Carolina Herrera Sues Oscar De La Renta Over Hiring Of Monse Designer


The house of Carolina Herrera is suing rival design house Oscar de la Renta, over a noncompete agreement with former senior designer and Monse founder, Laura Kim.

According to Herrera's lawsuit filed in the Supreme Court of New York, Kim, joined the Carolina Herrera team in October 2015 was slated to begin her transition to replace Ms. Herrera. However, two months after Peter Copping's departure from Oscar de la Renta in July, Kim and Fernando Garcia were named as co-creative directors of the American fashion house. According to Kim, she resigned upon realizing that she had been deceived into accepting the position of senior vice-president when the initial offer (she believed) was to be creative director.

Initially, the court ruled that the non-compete agreement was fair and plainly-worded but last week a New York State judge, Jeffrey Oing lifted the preliminary injunction that barred Kim from working at Oscar de la Renta. A statement from de la Renta said: 'We are pleased with the court's decision today to reverse the temporary restraining order that prevented Laura Kim from returning to our company where she worked for over 12 years before being recruited by Carolina Herrera. We look forward to returning on January 10, 2017 to fully brief the court on the non-compete matter and to more fully answer the claims in the lawsuit brought by Mrs. Herrera and her team.'

Whether or not Kim can pursue her job as co-creative director at Oscar De La Renta will be decided by a New York court on Jan. 10.

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