To launch their debut swim collection with Malia Mills, kate spade new york created “Swan Dive or Cannonball,” a chic, colorful video piece starring girl-about-town Hailey Gates.  Brad Goreski, the label’s Exclusive Brand Stylist, styled the video, in which Gates lounges by a pool sporting the Cockatoo Calendar Girl Bikini.  She later looks sassy yet elegant as she dances around the water’s edge to change a record on a vintage player, wearing another version of the bikini.

The kate spade new york creative team has taken the fun, lovely content a step further by adding an interactive component — viewers have a choice of two musical options to hear when the video begins, then again when Gates selects a new record halfway through.  For the video’s finale, the audience can select which kind of jump she takes — a swan dive or a cannonball — from the pristine turquoise pool’s diving board.

Adding a participatory aspect dovetails perfectly with the brand’s social media strategy — when we interviewed Senior Vice President of Global Brand Marketing Kyle Andrew on the brand’s overall social media blueprint, particularly in terms of the kate spade new york video content, Andrew noted that “When it comes to viewership, we definitely challenge ourselves, because we have such great content.”

Disclosure: kate spade new york is owned by Fifth & Pacific Companies, Inc., the sponsor of this site.

Lucky Brand epitomizes Southern California cool, and the label’s new blog, A Lucky Life, does the same — and more.  From snapshots of Lucky-outfitted bands performing at Austin’s SXSW to street style photos of the brand’s employees, the fresh editorial component perfectly articulates Lucky’s authentic, all-American, laid-back style.

Go behind-the-scenes with David Gandy on A Lucky Life.

A Lucky Life is the creative work of Style Director Karin Cole (and she’s got all the best tips and secrets to embracing California cool).  The site is smartly divided into four categories — Backstage Pass highlights the behind-the-scenes at Lucky Brand HQ, Travel Journal balances Fashion Week exploits with stylish recommendations for, say, a road trip, and Out + About encompasses everything from the aforementioned street style shots to vintage surfboard finds.  Last but not least, Lucky Picks puts together all the brand’s best looks, mixed in with great finds from around the web.

Seamlessly integrating Lucky Brand’s style with cultural goings-on and a peek into the creative process behind the brand, the new official blog has been getting great attention.  And it’s not even three months old — we can’t wait to keep reading and to pick up further fashionable tips from Karin Cole.

Disclosure: Lucky Brand is owned by Fifth & Pacific Companies, Inc., the sponsor of this site.

The High Low sat down with Fifth & Pacific Companies, Inc. (our editorially independent site’s sponsor) to learn how a company can most effectively tell its story — especially a new one — in this era of extensive, multi-platform media.

When it came to changing Liz Claiborne Inc.’s name to Fifth & Pacific Companies Inc., we needed to make sure we told people about it in a way that was memorable and exciting. We also needed to reach all the audiences that count to explain why it’s a new business with a new strategy. Here’s how we did it — with multimedia that takes advantage of digital, social, and other new channels.

Video: Name Announcement
About: CEO Bill McComb tells the world about Fifth & Pacific Companies
Audience: Employees, Investors, Media, Partners/Stakeholders, Industry Influencers
How we shared it: picked up by traditional media and blogs/sites, tweeted out by Fifth & Pacific Companies, shared via brands’ social media channels

Video: 30 Second Sizzle Spot
About: Narrated by fashion guru Tim Gunn, this video highlights the four brands of Fifth & Pacific Companies, captures the essence of the new corporate name, and touches on the new strategic focus
Audience: Investors, Consumers, Industry Influencers
How we shared it: aired on Taxi TV and Captivate’s Elevator Network, posted on Fifth & Pacific Companies’ website, shared via Fifth & Pacific Companies’ social media channels

Video: Our Brands, Our Consumers
About: Every great brand depends on great consumers…here’s what ours had to say about the brands that make up Fifth & Pacific Companies
Audience: Investors, partners/stakeholders, media, consumers
How we shared it: posted on Fifth & Pacific Companies’ website, shared via Fifth & Pacific Companies’ social media channels, shared via brands’ social media channels

Name: A Detailed Look at Fifth & Pacific Companies and Its Brands
Subject: CEO Bill McComb and the brands’ creative directors take you inside Fifth & Pacific Companies and highlight each of the brands’ strong creative identities
Audience: Investors, Media, Partners/Stakeholders
How we shared it: posted on Fifth & Pacific Companies’ website, shared via Fifth & Pacific Companies’ social media channels, shown to investors

1. Victoria Beckham & Range Rover:  The official title of Beckham’s car collaboration is the Range Rover Evoque Special Edition with Victoria Beckham.  The car costs $90,000, and among other amenities the designer chose to include, each of the 200 vehicles is outfitted with mohair carpeting.

2.  Jason Wu & Brizo:  He designed the First Lady’s inauguration ball gown, but did you know Jason Wu also created a sink faucet?  The young designer’s collaboration with Brizo was released this spring, and includes the faucet along with various bathroom fixtures, racks, and even a trash can.

3.  Karl Lagerfeld & Magnum:  Since Karl Lagerfeld famously doesn’t eat much besides Diet Coke (another one of his collaborators), directing three short promotional films for an ice cream company seems odd.  That said, the resulting videos were very fashionable, starring Rachel Bilson and Baptiste Giabiconi.

4.  Alice + Olivia & Magnum:  Of course it would be the case that Magnum would also find a fashion collaborator to celebrate the release of a smaller ice cream bar.  The European company teamed up with Stacey Bendet of Alice + Olivia to create a corresponding “mini” skirt to go with their new Magnum Mini.  The skirt will debut during Fashion Week in September.

5. Kirrily Johnston & Kellogg’s:  You’ll have to head to Australia for this one — Kellogg’s is publicizing their Special K brand cereal down under by partnering with Kirrily Johnston on a red leather handbag featuring a “snack bar pocket.”  This might sound like a silly stunt, but the bag made it into Johnston’s runway collection during Mercedes Benz Fashion Week in Sydney. And the thing isn’t cheap.  The special snack pack purse is $750.

The High Low:  How long did you work on the name?

Bill McComb: We put together the whole thing, soup to nuts, in just under 12 weeks. We had the name by November 15, shortly after finalizing the deal with JCPenney, and then got the graphics on it just after Thanksgiving. We settled on the whole thing around the 10th of December. We moved quickly because it was all working: The name came out of the first round of name generation work that we did, and the graphics came out of the first round of work on graphics.

THL:  But a new name has been on the horizon since JCPenney first became the exclusive U.S. retailer for the Liz Claiborne brand in 2009—so hasn’t this been percolating for a while?

BM: With the strategic shift that’s been going on at the company since 2007, a lot of people have suggested that we should consider changing the name. But it’s my philosophy and belief that you don’t do anything like that impetuously. The Liz Claiborne name had a certain historical meaning with investors and shareholders that I wasn’t willing to abandon so quickly. Even though changing it might have helped telegraph the scope and depth of strategy change going on here two years ago, for me it wasn’t right to do until we actually sold the brand — and I wasn’t sure if that was going to happen, and under what timetable. Yes, for a long time there’s been speculation, there’s been an internal discourse on the name. But not until the final transaction with JCPenney last fall did it become enough of a reality to sit down and put pen to paper on a creative brief and list what this new name would have to accomplish.

THL:  So where did you start?

BM: The first thing we said was that we wanted a name that came out of the consumer vernacular, not one that sounded like a re-coined or invented word. We also wanted a name that would fit all three brands—Juicy, Lucky and Kate—and evoke the common ground between them, the element of New York and Los Angeles. Juicy was built bicoastally, Lucky was always an LA brand, and Kate Spade is a quintessentially New York brand. As much as we are a global company, what we’re selling are these intrinsically American elements. And the name had to be approporiate for a fashion company: There needed to be some chic-ness to it, and not in a contrived way. We didn’t want it to sound like a hedge fund, a Silicon Valley high-tech company or a law firm. Fifth & Pacific is not a consumer brand, but it’s a brand to investors and we wanted it to feel consistent with our consumer brands without stepping on them or overpowering them.

THL:  Did you do any testing or focus groups?

BM: We didn’t focus group the name, because this brand is not going in front of the consumer; we had experts at the table, and we just felt that Fifth & Pacific was right. But we did take our time making sure that the name was clear and available for use—not just here but in all our markets around the world—and that we could get a logical New York Stock Exchange ticker and the right URL.

THL:  What does this new name say about the company?

BM: Number one, it says: This is day one. We’ve gone through a very difficult, laborious turnaround, but this doesn’t feel like an end to that; it feels like the beginning of the new company that we’ve created. Fifth & Pacific embodies the brands—the dressy, uptown, city side and the casual, beachy LA component—and it has a contemporary, progressive, forward-looking feel. It has a future, it has momentum. This is a beginning, not an end.

THL:  Does that include new brands under this new umbrella?

BM: We have so much opportunity—what I call pipeline—within these product lines that for many years to come we’re going to be allocating our capital and expense resources to playing out the full potential of these lifestyle brands. I’ve said that this can be a multibillion-dollar basket of brands; our focus is on growing domestically and tapping the shores of Asia and Europe in a big way. This name change doesn’t impact those moves because we’ve already been making them, but Fifth & Pacific sounds and feels like a lifestyle company, which is what we are.

THL:  It’s been a dramatic and sometimes rocky few years—how have all these big moves positioned the company for growth?

BM: Number one, we have the right portfolio of brands: They’re early stage, they don’t step on each other’s toes, they’re trend-right and they’re hot. Number two, we have the right people in the right jobs—we’ve hired some of the industry’s most talented creative and business people and they’re deployed well. Number three, we finally have the right capital structure. We don’t have significant, onerous interest payments and balloon debts coming due that make investors anxious. When you put those three things together and look at the growth profile and the margin expansion potential that we’ve got, it’s a momentum package. And now we have a name that fits all of that, so that’s the icing on the cake.

1. Svpply:  Of course one of our hands-down favorite online style curation sites also has an awesome app.  Download Svpply to follow the stores you like, make collections of products, and shop from 30 sensible categories.

2.  Fashion TV:  With massive video content covering fashion shows, designer information, parties, and trends, you could get lost in this new app from Fashion TV (which is de rigueur in Europe but not as common in the U.S.).

3.  Fashion Police:  Joan Rivers, snark, polls, and celebrity style — enough said.  Oh, but there’s more — this extension of Rivers’ popular program includes bonus clips and complete awards show coverage.  There’s even a section entitled “Joan’s Jabs.”

4.  Modelinia:  In an apt reflection of the current modeling industry, the app devoted to everything and anything related to the stars of the runway is available in 15 languages.  Get the best in beauty, fashion, and lifestyle tips from the experiences of those in the know (namely, models).

5. Kaleidoscope:  Okay, we have to admit that we’ve been excited about this shoppable street style app for a while.  That said, it launched on Android first, and we’re all iPhone owners over here.  If you’ve ever wanted to click on, say, a Sartorialist photograph and buy everything the subject was wearing, Kaleidoscope was created just for you.

Click here to view the gallery

This cross-body bag is perfectly functional without failing to make a sartorial statement.

1.  Tryst bag on Of a Kind:  First up in our mother-appropriate stylish line-up is a limited edition shoulder bag by Collina Strada.  The label is only offering 20 of the handmade lambskin and organic cotton item ($240), so move fast.

A favorite of fashionable French women, Les Néréides makes imaginative, novel jewelry.

2. Paired bee necklace on AHAlife:  Look, it’s a little bee and a big bee, just like you and your mom.  This whimsical gold and horn necklace by Les Néréides ($175) comes straight out of Parisian fashion magazines.

Unique hand-beaded sandals will get Mom ready for the beach this summer.

3.  Aspiga sandals on Lux Fix:  Aspiga makes ethical beachwear in Kenya, with 20% of the proceeds given to an orphanage outside Nairobi.   We love this colorful pair ($54) for a casual summer day.

Pretty in pink — this scarf makes a springy, festive present.

4.  Tambourine scarf on L-Atitude:  When in doubt, go with a silk scarf.  This one by Tambourine ($80) features an unusual print and was made in Mumbai by local artisans.

Last but not least, a gold link watch pairs well with the scarf above.

5.  Blade watch on Svpply:  For the more classic mother, this rose gold Marc by Marc Jacobs watch ($275) is a great statement-making piece.  Now, is it currently trending on the social style site Svpply as a good gift, or because people are tracking it for themselves?

We pointed out, way back when, that the trunk show was becoming a selling point for luxury brands looking to offer something different.  With a coterie of fashion cred, a start-up Luxup is launching this summer — embracing that institution and other hallmarks of luxury fashion.

The invitation-only online club will cater to international travelers seeking unique in-store experiences.  Besides admittance to trunk shows, the site will arrange one-on-one designer chats, fashion shows, and provide access to exclusive products.  The site will kick off its offerings in London, but intends to provide its unique warm welcome to international travelers in cities all over the globe.

We’ll be following Luxup’s launch and expansion — the start-up includes fashion heavyweights like former Harvey Nichols’ buying director, Averyl Oates, and British Vogue‘s Harriet Quick.  (The women have signed on, respectively, as the commercial director and editorial director.)  If Luxup takes off, it’ll be a whole new way for global consumers to interact with luxury brands.

Celebrity-edited looks the ones above will carry over to Piperlime’s first-ever physical store.

In Piperlime’s case, the new womens’-focused store is the result of customer feedback.  Though the site sells over 500 apparel and accessory brands catering to women, men, and children, the retail outpost will necessarily present a scaled-down version of that inventory.  However, in keeping with an ideal omni-channel retail strategy, the approach will be consistent with the site — designer exclusives and guest editor-led layouts, for instance, will carry over to the Wooster Street store.

WWD reports that Saks Fifth Avenue’s CEO, Stephen I. Sadove, noted that an “omni-channel customer” spends around four times as much as, say, a shopper who only browses in-store or online.  The channels necessary to reach these particular consumers are physical, web, tablet, and mobile.  At this point, the four-pronged version of retailing is key, and Gap Inc.’s multi-brand online emporium is making a critical leap by venturing into brick-and-mortar territory.