By Emily Anne Epstein 2/05 7:37pm

Couture Control

(Emily Anne Epstein)

Meet Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, the Ego-tamer, Ringmaster and Floor-sweeper of Fashion Week

In the 31st-floor offices of SWW Creative, the walls are beige, the carpet is gray and the cabinets are standard-issue wood-grain. There’s no Eames armchair, no runway stills splashed across the walls, not even a lucite coffee table with a copy of Grace Coddington’s memoir. There’s not a flower in sight.

While fashion professionals are known to obsess over the color of their pens, SWW Creative’s offices are about as splashy as an insurance agency’s. Stephanie Winston Wolkoff is not concerned. Read More

By Benjamin-Emile Le Hay 9/10/12 10:00pm

Fashion Week

The atmosphere of American Express Skybox. (Photo by Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for American Express)

Taking a Break Behind-the-Scenes Backstage with American Express

“We like that you feel a little chaotic and it’s all very well planned,” explained a representative from American Express. “This is an opportunity for us to give back to our premium card members who are passionate and we are giving them a very immersive experience, as you can see, with the models running around.”

Cardmembers are spoiled with backstage tours, coups de Champagne and a gourmet spread worthy of a sultan.

“They get rushed into a show right as it is about to begin and then the best part is that after the show they get to come back into the studio and the designer comes in for a Q&A,” we were informed by one of our hosts.

The Observer threw back a few a glasses in the sun-lit salon that had been tastefully decorated with cozy loungers and a private hair salon replete with stylists, before we were ushered to the front-row of Cushnie et Ochs’s runway presentation last Friday. Read More

By Nitasha Tiku 2/29/12 3:23pm

Fashion Week Observed

Picnik collage

Fashion Week Etiquette Breach: Photogs Bemoan Bloggers With iPhones

As sartorialists make their biannual pilgrimage from New York to London to Milan to Paris, some veteran tent-dwellers still have a pebble stuck in their Louboutins from Lincoln Center.

The glossy editor’s anxiety over being edged out of the front row, it seems, has migrated over to the media riser and down to the pit. What was once the province of professional photogs, to hear them tell it, has been overrun by iPhone and iPad wielding bloggers who wouldn’t know a bounce flash from a zoom lens. And they’re hogging up the press passes for backstage beauty shots!

Shortly after they turned off the stage lights and sopped up the champagne, a handful of disgruntled photographers reached out to The Observer to kvetch. Slights ranged from being turned away from shows, to an errant iPhone interrupting their runway image, to discovering that the insolent photo-bloggers never learned the etiquette about getting your shot and moving on. Read More

By David Foxley 2/14/08 7:59pm

Fashion Week Dregs: The Lauren Conrad Collection

The grass at Bryant Park isn’t even cold yet, but the folks behind last week’s midtown mayhem have already started seducing coverage for their next runway romp. Mercedes Benz Fashion Week at Smashbox Studios will take place from March 9-13. Confirmed designers, as of today, include: Kelly Nishimoto, Kevan Hall, Octavio Carlin, Maggie Barry and Read More