Mark Kolsky sat at his home in Brooklyn's Stuyvesant Heights neighborhood and drank a cup of coffee on his sewing machine as messages began to pour out.
On Tuesday, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, released the name of her new culinary and lifestyle brand, just like before. But Kolsky's morning was thrown into Tumult as the vintage-inspired workwear brand he started a decade ago is named as before.
“I've started receiving messages from friends, family and people who know my brand,” said Kolsky, 58. “And they were like, 'Have you seen this?' There was a lot of confusion and I really didn't know what to do. ”
Kolsky's life was found to be thrown into a gust of speculative tabloid reports about using Meghan's label's name, and it was knocked down within days of his phone constantly ringing. Ta. In an interview this week, he said he was reading the trademark law and consulted with an attorney. His brand has also been discovered by new fans whose Instagram accounts have netted thousands of followers.
For Meghan, the incident is the latest groan in her efforts to create a lifestyle brand. Last year she announced that she had launched what she called American Riviera Orchard, but her trademark application has included questions about the use of geographic location names and similarities to potential trademarks with Harry & David's Royal Riviera Products. I was faced with a set that included sexuality.
In a video announcement on her Instagram account Tuesday, Meghan dealt with the name change and added that she will soon debut at the same time as Netflix's series Love, Meghan.
“My show will be coming in in two weeks. I'm very excited. I'm also very excited about my business. “Last year, I was thinking: 'What do you know? Is it the American Riviera, it sounds like such a great name. It's my neighborhood, it's the nickname for Santa Barbara.” But it limits me to something that was manufactured and just grew in this area I did. ”
“I waited a little while to share my name,” she said. “And it's still called as ever. It essentially means it always, as always,” she continued. This is what I do. And I haven't been able to share it with you the same for the past few years, but now I can. ”
Meghan representatives did not immediately respond to requests for comment on whether they knew the venture's new name, or Kolski's brand.
When Kolsky looked back at his Odyssey this week, he recalled the humble beginnings of his label.
After moving to Manhattan in his early 20s, he worked for Billy Martins, a boutique in the Upper East Side and western boutique, and became passionate about gathering vintages. He adopted a design style based on reusing old military clothing into clothing such as tanker pants and work jackets. His work was discovered, and he was in a pink jumpsuit made for her by fashion editor Samira Nasr's wife, his longtime creative collaborator Astrid Dahl He said as he saw him walking down the street. That jumpsuit became his label's first hit, and in 2017, a photo of the Gena Lions wearing it appeared to be advertised as “Millennial Pink” in a Vogue article.
He explored his options, but Kolsky says he has no plans to rely on legally. “My brother is a lawyer, so I called him,” he said. “He's not an intellectual property lawyer, but he said you have some rights based on the established business.”
“We're not going to carry out a legal attack here,” he added. “Now I'm just going back to work and I'm trying to maintain awareness of my brand. If there's a dispute that ultimately affects my business, I'll rate it. .”
Kolsky also emphasized that despite reports on the tabloid island, he would not be able to hold a resentment to the Duchess of Sussex.
“What makes me feel like that is the media that people are making comments and the kind of media they want to create a rift between us, but it's not,” he said. “I'm not talking to them. They're not talking to me. There's no fight.”
Jeanne Frommer, a law professor at New York University who specializes in intellectual property, said Kolsky doesn't have a registered trademark, but he has trademark protections probably just because he is in business under his name. I said that.
“They have the assertion that they might be able to make with a proper set of facts,” she said. “It could be a tough fight to make, but that's not a laughable claim.”
But as of Friday afternoon, the issue of trademark law was not in Kolsky's mind. He was busy dealing with the surge in interest in his fashion line. The inventory in the sales section of his website is sold out. And new fans continued to follow him on Instagram.
“It brought new eyes to my business,” Kolsky said. “It's positive for me. More people know me now. So will it hurt my business in the future? I don't think so?”
Natasha Rodriguez contributed the report.
