Another New York Fashion Week come and gone, my third as a freelance writer, and I have to say, the vibes were…off. I admittedly did not attend much for reasons which sound fake (a freak bicycle accident, acting class, federal jury duty) but which are very much real. Still, I couldn’t help but detect a general fatigue in the air.
It must be said that the weather was absolute ass—probably the worst consecutive stretch of bad weather days I’ve ever experienced in a single fashion week, alternating between rain, heat, and humidity, sometimes all in one day. No one is in a super great mood when you step outside and become soup.
But there was also so little that had people excited about seeing shows. The cries about New York Fashion Week being so over happen every season: It’s too influencer-driven, there are no real big talents, the tentpole labels have all fled the schedule, shows are flung all across the city, etc. The show with the most hype this season was Peter Do’s debut at Helmut Lang, and…well, we’ll get to that.
To me, what all these complaints boil down to is the commercialism of it all. All fashion is inherently commercial—everyone is trying to sell something, after all—but there’s something tacky in the bald Americanness of it all here. At least the Europeans have the decency (and the budgets) to wrap their commercialism in fun ideas and blowout runways.
As Cathy Horyn wrote this week for The Cut, fashion has all but abandoned the idea of taking risks on exciting new talent. Look at the turnover churn in any blue chip-level creative director role and you’ll see that commercialism is definitely coming at a cost. New York is not alone in having an inspiration deficit.
Fashion people might miss high risk/high reward runways, but they’re not paying anyone’s bills. Frankly, I have an issue with the way our industry loves to rally behind some exciting, fresh new talent, only to abandon them without a real business within a few seasons. I could rattle off a list of a half-dozen labels from my last decade in fashion that were fashion darlings one year and non-existent the next.
Personally, I don’t mind a little commercialism in my fashion, especially not here in America, where sportswear was invented. Sell me something fun! I’d guess that 98% of the population, even those interested in fashion, are less interested in having something statement-making than they are something that’s beautiful and well-made. There’s a lot to be said—and celebrated!—about having a label with a clear identity and good product.
That’s why I find what Stuart Vevers has done at Coach to be so impressive. The Spring 2024 show marked his 10th year at the brand (which in today’s fashion years is basically half a century) and has accomplished something remarkable in that decade: He made Coach cool again. When he took over, Coach was a label worn by suburban moms who shopped at outlet malls. (Please note that I find nothing wrong with suburban moms nor outlet malls, I’m just saying the brand wasn’t exactly Vogue material.)
Then Vevers introduced his vision of ready-to-wear to the brand with the kinds of over-the-top runways which have all but died out in New York, slowly building up a vocabulary of inspiration points: vintage Americana, gritty downtown scene kids, ‘70s and ‘80s pop culture references, dusty prairie girls. Coach is primarily a bag and shoe business—just a bag business, if we’re being honest—but damn, does Vevers make the ready-to-wear look good.
Credit must be paid to the Coach execs who gave Vevers the freedom and the time (fashion’s greatest luxury) to experiment at the brand, but to me, he’s an unsung hero of American fashion. I think what he’s done at Coach is like—and please take a deep breath!—what Marc Jacobs did for Louis Vuitton in the late ‘90s. There are key differences, the biggest of which being that LV sits at the luxury price point where Coach is firmly contemporary, but both created a halo around the ready-to-wear runways that elevated each brand into capital-F Fashion territory. That’s no small feat!
We can be kind of snooty when it comes to contemporary labels, again because they’re so nakedly commercial. But: Coach runways have embraced better body diversity (yes, this will always be a sticking point with me), the product is made with truly quality materials, it’s more sustainable than its counterparts, it has a very clear identity, and frankly, Vevers’s designs are good. I hope we’re lucky enough to have him plugging away at Coach for another 10 years.
Of course, commercialism isn’t welcome everywhere. Yes, we’re back to Peter Do at Helmut Lang! Look, asking someone to take over at an existing label with an iconic founder is not an easy task; if anyone asked me, which they have not but here’s my opinion for free anyway, we should retire certain fashion labels the same way sports teams retire jersey numbers.
(Here is where I can admit to feeling deeply uneasy at the idea of someone taking Sarah Burton’s spot at Alexander McQueen….folks, I am scared.)
It is a very fine line to walk when pairing a new creative director with an old fashion house. The brand has to have the right amount of strong codes and identifiable signatures, but not so strong an aesthetic that it can’t evolve; the designer has to balance honoring the history of the house without being too referential to the archive, and work in their own perspective without railroading over the existing oeuvre. I’ve been quite open about my admiration at how Wes Gordon has handled the task at Carolina Herrera, for example, which is even trickier considering Ms. Herrera is still alive.
Do erred too far in the “respectful” column, according to the reviews from critics like Vanessa Friedman and Cathy Horyn. I can’t say I’m surprised, considering the task he was given: Helmut Lang is owned by Fast Retailing, Uniqlo’s parent company, and they would almost certainly have been pressuring him to fall under the “commercial” column. That’s not what hardcore fashion fans want out of a label like Helmut Lang, which was revolutionary for its time.
But still, it sits perfectly alongside New York’s roster of safe-but-sellable labels: Khaite, Tory Burch (which also continues to get cooler every season after a design team switch up a few seasons back), Ulla Johnson. Lauren Sherman has an excellent piece on this whole situation for Puck. (And I talk about this all the time, but you really, truly should be subscribing to Puck; Lauren’s reporting alone is worth it, but Matthew Belloni and Jonathan Handel have been doing excellent work around the Hollywood strikes that make them feel comprehensible to outsiders like me.)
I would agree we’ve let the pendulum swing too far away from the fun risk-takers; I, too, miss being delighted and surprised by something on the runway that wasn’t a stunt! But there’s nothing wrong with the ol’ razzle-dazzle of commercialism when it’s done well.
Now: Who won the front rows?
“But Tyler, it’s not a compet-”
DON’T be silly, of course it is!!!!!
On the Hollywood side, I think the big winner from this New York Fashion Week had to be the Jenny Han Universe™. I am a huge fan of Jenny’s shows and I feel like I saw Jenny’s kids (not actual relatives, just actors from her shows) everywhere this past week.
From THE SUMMER I TURNED PRETTY, Christopher Briney (in this house we are #TeamConrad) was at the Target x Rowing Blazers party and a Dior dinner; Lola Tung was at Coach, Sandy Liang and Bach Mai; Rain Spencer was in Rodarte’s stunning celeb-packed lookbook. TO ALL THE BOYS star Lana Condor was also in a Rodarte shoot and sat front row at Jason Wu. Anna Cathcart from XO KITTY (oh my god please tell me you’ve watched XO KITTY!!!) was at Kate Spade, Adeam, and Altuzarra. And Jenny herself was at Helmut Lang and Altuzarra! FUN!
On the fashion side, there is only one real winner, and that is Proenza Schouler for getting the It Girls of the season in one spot. I always judge who had a successful VIP placement by how far it breaks out of fashion containment, and my corner of the internet went bonkers over all the photos from PS. I’ve been wondering since season two of THE BEAR premiered who would get Molly Gordon, and of course Ayo Edebiri is a hot commodity, but BOTTOMS was the surprise hit of the summer, making Emma Seligman and Rachel Sennott big gets. I would pay very good money to take Chase Sui Wonders’s seat. (Who is also great! Not to make her an afterthought. Also, to share a final take on cinema, THEATER CAMP was a big winner for me.)
I still don’t know who Olivia Ponton is, though, and she was everywhere. Can someone send me a primer? Is this an Alix Earle thing and I’m just too old to understand what’s happening?
What else I read this week:
A Fashion ‘Prodigy’ Makes a Big Debut. No Pressure. — New York Times
Jess Testa is one of my favorite writers, period, but I love getting her viewpoint on fashion. She has a way at getting at the humanity of her subjects that is unmatched.
Even the Publicists Are Influencers Now. Just Ask Gia Kuan. — Vanity Fair
Delia Cai interviewed Gia Kuan ahead of fashion week, and I think Gia embodies some of the best qualities of her current cohort of independent publicists: she’s kind, genuinely cares about her clients, and isn’t afraid to try new ways of doing things.
The Decomposition of Rotten Tomatoes — Vulture
I can’t really say I’m shocked by Lane Brown’s report that PR companies are playing the system when it comes to Rotten Tomatoes ratings. What I am shocked to learn is that something like one third of consumers determine whether they’ll see a movie based on the RT ratings?! GUYS! Is this real?! Are you doing this? If so, please tell me, I must know more.
Girlhood, Interrupted — The Cut
I personally am a fan of Dylan Mulvaney’s and I think what happened to her is, excuse my language, a fucking crime. I appreciated that Brock Colyar was able to go deep with her for this profile.
Fashion Week Dispatch: Part 1 — Shop Rat
Once, in Milan, Emilia Petrarca taught me the phrase “salami knees.” I am absolutely positive this ranks low on a list of things she hopes to be remembered for, but I say this to illustrate that I am near-constantly learning about new things from her, so I hit subscribe on her new newsletter SHOP RAT so fast I nearly broke my ‘Enter’ key. Her first issue was about The Clip, which has haunted me around the city ever since I read it.
Some housekeeping before I go:
Thank you so much for subscribing to VOTED MOST TALKATIVE. I hope we’ll have fun here together!
I am very much navigating what this newsletter can and will look like, so for the time being, it will be FREE. I do plan on moving to a paid model within the next few months, but I will of course give ample notice for that. And thank you to everyone who has already become a paid subscriber!
Also, I love feedback. I especially love positive feedback, but I have a therapist for handling negative feedback, so please don’t be shy.
Re: Coach. I'm a middle aged suburban mom, selling handbags in an upscale department store in a Midwestern suburb. I'm shocked to see you compare Vevers to Marc for LV, but I am primarily talking about handbags, no one in our area carries Coach RTW except maybe the Coach stores. Absolutely no one is asking about Coach except women in their 60s and 70s. There was a brief surge with women in their 20s asking about the Puffy Tabby bags, but no more. I haven't seen any ads with J Lo, and no one is asking for whatever Coach bag she is given to carry. It's a basic line, like it's sister brand Kate Spade, that does enough business that you should carry it, but the customer base is aging and younger people are carrying Marc Jacobs while they are saving for YSL (at least in my area).
Incredibly insightful, Tyler. This was so interesting to read. P.S. I am also very much unabashedly #TeamConrad.