Fashion fakes, Kanye and Kim.
After years of endless marketing and promotion, American fashion is flailing in terms of prestige. At least, that’s one way to look at it. Another is that American fashion may be returning to its roots as the wellspring of commodity chic. Whom did everyone talk about last season? Jacobs’ stunning show was an outlier. Otherwise, it was all about Kanye West and Rihanna, two glossy, nondesigner marketers who get the value of tricked-out staging and how to work (work, work, work, work) a sweatshirt to maximum effect.
– Bridget Foley, executive editor of Women’s Wear Daily.
It seems the fashion press has a love/hate relationship with Kanye West and other fashion poseurs, such as the Kardashians. They don’t really like them but they won’t stop talking about them.
On the “love” side – West and his wife Kim Kardashian grace the cover of this month’s Harper’s Bazaar, feature in a photo spread by Karl Largerfeld and get a Q&A to boot! Really HB, I thought better of you.
On the “hate” side – WWD’s recent coverage of West’s spring 2017 show spent as much space commenting on his disrespect for the fashion press (inconvenient location, show started very late, uncomfortable venue) as on his “unoriginal” designs.
West is an interesting story. In reality he has no talent for design and I have read accounts that he has pushed, pushed, pushed his way onto the runways throwing around his celebrity and money and sometimes using ghost designers. Still he persists and it seems we can’t get rid of him despite his lack of fashion talent, disregard for everyone, and even poor reviews.
He’s just one example of the noise in the fashion industry these days. With spectacle shows, celebrity brands, corporate drama … the fashion part is getting lost.
OverDressed for Life 
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