Paul Smith launches 531 cycle clothing range with a £550 jacket

London and Cheshire and not much anywhere else.

This isn't really working for me. I'm going to hang on for Karl Lagerfeld's spring tandem collection.

Awesome stuff. If you can afford it great. Wear it with appreciation for your privilege. If you can't or just don't want to pay that no need to poopoo it, you probably spent money elsewhere.

I think what you're paying for with this kind of thing is in fact neither fashion not function but the ability to drive the Aldi Army into red faced paroxysms of indignation when you ride past them and if this thread is anything to go by you get quite a lot for your money from this collection in that respect

Paul Smith seems to be an extremely nice chap, I used to like a lot of his clothes in my youth, as I've grown older (as opposed to maturing obvs!) I'm not that enamoured with the range.

His cycling apparel looks appealing, but I have to say when confronted with the pricing strategy it leads me to ask ;- "Is he f@ck!ng p!$$ed?"

£350 for a $&*£^/# gilet !!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm in the wrong job ......

I've trashed enough bike kit to know that wearing a £550 jacket for winter riding does make it less likely that you're going to hit wet leaves or black ice.....I once totalled about £300 of Assos kit on a single ride, an experience I'm not keen to repeat.

Looking at the range I don't think it is what I would refer to as real cycling kit as there is no padded bib kit at all and I'm not sure it really for riding far, the kit would look great for riding to a local cafe and drinking your posh coffee while you watch cyclists ride by and there is nothing wrong with that.

The price is irelavant, if you like it and can afford it then great but don't expect those shorts to be comfortable for a centurary ride, you might be better off in Aldi kit if you want to do more that look nice.

I get the impression these items are priced the way they are purely for branding / marketing purposes. They appear to be priced way ahead of the development and material costs and way ahead of the functional value (cheaper items functioning just as well). Same thing with that single speed Mercian bike Paul Smith designed.

As far as I can tell, the high prices only exist to artificially elevate the brands to a premium position in the market place. It is an expensive brand, therefore the items are supposedly premium quality etc. It is interesting that this article (or should that be full page advert?) contains a price in the title. Whilst factually correct, it's also part of the marketing to present this range as a premium range.

Nice that the champagne socialists have something to buy that will reflect their working class status down the wine bar

Over the top in every sense. Price, name and everything else. Very unbalanced article, which is obviously just another "paid for" infomercial.

I wouldn't be caught dead dressed in Paul Smith.

Take another look at the video. In the section where there are 3 guys riding along, the guy in the front wearing the orange jacket, the sleeves are far too short and there is a couple of inch gap between the sleeve and his gloves.
I really would want a jacket that actually fitted or use a model with shorter arms for the promotion film

I have lots of Paul Smith gear, classic, none of it has went out of fashion, resale price is high.

I tell thee that there is as much time and material in that jacket as there is in your plastic frame.

This stuff will be small runs and sell out fast, it's not made by kids in Bangladesh.

I won't be buying it though, as I would be shit scared of damaging it.

Agreed! Let's sort it out, guys! I'm sure if we put our heads together and summon our collective mights, we can make everything alright again!

☆*･゜ﾟ･*(^O^)/*･゜ﾟ･*☆

I'd just like to say I feel very strongly about this issue and that someone should definitely do something about it.

Two words. Veblen Goods. These appear to defy the general principles of economics, because they become more desirable as their price rises. The whole point about them is that they are prohibitively expensive for most people, and purchasing them is an act of conspicuous consumption. In terms of material, construction and performance they are probably pretty good at what they are made to do, but that isn't the point of buying them.

Different items for different purposes...
Comparing apples with pears

No shit.

Point is, people when they talk about designer kit talk about it being "handmade" and "finest materials" , "knitted from the dreams of kittens"" Well quite. £200 stops me from my feet dropping off and thus dying (which would annoy my mum) so it's pretty fundamental.

That tabard is up there with a Victoria Beckham £5k handbag, very nice I am sure but you can get one from Screwfix and that does the same job. I doubt we will see many on the V341/10
at 7am of a wet Sunday.

I am a big Paul Smith fan, have a few items of Paul Smith clothing , but this is out of my price range. Rapha is as expensive as I will go!

The collection is stylish and very Paul Smith, but very dull and boring in my opinion so nothing interests me even if I had the cash.

Spend it how you like.
Maybe however some one would like to tell me how a 500 quid jacket is 5 times better than a 100 quid one. Not being funny so much s wondering if t is good value.
The only thing that I will not accept is a name.
It could cost a million quid and be designed by God but if it doesn't fit it's no good. The word designer is wrongly applied to expensive stuff. Everything is designed so we can ignore the name.
So please tell me what I am missing. I Need a good jacket.

What I'm struggling with is why £550 on a jacket is 'ridiculous' and 'pretentious' but £550 on e.g. a pair of wheels isn't?

The jacket looks good and when I win the lottery I may get one, in black, and some Zipps to go with it. Until then, I'll struggle on in Sportful.

I have some Rapha items and don't find they 'perform' any better than Castelli or Craft (which cost much less though neither is given away for free). Looks good though.

Rapha's brilliant marketing, including photos of helmet-less riders on steel bikes, has created this impression of pedigree and desirability (even though they've only been around for 10 years), and good for them. Good for you too. But no one claims that a £10,000 watch keeps time any better than a £10 one - that would be ridiculous!

Now that Rapha's clearly shown to be second-best in terms of price I wonder what happens next. A price war? Who will reach the £1,000 point first?

You can buy a Chanel Vintage small double flap bag for £12,863.02 to carry your stuff in. Or M&S will charge you 5p for a plastic carrier bag. Somewhere in between there's probably something to suit all tastes/budgets.

I wear quite a bit of PS and I own some Rapha stuff, which works pretty well. I think its unlikely I'll be buying any of the PS 531 range because I don't like the way it looks even before I get to the price. However, I am certainly not going to explode with rage that PS have begun selling this stuff. If they can find people to buy it at these prices then I wish them well.

I'd want a chauffeur for that price....
too much of a poseury city look for any serious riding IMO.
Not my thing...if it's anyone else's then fair play to them...
and as for some replies on here...don't make judgements on whether anyone else could afford them or not based on their comments
...I'm pretty sure a lot of people 'could' afford them (disposable income or not)...but wouldn't purchase because they are sane and sensible beings....and don't see them as an appropriate purchase based on the high cost and lack of suitability for their own desires, needs or wants.

Ironically the Reynolds 53x line is their low-end steel tubing so these rather nice pieces of kit would cost more than the bike (e.g. my $600 commuter)

Aimed at the corporates who handed in their golf clubs and took up cycling after 2012. Hmmm.

I just cover myself in glue and roll around in feathers and crisp packets for a while. Then I'm insulated and waterproof, and smell of salt and vinegar. It's great.

But it's nice that there are alternatives.

Well Sir Smith, you've certainly caused a stir on here. A lot of good points made - especially regarding the snobs that look down their noses at fellow cyclists in the "expensive gear".

Will be interesting to see how sales figures are post Xmas.