Who’s the boss in Singapore?
‘Boss is a very iconic brand and I’d always been a fan, so it wasn’t a tough decision to jump on board,’ says ‘Thor’ star Chris Hemsworth.
Hugo Boss opened its new store in Singapore with a blast of star power, showing the importance of the Southeast Asian market to the German luxury fashion brand.
Avengers stars Chris Hemsworth and Sebastian Stan were on hand to celebrate the newly revamped store at The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands. Hemsworth is the ambassador for the Boss Bottled men’s fragrances, in particular the newly released Boss Bottled United.
The Thor star, who did a meet-and-greet with over 300 screaming fans at the Sands Theatre foyer, said his partnership with Boss began a couple of years ago. “I’d always been a fan and it’s obviously a very iconic brand with a number of wonderful people involved, so it wasn’t a very tough decision to jump on board,” he said. “I felt honored to be asked, especially for what the brand spoke for and the message behind the campaign was very unique and important, so it’s a wonderful opportunity.”
Stores Specialists, Inc. marketing communications manager Michelle Suarez, merchandising general manager April Reyes, and Hugo Boss merchandising manager Kristin Tiongco pose with Chris Hemsworth.
Stan, who plays Bucky Barnes/the Winter Soldier in the Captain America and Avengers series and starred in Boss’s 2018 “Summer of Ease” campaign, voiced similar sentiments (see sidebar).
At the store opening Boss also introduced its first Singaporean brand ambassador, Olympic gold-medal swimmer Joseph Schooling, who collaborated on a capsule collection and shot a new video campaign with the brand (see sidebar).
Hugo Boss chief brand officer Ingo Wilts said the concept of the expanded, 5,500 square-foot store was part of Boss’s new brand strategy. “We really want you guys to have a clear and distinctive idea of how we see Boss in the future,” he said. “We thought, how we can make this more modern, more sophisticated, but still very comfortable to shop for our customers?”
The result is the Marina Bay Sands store’s predominantly white, modular interiors, where the menswear, womenswear and accessories pop against sleek and shiny surfaces, and there are seating areas for customers to relax in.
Star-studded event
Celebrity couple Solenn Heussaff and Nico Bolzico look sharp in head-to-toe Boss at the Marina Bay Sands store opening.
Over 1,000 guests from all over the world attended the star-studded “Boss Unveils” event, which featured a fashion show the following night. Mingling with VIPs from Hugo Boss were industry leaders, celebrities, society figures, media and influencers.
Boss’s business partners were encouraged to bring celebs from their home countries, so the team from Philippine partner Stores Specialists, Inc. (SSI), led by marketing communications manager Michelle Suarez, merchandising general manager April Reyes, and Hugo Boss merchandising manager Kristin Tiongco, brought “it” couple Solenn Heusaff and Nico Bolzico to Singapore, where fans would ask them for selfies everywhere they went. The couple also had a special photo op with Chris Hemsworth, walked the red carpet and sat front row at the fashion show looking sharp in head-to-toe Boss.
“I like Boss because it is simple, classic and classy at the same time,” Bolzico said.
Sports tailoring
At the Marina Bay Sands Expo and Convention Centre Boss presented its fall/winter 2018 collection for men and women, which was shown for the first time since New York Fashion Week.
Hemsworth and Stan were seated front row, enjoying Boss’s more athleisure, less corporate and buttoned-down looks, with patchwork logo jackets, baseball shirts with piping, and tailored trousers with drawstring waists.
Sports tailoring: Boss’s fall/winter 2018 collection for men combines athletic influences with the brand’s heritage of suiting and tailoring.
“We named it ‘sports tailoring,’” Wilts explains. “There are especially baseball influences… it’s such a New York thing, baseball. This is combined with our heritage, and then a layer of protective surfaces, like rainwear, is also present.”
Meanwhile, the women’s Gallery Collection is designer Jason Wu’s last as artistic director of Boss Womenswear. The highlight of the collection was Wu reimagining Boss’s iconic man’s suit for a woman, with a stronger shoulder and contoured waist.
For the finale Boss played the powerful yet poignant video campaign shot with Joseph Schooling, who closed the show by leading all 45 models down the runway.
Then, the black curtains ringing the runway fell to reveal the space for the after-party, where international model Park Soo Joo and Swedish DJ Mike Perry took turns DJ-ing and getting guests to dance the rest of the night away — definitely a boss way to end a Boss event.
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In the Philippines, Boss is exclusively distributed by Stores Specialists, Inc. and stores are located at City of Dreams, Greenbelt 5, Shangri-La East Wing, Rustan’s Shangri-La, Rustan’s Cebu and 158 Designer’s Blvd. Newport Mall. Visit www.hugoboss.com and www.ssilife.com.ph or follow @ssilife on Instagram for more information.
