A hard act to follow

The end, when it finally came, was not surprising but a shame. On Monday the French fashion house Chloé announced that Paulo Melim Andersson, the company's chief designer, was to stand down after a mere three seasons in the job. "Paulo is a truly talented designer and we would like to thank him for his contribution ... I am totally confident that he will have a very successful career," said the firm's chairman and chief executive, Ralph Toledano, smiling politely as the knife nestled that little bit deeper between Andersson's shoulder blades.

Certainly, there had been problems at Chloé. Ever since the departure of the very popular Phoebe Philo, under whose aegis the label became the choice of self-consciously cool twenty- and thirtysomethings and photogenic celebrities, there had been a feeling that Chloé was slipping. The International Herald Tribune described the most recent collection, which showed in Paris a fortnight ago, as "awkward", while Cathy Horyn, fashion editor of the New York Times, said bluntly: "Paulo Melim Andersson cannot create a look that is either uniquely Chloé or interesting."

"It was incredibly difficult for someone to step into Phoebe's shoes," says Harriet Quick, fashion features editor of Vogue. "She was so much the embodiment of that look that she had coined and had made successful. She was strongly associated with the Chloé pieces that people loved, such as the beautiful blouses, the great trousers and that whole innocent look. Paulo tried to give it more of an arty spin with complex cutting techniques, which some people liked and some didn't." Bridget Cosgrave, buying director of the luxury fashion chain Matches, admits that there had been "huge concern" among retailers when Philo left the company back in 2006 and, "Yes, the business did then decline. When Paulo came in, he was in a tricky position because he had to be different in order to take the business forward, but at the same time stay true to its original appeal."

And that sums up what is becoming a growing problem in the fashion business, one that is particularly evident this season. How do you step into someone else's shoes and keep their customers happy and retain the label's identity, without just churning out pastiches of what came before?

This season alone, Marco Zanini took over at Halston, Stuart Vevers became creative director at Loewe, Avsh Alom Gur assumed duties at Ossie Clarke, Esteban Cortazar started at Emanuel Ungaro, and Alessandra Facchinetti arrived at Valentino, all with varying degrees of success. As if to remind everyone how tricky this kind of fashion ventriloquism can be, Facchinetti had previously worked as creative director at Gucci, but been sacked after two seasons because her designs were seen as insufficiently Gucci. Falling too far on the other side of the fence, Gur's pieces for Ossie Clarke were widely deemed to be little more than period costumes, impossible to wear outside a 70s revival party.

Vevers' collection for Loewe, at least, managed to be both elegant and true to the label's look, although he unquestionably had it easier as the Spanish label has a far less defined and therefore restrictive style than Ossie Clarke. But Vevers also knew what he was in for, having taken over at Mulberry three years ago after the departure of its original and very popular creative director, Nicholas Knightley.

"There is a certain awkwardness in taking over from someone else but I'm a designer who likes to work with what a brand already has," says Vevers. "I do have my own aesthetic but it's not one that is all-encompassing and I just use it to enhance what is already there. It probably ends up being 50/50."

Facchinetti also seems to have hit on that delicate balance this time round with her autumn/winter collection for Valentino. After the show, Valentino's very protective business partner, Giancarlo Giametti, said happily that Facchinetti "respected a master [but] it looked pretty and modern".

It's a difficult compromise for a company: on the one hand, it wants a new and exciting designer to bring a fresh audience and interest to the label; on the other, it doesn't want some scallywag to trample all over its legacy. Givenchy has a particularly tricky history in this regard. Both Alexander MacQueen and Julien Macdonald worked there, and neither seems to have particularly happy memories. The current designer, Riccardo Tisci, has alienated critics with his drop-crotch skinny trousers and gladiator sandals, which don't sit happily with the memories of the ladylike dresses that Hubert de Givenchy created for Audrey Hepburn. The reason that labels such as Givenchy were so exciting when they emerged may have been that their clothes looked so new - but that doesn't necessarily mean customers still want them to be seen as avant-garde. After all, if a designer makes an old label look too modern, it no longer looks like the label.

But if it's so tricky to carry on, why not just shut down the label when a designer leaves? "The thing with these old houses, particularly the Parisian ones, is you already have the retail in place: the shops, the cosmetics business, the perfumes," says Quick. "Financially, these are very important sides to the business that no one would just shut down."

One designer who everyone agrees has been able to combine a respect for the past with something more modern is Nicolas Ghesquière, who has been at Balenciaga since 1997. With his egg-like shapes and luxury fabrics, his designs show the influence of the original designer, Cristóbal Balenciaga, who died in 1968, but look undeniably modern. Stefano Pilati at Yves Saint Laurent, Alber Elbaz at Lanvin and Olivier Theyskens at Nina Ricci have also achieved this double-hander recently.

None of which will be of much consolation to Andersson. The real shame of it is that his last collection, many felt, was by far his best yet and getting closer to the Chloé look. "It takes a while for a designer to find his way but in the current economic climate there is just more pressure to get there quickly," says Quick.

So now it's the turn of Hannah MacGibbon, the young British designer who is taking over at Chloé. Hopes are high for her because she worked at the company under Philo, a point the company's chief executive Ralph Toledano was keen to emphasise in his announcement: "Hannah has been an integral part of our company for many years and we look forward to the overall creative vision she will bring to the growing world of Chloé." The words that matter in that sentence were "world of Chloé", not "creative vision".