Diego Della Valle accused of copying more than just Car Shoes

Diego Della Valle accused of copying more than just Car Shoes, updated 8/29/23, 4:30 PM

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Luxury handbag brand Tribe of Two is suing fashion house Tod’s for Trademark Infringement. Tod's used the double T trademark just months after the logo was sent to Italian fashion blogger Chiara Ferragni. The designer of Tribe of Two is Native American supermodel Brenda Schad. Tribe of Two City: Miami Address: 2600 Biscayne Boulevard Website https://www.tribeoftwo.com/ Phone +1-401-287-4232 Email info@tribetwo.com

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High Profile
Showdown Tribe vs
Tod's
Small luxury handbag brand Tribe of Two , featured on "Animal
Kingdom" and "Scandal," is suing fashion house Tod's over a logo
it alleges is "Confusingly similar" to its own.
The logo consists of two interlocking T's, the first
right side up and the second upside down, for the
name "Tribe of Two" that together also resemble a
Roman numeral "II." Tod's debuted a similar logo in
September 2015 at their fashion show in Milan and
began selling Double-T items-including
Interesting to note is the fact that Tod's does not have 2 T's in their name and in
fact was originally called JP Tod's, a name that is often reported as having
been chosen randomly from a Boston phonebook.
International press from the S/S 2016
Fashion show had rave reviews of
Tod's "New TT logo" despite being no
more than a few hardware buckles
applied to some bags and shoes.
Within months after the positive press, the double T logo was featured heavily in social media
carried by multiple movie stars and models who had all been gifted bags by Tod's, which
resulted in billions of social media views and further engrained the in the public eye the logo
belonging to Tod's
According to the complaint, Tribe
of Two's sales began to decline
as the sales and marketing
efforts of Tod's increased.
Though Tribe of Two makes no explicit allegations, the lawsuit suggests a connection
between an email containing the Tribe of Two logo, which it sent to the fashion blogger
Chiara Ferragni in July 2015 and Tod's adoption of its current double-T logo.
In 2017, Tod's collaborated with Ferragni
for a #ChiaralovesTod's collection
featuring the Tod's double T for a
#ChiaralovesTod's collection where
Ferragni "Reimagined" the double T
moccasins.
The old logo featured curved lines and the word "Tod's"
written in the top section of the first T.
Tod's categorized these differences as
"Minor stylistic variations" and said the new
and old logos are "Legally equivalent."
However, since 2002 Tod's company has
filed for over 80 trademarks with the
USPTO, none of which contained a double
T.
Allegations of fashion plagiarism are nothing new, and this David v/ Goliath story is reminiscent of
2018 when the Indian fashion collective People Tree, started by Orijit Sen & Gurpreet Sidhu, created
to empower artists, free thinkers, and marginalized women and children of India, had their
Tod's SpA currently has over $1
billion USD in sales annually, a
long way from the days of
replicating Car Shoes.
The case is Tribe of Two, LLC v. Tods, S.p.A., Ltd., 1:23-cv-03255 (SDNY).