Armani

Giorgio Armani is set to launch a Travel Collection handcrafted for men and women in luxury materials like patent crocodile skin, supple calfskin lined with smooth nappa leather, Sassy reports.

David Beckham's Armani campaign is causing a stir among London fans, WWD reports.

Selfridges has reported a 50 percent leap in sales of Armani white men's briefs after the British press reported Beckham would be the new face, of Emporio Armani underwear.

Just yesterday, Beyonce officially became the new face of Emporio Armani's Diamonds fragrance, complete with a big launch at the Herald Square Macy's in NYC. The first 150 people to pick up a bottle even got to meet the R&B singer herself. She has also previously done two fragrance campaigns for Tommy Hilfiger. She also performed during an Armani showing in 2006, so is no stranger to the design house.

A while back, Dolce & Gabbana collaborated with Motorola to release the D&G/Motorola Gold Razr, which was basically exactly the same as all the other Razrs except that it was gold, had the D&G logo, and sold for $500 instead of the usual $100 (at that rate, you'd be better off buying an iPhone!) Nevertheless, Prada recently collaborated with LG to release their own cell phone also. And now, rumors are circulating that Armani may be the next design house to make their mark on the cell phone world, and may be considering a partnership with Samsung.

Is it true? Will we see an Armani phone soon? Armani denies it. “It is speculation in the Korean marketplace. If we have new products to announce in new categories you will be among the first to know it.”

However, a Samsung spokesperson told the Yonhap news Agency in South Korea that “We are now in talks with Armani to work together in making premium goods such as mobile phones and televisions.”

Fashion Week Daily reports that talks between Armani and Samsung have been going on throughout the year! “Armani is expected to contribute designs and be actively involved in new product development,” the report continued.

So since I can't traipse around Europe, sit in the front row of every couture show, wine and dine with fashion's best, and come home to write about it, I've been spending some time scouring the world wide web for the best photos and videos from this week's couture shows. The following photos are some interesting ones that I found from the Armani collection. They strike me as strange simply because...they're so normal! Almost every other couture collection I've seen has been crazy, brilliant, and way too extravagant for any real woman to wear any of those clothes. But practicality was never the point, because couture is about art, not the real world. So while the Armani couture collection is great without a doubt -- I even find myself looking at some items and saying, hey, I would love to wear that -- it's that very thought that strikes me as odd. You're not supposed to be able to look at true couture and feel that you could wear it! If you can, well, then, something is not right, because these are not clothes for real people! But all the same, they're gorgeous clothes, they just fall short of the expectations I normally hold for a collection that is supposed to be haute couture.

Photo Credit: Style Crunch.