custom orders and celebrity clients that at the end of that year — 80 per cent of my business was made up of those special orders — so we decided to employ a full made-to-order business model.”
This way of working aligns with his brand DNA, which explores concepts about the human spirit and the soul (each look speaks into the idea of the layers of what it means to be human, intimately portraying one’s life). “Being able to have a personal relationship with clients who live in the world of my creations, or working with museums who want to purchase what I make, allows the clothes to live as intended, and my design world becomes a lot more personable and intentional in its creation,” the designer says.
The shift also gave him more control and creative freedom. “My strategy and business plan have always been about the vision. I wouldn’t say that I won’t go back to ready-to-wear or create a capsule collection ever again; I just would want to do it when the time is right and it makes sense with our plan of expansion. Having a stable business with higher margins and stable sales, alongside the right customer and freedom of creation is what my intention has always been. Growth is not only about being bigger, but also better. People need to actually understand how incredibly saturated the industry has become. Do we really need that many clothes?”
For LVMH Prize winner Steve O Smith, celebrity placements led him to a made-to-order model. “We dressed Eddie Redmayne and his wife, Hannah, for the 2024 Met Gala, and afterwards we had a huge influx of new clients and special orders. Seeing that economic process of receiving payment up-front, utilising and purchasing only the exact fabric needed, and dedicating time to the creation of those drawings into looks was my sustainable way of avoiding collisions as a brand, and focusing on the meaningfulness of my design.”
In his case, Smith wants the business to always revert back to a model that is offering the ability to future proof his production and capital. “Having another influx of orders since the LVMH prize announcement allowed me to look at cash flow and decide how to expand our production, and how to invest back into the business as our margins and production become optimised without wasting any resources. That also gives me the freedom to decide when I want to show my collections, which is why I didn’t show this September. If people are already still interested in the clothes that already exist, there is no point investing money in showing new ones yet.”
Not for everyone
All of this said, for the majority of emerging designers, wholesale is still a necessary route to building a customer base.
Having a retail presence gives a much broader picture of what customers want. “I believe it’s really important for every designer to experience going into retail, because it gives you unmatched insight into the data of what your customer wants from you.” says Stavros Karelis, founder of concept store Machine-A, which supports emerging talent through orders and support. “So many of the designers we have championed gain insight for the very first time into an environment that makes you understand how the customer experiences the collections, and how you compare to the other offerings on the market. Is your price point appropriate? How do your clothes translate in real life? What does a customer outside of your core circle actually connect with? It’s an incredibly important learning experience for them.”
For some designers, a hybrid may be the best way forward. During her London Fashion Week show this September, designer Dilara Fındıkoğlu announced her increased focus on expanding the ready-to-wear side of her business, offering more looks, shoes and accessories available to purchase. After winning the Queen Elizabeth II Award for British Design, London-based Patrick McDowell revealed that they are launching ready-to-wear, though with tightly controlled production volumes and distribution.
After winning the Queen Elizabeth II Award for British Design, McDowell is meeting the moment with a new ready-to-wear line — but says mass production is off the table.
McDowell says building a ready-to-wear wardrobe for select stockists was the natural next step for the brand, allowing it to acquire new customers. “When you work in the way we do, when everything is bespoke, it takes a long time and it’s very expensive. There is only a small group of people who understand that process and can buy into it. So it felt like the right time to explore ready-to-wear and offer our clients something they can buy more easily, in the places they already shop. Our client likes to get dressed up wherever they go, but we wanted to build out more of an everyday wardrobe of items they can wear to her workplace or to dinner with family.”
For many emerging designers today, it comes down to a more conscious way of doing business, whether through made-to-order, selective wholesaling or a mixture of the two. Smith believes fashion’s future will be shaped by a move towards involving customers more in the process, and away from the current system of largely guessing what might sell. “Making someone a piece of clothing is so incredibly personal; you psychologically have to dive into their way of thinking. You need to understand what they want to feel, how they want their body to move — that, to me, is the true definition of luxury.”
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Patrick McDowell launches ready-to-wear
