Norma Kamali to Design Collection for Wal-Mart

Norma Kamali, a fashion designer known for innovative designs like her sleeping bag coat, her use of silk parachutes as fabric and fashion-forward take on jersey sportswear, will design a collection for Wal-Mart, in the latest mass merchant-meets-fashion designer collaboration.

The collection, to be produced via a licensing agreement with Cherokee Inc., Norma Kamali and Wal-Mart, will be offered in select Wal-Mart stores beginning in fall 2008.

Kamali is no stranger to partnerships with mass retailers, however – in 2006 she joined forces with sportswear brand Everlast and Spiegel to bring her brand of multifunctional, mix-and-match style to a wider audience of women.

As with the collections she's created for Everlast and Spiegel – offered at lower price points than her namesake Norma Kamali Collection – Kamali said in a phone interview on Wednesday, Feb. 27, that she will carry the Wal-Mart collection in her store on 56th Street in New York. (Currently, there are no Wal-Mart stores in Manhattan).

"It's a great opportunity to do what I love to do," said Kamali, which ultimately for her is to help women look and feel great through well-designed clothes.

"It's solving the problem that women all have with self-esteem – there are always a couple of days a month where we don't feel so great," she said.

In the case of her partnership with Wal-Mart, she'll be able to offer a self-esteem boost for her biggest audience yet, specifically targeting style-conscious people on a budget – students, for example, or women who have a family to take care of, she said.

"It's about good value at a good price," she said. "We're all looking for great prices."

For Kamali's collection for Wal-Mart, she said that you'll be able to build a full wardrobe with every collection, but emphasized that it will consist of "concepts, not pieces" that Kamali said will have a timeless quality." She said they'll look of-the-moment, but they'll still work five years from now and "not be boring."

In other words, they'll make the wearer feel good, stylish, and fashionable without looking like a fashion victim.

"Products should be timeless," she said. "It's components that create style, rather than fashion that creates style."

The Wal-Mart collection by Norma Kamali will be an ongoing collaboration. And why partner with Wal-Mart? Beyond the obvious advantage of reaching a huge number of women, she said the partnership actually came about from a series of coincidences and "it just worked."

"It was not a hot pursuit," she explained, "but it started to sound so exciting, with all the possibilities."

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