Yamamoto bags Mandarina Duck

Yohji Yamamoto has signed a deal with Italian luggage specialist Mandarina Duck. The designer, who also collaborates with Adidas on its Y-3 sportswear line, will design a line of bags, travel cases and accessories under the name Y's Mandarina. The new collection will debut for Spring 2007 in showrooms in Milan, Paris, Antwerp, Tokyo and New York. "It will be designed with Yohji's DNA," said Yamamoto chief executive, Keizo Tamoto, of the collaboration. He told WWD that the travel theme has featured strongly in Yamamoto's collections and that the explosion in global travel had prompted him to want to design this collection. "This category, we think, will become more and more important," said Tamoto.

The range will be approximately 30 to 50 percent more expensive than the standard Mandarina Duck products. It is expected to generate annual sales of EUR20 million by the third year of the collaboration. Distribution will include specialty and department stores as well as a number of freestanding Y's and Mandarina Duck stores."This is the first collaboration we have in our 29 years of business," said Mandarina Group vice president Sergio Rao. "It is a strategic milestone."