The artist and sustainable fashion designer announces the opening of Philip Karto St Tropez, his first retail premises, selling signature Philip Karto luxury recycled vintage bags alongside the designer’s ready-to-wear ‘Prohibition’ clothing line.
May 24, 2022 – Florida, Miami; The Philip Karto collection of customised luxury handbags are currently sold in 87 stores across 17 countries, but Philip Karto St Tropez is a first standalone store for the luxury brand and signals a return to the French designer’s roots.
Originally from Cannes, designer Philip Karto fell out of love with the fashion industry a decade ago, unable to reconcile the huge levels of waste associated with designing clothes and accessories for fast fashion.
In 2017 Karto famously borrowed and painted his mother’s Louis Vuitton Keepall to give it a new lease of life; its newly eye-catching, bold appearance meant he was unable to walk down the street without being asked where he had bought it. On a whim, Karto purchased a handful of vintage Louis Vuitton bags and proceeded to deconstruct and clean them before replacing leather pieces with sustainable recuperated snake or crocodile skin and swapping steel parts for 925 silver trimmings and fixtures. Each piece was then transformed with his colourful, tongue-in-cheek designs featuring painted characters, irreverent objects and graffiti-style tags. He asked a friend at Paris’ celebrated Montaigne Market to take the upcycled bags on consignment: they sold out in two days and the Philip Karto brand was born.
Today each piece is handmade in Karto’s Miami atelier using his philosophy of ‘Reuse, Reduce, Recycle’ and painted using designs to inspire positivity, passion, love, humour, hope and peace. The Philip Karto collection spans unique bags, luggage, motorcycle helmets and more and lists Bella Hadid, Miley Cyrus, Puff Daddy and Floyd Mayweather as fans. Karto has collaborated with high profile designers including Karl Lagerfeld; a ‘Rock’n’Roll Hermes’ line is currently underway.
Karto’s ready-to-wear Prohibition line follows the same principals of recycling and transformation. The collection features ‘worn’ clothing from denim to hoodies and T-shirts which are intended as a luxe antidote to fast fashion, inspired by the passing of time.
Philip Karto commented: ‘I like to wear a piece that has lived; that is why my Prohibition line smells of life. I wash and re-wash worn out or damaged garments. They are then stained and ‘cleanly soiled’ so that all pieces in my collection give my clients the impression that they have worn my clothes their entire lives.’
The Philip Karto boutique is located at 37 Pl. de la Garonne, 83990 Saint-Tropez, France
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