Dior Makeup about to get a lot cooler with new creative director
Dior Makeup is about to get a whole lot cooler, thanks to the appointment this week of Peter Philips as the new creative and image director.
If anyone can translate Dior’s new vision into the kind of affordable, everyday luxuries (lipsticks, nail polish and such) that are a fashion brand’s bread and butter, Philips can.
As the creative director of the multi-billion dollar Chanel makeup brand from 2008 to 2013, he helped give credibility to the funky colored nail polish trend we now take for granted, creating colors such as Khaki, Jade and the gray-beige Particuliere and putting them in Chanel packaging.
He came up with trend-setting makeup looks for Karl Lagerfeld’s Chanel runways, including temporary Chanel tattoos that spawned a waiting list before they even went on sale, and revamped the brand’s lipstick offerings, developing the more contemporry Rouge Coco Shine range, including the popular shade “Boy.”
And now, he’s going to work for Dior, which has been in the midst of a turnaround since Raf Simons took over as the brand’s creative director in 2012, designing all the ready-to-wear and couture collections.
“I am honored by the responsibilities that are entrusted to me by Christian Dior Makeup, whose values, savoir-faire and innovation I respect. I am very excited to work with all the teams involved and immerse myself in the world of Dior,” Philips said in a statement.
Like Simons, Philips hails from Belgium, where he spent a lot of time at his stepfather’s sandwich shop, which served students at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, including some of the famous “Antwerp 6” fashion designers, namely Ann Demuelemeester and Dirk Bikkembergs, who were heroes to Philips and Simons alike.
“I called them the colorful birds of paradise,” Philips told me during an interview in L.A. in 2011. He enrolled in the school’s fashion program after studying graphic design.
He worked for years doing makeup for runway shows and ad campaigns before Chanel came calling. And now, he’s bound for the LVMH-owned Dior, where he has big shoes to fill, following makeup artist Pat McGrath’s tradition of creating wildly imaginative runway looks for the brand.
I can’t wait to see what Philips and Simons cook up together. Apparently, the two have been friends for years.
Philips will show his first runway looks for the Dior Cruise collection show in May. His first product range will arrive for fall 2015.
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