Sarah Brown has left her position as chief model officer of Violet Gray, WWD has realized.
Brown, a former magnificence director at Vogue, first joined the corporate in 2021 as govt director of Violet Lab, the retailer’s model improvement arm, earlier than being appointed chief model officer in March. She left “to pursue different alternatives,” a spokesperson for the corporate advised WWD.
Her departure comes shortly after founder Cassandra Gray purchased again Violet Gray from Coupang-owned Farfetch in September with the assistance of personal fairness investor Sherif Guirgis.
Monetary phrases of the deal weren’t disclosed, although Gray advised WWD on the time: “There was by no means any query if I may have purchased again Violet Gray, even three months after the acquisition, I’d’ve. It wasn’t on the market till now.”
As a part of the deal, Gray turned chairman and inventive director of Violet Lab. “We’ve been capable of get behind manufacturers through the years,” Gray mentioned. “However we’ve by no means had that infrastructure. That is about organizing that core competency and having the ability to finest serve them by incubation and acceleration.”
The Los Angeles-based firm started as a magnificence weblog in 2012 and moved into e-commerce in 2014. Among the many skincare, make-up, perfume and hair care manufacturers it carries right now are Eighth Day, Victoria Beckham Magnificence, Dr. Barbara Sturm, Dyson and Augustinus Bader, which was a breakout success at Violet Gray when it launched in 2018.
Violet Gray has lengthy operated a stand-alone L.A. boutique, and this month added a second brick-and-mortar level of sale at Hirshleifers, the family-owned division retailer in Manhasset, N.Y. Along with providing a curated assortment of merchandise bought at Violet Gray, the shop-in-shop contains a vary of Goop merchandise, too — a Violet Gray first.
Marci Hirshleifer, Cassandra Gray and Lori Hirshleifer.
Courtesy of Violet Gray/Ben Hassett
The eastward enlargement marked Gray’s first massive transfer since shopping for the corporate again from Farfetch, which had acquired Violet Gray in January 2022 for $49.4 million in money, $1.3 million in reverse vesting shares and $5 million of restricted inventory items because it ready a luxurious magnificence foray of its personal.
Farfetch Magnificence debuted that April with greater than 100 manufacturers, and wound down simply over a 12 months later. Shortly after, mother or father Farfetch was acquired by South Korea-based Coupang for $500 million.
Different luxurious retailers, too, have confronted headwinds of late: Internet-a-porter confirmed in September it could shutter its magnificence enterprise and pivot to an affiliate mannequin in 2025 and a month later the struggling e-tailer was bought to rival Mytheresa. Matches, however, was positioned into administration by Frasers Group in March, simply two months after the group bought the e-tailer from Apax Companions for 52 million kilos. Frasers subsequently purchased Matches’ IP.
However Gray and Guirgis seem decided to buck the development. “We simply need to useful resource the corporate with the distinctive execution-oriented individuals and technique to ship,” Guirgis advised WWD in September.
