Like, like, like. As I scroll through my Instagram feed during the months of September and February, I am bombarded with outfit of the days from various fashion bloggers, paparazzi shots of off-duty models or high quality action shots of models strutting down the runway. Almost half of the pictures on my feed have something to do with the highly anticipated events surrounding each fashion week show, and I’m not positive if it’s because 200 out of the 500 people I follow on Instagram are in the industry or because everyone has access to the so-called “prestigious” event.
Years ago when fashion bloggers weren’t a thing and when fashion was viewed as an untouchable industry, the bi-yearly events were prestigious, unapproachable and unaccessible. You would never hear of 17-year-old girls getting 3rd row tickets to see the Marc Jacobs show or hear that buyers were no longer in the front rows of the shows but instead, sitting in the back by the camera crew. Due to the immense power of social media and the fact that almost every attendee publicizes their day-to-day lifestyle during fashion month, it feels as though we can all be a part of this industry.
Everything nowadays is all about the picture. It’s all about publicizing what’s happening, showing off what you’re doing and making it clear that you are in fact part of the it-thing. While we all do this, if the people behind New York Fashion Week lower their standards and make these events more accessible to people like you and me, then in the next ten years, no one will be intrigued by it. There will be nothing special about attending a fashion week show if it starts to become easy to do so. And lately, it feels as though it’s starting to get easier and less luxurious.
In September 2015, Uber partnered with Rag & Bone to giveaway hundreds of free tickets if users used the app at a specific time of the show-date. While that’s pretty cool for normal people like you and me who would normally scroll through vogue.com to see all of the looks, should fashion week be accessible to the public? And the reason why they partnered together was to create talk amongst the people — various news websites posted about this and it gained awareness on the brand.
Is fashion supposed to be about social networking? People will argue that this is just the pace of fashion and that the industry is just moving forward. They will claim that this is just evolutionary. But, in a day and age where social media consumes all, it is almost predictable that fashion is headed in that direction of being solely about social network. Renzo Rosso, President of Italian fashion group OTB stated, “Fashion is now full of people doing social networks, crazy things, just to make people talk. I don’t want to be part of this system. I just want the beauty and the dream.” Lately, fashion week is less about the art of fashion and creativity and more about who’s attending what show.
Don’t get me wrong; I live for the New York Fashion Week Snapchat account that posts videos of backstage occurrences or 15 second videos on Instagram of the final walk at every show. It makes me feel like I’m part of the prestigious event that has been going on for decades. However, if social media continues to overpower the actual fashion show and the meaning of fashion week, it will slowly ruin the value and what the entire thing is truly worth. Although Gigi Hadid’s and Kendall Jenner’s backstage photos are insanely cute and intriguing, is that Instagram post really what fashion week is about? Or should we be more focused on the weeks worth of work that went into the detailing of their look for that designers’ collection?
Unfortunately, rather than focusing on the most important editors and buyers of the fashion industry or the actual collection, designers are more focused on the famous socialites, VIPs and bloggers who will give their show more coverage and publicity. Fashion week should be about the clothes, not about the celebrities. The bi-yearly event is turning into a hype-generating event and while that might benefit everyday people, the fashion industry will soon burn out.
