By Drew Grant 2/11 3:54pm

New York Fashion Week

Video

Moncler's Human Forest (Video)

Who Needs Clothes in a Human Forest? Moncler Takes Fashion Week on a Trip to Remember (Video)

Moncler, the foremost design label for premier puffy coats and Fashion Week presentations involving people sculptures, held its exhibition in New York’s Gotham Hall Saturday night. It did not disappoint: The “Human Forest” show involved 370 boys and girls wearing the label lining up on different tiers underneath a mirrored ceiling, while flashing lights and a Star War-y soundtrack blared.

Of course, the biggest fans of Moncler that evening were the Brant brothers, who have yet to see a Fashion Week event that they couldn’t throw their teenaged two cents on. Read More

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 9/13/12 5:46pm

Fashion Week

An exclusive backstage photo from The Observer's Wang-insider/tipster.

Does the Sensationalism of Alexander Wang and Other Designers Overshadow Their Fashion?

American fashion design has seen an exciting new crop of talented youngsters creep onto the scene. Creatives such as Joseph Altuzarra, Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez of Proenza Schouler, Alexander Wang, Jason Wu and Prabal Gurung have received a great deal of attention—and rightfully so. The majority of this bunch thrive on fanfare—not always on the design of their clothes, but on their front-rows, frantic check-ins and backstage dramas.

The Proenza Schouler duo, after several seemingly shaky years, have quickly become darlings of the global fashion elite, continually present interesting and attractive collections. Now sitting more comfortably with financial investments from Theory Group’s Andrew Rosen and a glossy new David Adjaye-designed boutique (albeit too damn dark to see any of the merch), its safe to say they are no longer emerging.

Mr. Altuzarra’s nomadic, opulent materials and prints seem to satiate the critics. Since PR Consulting has never invited us to one of his magical shows, we’ll let him be.

Jason Wu’s nearly flawless technique and practical glamour—not to mention being a favorite of first lady Michelle Obama—means he’s fine and dandy.

Same for Thakoon Panichgul. Read More

By Benjamin-Emile Le Hay 9/12/12 5:00pm

Fashion Week

Nina Agdal, Max Azria, Lubov Azria in Hervé Léger, Dania Ramirez and Rico Love are all smiles at The Boom Boom Room.

Lubov Azria Dishes on Backstage Model Drama and Hosts Boisterous Party for Hervé Léger

Rebecca Taylor was not at Lincoln Center. Had we not been slammed with events, emails, editorial projects, tweets and social babysitting of our entourage, we would have easily noted this. Rebecca Taylor was scheduled for 2 p.m. on Saturday at Highline Studios Downtown. Yet we had eagerly arrived at the Mercedes-Benz complex, bewildered and irritated. 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 Benjamin-Emile Le Hay 9/10/12 4:00pm

Fashion Week

NANETTE LEPORE Fall 2012 Fashion Show

Kristin Chenoweth Back on Her Feet and Front-Row at Fashion Week

Broadway star and Tony winner, Kristin Chenoweth was badly injured on the set of popular primetime CBS show The Good Wife in July. The petite star told the LA Times in September that she “had a skull fracture, rib issue and neck issue and a hip issue,” and had to be carried off in a stretcher after a lighting rig fell on her.

But this week, she has back in action for the first time, attending several runway shows in New York.

“This is my big night out after seven weeks,” the giddy and tenacious Ms. Chenoweth told The Observer at the DL 1961 fashion show last week in West Chelsea. Read More

2/16/12 9:08am

Fashion Week Observed

KCD's darling, Hallie Chrisman.

KCD’s Hallie Chrisman Runs a Tight Ship and Spots Crashers Like a Hawk

Navigating the realm of fashion publication relations can be a difficult job. For in-house publicists and leading New York PR firms, such as KCD, PR Consulting, Karla Otto, Starworks, Bismarck Phillips and HL Group—fashion week is a marathon: RSVP-management, developing press releases, endless email chains, photography and artistic direction, event and runway production, front-of-house organization, Read More

2/09/12 9:43am

Fashion Week Observed

McMillan at the Richard Chai Love Spring 2012 Fashion Show

Model Miles McMillan Strikes a Pose

Fresh off the runways in Milan and Paris, model-newcomer Miles McMillan (who walked in Dior, Etro, John Varvatos, Costume National and Damir Doma—to name a few) is gearing up for another strong season of shows and parties in New York. The Observer hunted him down to find out what life is like when you’re so in-demand. Read More

By Jenna Sauers 2/08/12 10:30am

Fashion Week Observed

The Boy who would be queen. (Fred Harper)

How Fashion Blogger BryanBoy Became a Front-Row Fixture

In February 2009, a young-looking man appeared in the audience of the Marc Jacobs Fall-Winter show, one of the most exclusive at New York Fashion Week. He was not a director, like Marc’s friend and frequent guest Sofia Coppola, or a famous singer, like Madonna, or an actor, but his handsome, androgynous face was already familiar to tens of thousands of fans online. And there he was, in the pantheon. Fashion-show invite lists are feudal and loaded with meaning, and that man’s arrival at Marc Jacobs meant: I am now Anna Wintour’s peer.

An unlikely peer he was. Read More

By Adrianne Jeffries and Ben Popper 9/13/11 9:16pm

September Issues

(Fred Harper.)

Techies Try to Make It Work in Fashion, But It's an Awkward Fit

Earlier this year, microblogging service Tumblr was the toast of Fashion Week. The company’s fashion director, Rich Tong, negotiated access for influential Tumblr users to cover swanky events. Bloggers got access to A-list fashion shows and in return big brands got access to an online community of fashion enthusiasts that were active on one of the edgier platforms to emerge in the social media landscape in the last few years. And the industry took notice. Now fashion luminaries are on the platform, too. Stefano Gabbana has a Tumblr. So does Terry Richardson. Read More