Rihanna’s Super Bowl LVII halftime show: Simple yet captivating: Rihanna dominated center field last night for the 13-minute Super Bowl halftime show — marking her first live performance in six years, CNN reports. Running through a selection of hits — We Found Love, Only Girl in the World, Rude Boy, Work, Umbrella, All of the Lights, and Diamonds — there was never going to be time for each of her 14 number ones (the fourth-highest number of all time) but the singer did manage to squeeze in many of her most popular work. The pre-show press conference revealed that 39 different setlists were proposed with selections from the artist’s catalog. Head-to-toe in red silk and leather, Rihanna belted from a platform precariously high above the pitch and strutted amongst her backup dancers, decked out in items from her Savage X Fenty line.

The show had little of the extravaganza of recent years, especially when compared to 2021’s performance by The Weeknd or JLo and Shakira in 2020. There were no celebrity guests, costume changes or build up and the choreography was notably low-key. Perhaps a result of her second pregnancy, confirmed by her PR after the show, Rihanna’s performance “relied more on star power than delivery,” said the Guardian.

Can Louis Vuitton maintain the air of exclusivity that is so integral to its brand as it grows at unprecedented rates? Arguably best known for its brown LV-monogram canvas bags, luxury fashion house Louis Vuittion piggybacked that success to develop a fashion empire that now encompasses shoes, ready to wear apparel, and fragrances. Today, Louis Vuitton’s sales account for nearly a quarter of parent company LVMH’s revenues, outpacing LVMH’s other subsidiaries, including Tiffany & Co., Dom Pérignon Champagne, and Christian Dior, the Wall Street Journalreports. Louis Vuitton’s revenues hit USD 20 bn in 2022, prompted by a post-pandemic boom in luxury spending and regular price increases. Its explosive growth helped boost LVMH to the highest stock market valuation in Europe and helped make its chairman, Bernard Arnault, the world’s wealthiest b’naire.

Inclusive, yet exclusive: Louis Vuitton launched a 450+ piece collection from the most expensive woman artist alive, Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, which was accompanied with a massive marketing campaign. Its latest menswear show, held at the courtyard of the Louvre, was lavish even by fashion industry standards, with a celebrity guestlist and a performance by Grammy-winning pop star Rosalía. The brand has also been collaborating with youth-focused streetwear brands. It launched a landmark collaboration with Supreme in 2017, then hired Virgil Abloh, the late American designer behind the upscale streetwear brand Off-White in 2018, and most recently its latest menswear collection was partially designed by Colm Dillane, founder of streetwear brand KidSuper.

But it’s not growing the accessibility of its products: Over the past decade, Louis Vuitton has maintained roughly the same number of stores, only opening new locations if it closes others. It only produces small batches of its fragrances, which are exclusively sold at its stores and online — even LMVH’s beauty retailer Sephora does not carry Louis Vuitton fragrances. The brand does not sell through wholesalers or have seasonal sales.The company intentionally limits supply, producing less than demand to maintain a sense of exclusivity. “The product remains desirable if it is limited,” a former Louis Vuitton executive told the WSJ. “The difficulty as time passes when you have a war machine like Louis Vuitton is to restrict yourself — to resist the temptation to make easy sales.”

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