Today’s contestants are Derek Lam, the hip young designer that’s taken New York by storm, and Ivanka Trump, the workaholic heiress with a thing for shoes.
Lam served Trump with a cease-and-desist order for her Cadie wedge which, at $150, looks remarkably similar to Lam’s own $780 Ayami wedge. Lawyers for Lam told WWD that “consumers will be confused” by the case of the identical wedges, given that the two shoes look so similar but are so dissimilar in price.
And too true: I am confused! Both pairs of shoes are available in both black and beige; both pairs of shoes were imported; both pairs of shoes appear to have leather straps and a rubber sole—it’s totally reasonable that Derek Lam’s original designs should come at a hefty markup, but Ivanka was able to make the same shoe, and hope to profit from it, with more or less exactly the same material at 19% of the cost. Ivanka may be a dishonest fraud (allegedly), but Derek Lam’s prices don’t exactly seem conscionable in this light.
Derek Lam Ayami Wedge
Ivanka Trump Cadie Wedge
[via WWD]
