The year1965 was the year when the Fendi sisters and Karl Lagerfeld started the transformation of Fendi from the fur coat maker it was to the fashion house it is today. Fendi began to go from just using base colored heavy furs to using other lighter materials in different colors and combinations. This does however not mean that Fendi stopped producing fur products; they just started to use it in a more modern way with the help of new techniques and new standards for what constitutes a good product. An example of this is how they began to use furs that earlier would have been discarded due to poor quality to produce high quality fur products with a unique look. Another development in Karl Lagerfeld’s and the Fendi sisters transformation of fur coats was that they started creating lighter and more easily worn coats specially designed to be worn by women which was an important step in the history of Fendi.
The first of these new couture collections by Karl Lagerfeld that played such a large role in the history of Fendi and that helped transform Fendi into what it is today was presented in 1966. It was an immediate international success. This collection made Fendi a worldwide name in fashion and started a new chapter in the history of Fendi. Fendi’s true international commercial breakthrough would however not come until two years later when Marvin Traub discovered the Fendi handbags and decides to start selling them in Bloomingdales in New York. The same year Mr Sakai, which at this time was the president of AOI, one of the largest distributors of high end fashion in Japan, discovered Fendi at a Japanese fashion show and started selling Fendi products on the Japanese market. The following year Fendi introduced the first of their ready to wear fur collections which meant beautiful high quality furs to retail prices and would change the history of Fendi by its success.
