• by Karl Greenberg , August 8, 2007

Specialty department store Lord & Taylor's new owner, NRDC Equity Partners, is footing the bill for a brand makeover.

The high-end store chain, with 47 stores in nine states and the District of Columbia, acquired from Federated Department Stores for $1.1 billion, is rebranding with a $10 million campaign beginning this month.

The effort aims to update the tweed-and-herringbone image of the store chain to be more "multigenerational," per a release. The campaign, which begins this month and runs through the quarter, features a stable of sainthood-level celebrities and A-list socialites and their kin in Avedon-type ads shot in California by fashion and celebrity photographer Mario Testino.

The ads feature people like Lauren Hutton, Lydia Hearst, top models, and the kids of John McEnroe and Clint Eastwood. Multi-page inserts will run in September issues of Vogue, and Vanity Fair. Single-page versions of the ads will appear in a range of lifestyle and fashion mags like Harper's Bazaar, Elle, Town & Country and GQ.

The department store will also run 25 billboards in cities and railway stations in markets such as Boston, Chicago, Connecticut, Detroit, Philadelphia and New York. The outdoor executions will also be at Fashion Week in New York, at Bryant Park this fall.

The company says the rebranding campaign follows a four-year repositioning effort by the department store to update its image. Jane Elfers, Lord & Taylor's President and CEO, said in a release that the campaign parallels efforts to upgrade merchandise assortments, in-store services and amenities, brand packaging, and that there's been a "total overhaul of its media mix."

The company will also unveil a redesigned version of its handwritten logo in September; redesigns of Lord & Taylor shopping bags and boxes will be introduced in the stores Sept. 4. Per the company, the new packages will sport an orange/yellow "sunrise" interior, intended to evoke the East Coast home base of the chain and a new dawn for the company.

Also on tap--a five-year, $250 million capital budget plan.