Like Paris, Milan and London, New York City has a semi-annual fashion week. In New York City, spring-summer womenswear shows are usually scheduled in the first week of September. New York fashion week is often criticized for being overly commercial and imitative of european fashion. This criticism dates back to the early 20th century, when French couturiers would license their designs to New York manufacturers and department stores to literally replicate and produce for an American market. New York Fashion week was created during Word War II (originally called "Press Week"), because American press were unable to travel to Paris fashion week and report on the new collections. So American designer began to show collections in New York City during what is now fashion week. Before 1943, all of America looked to Paris runways for inspirational styles. As American designers started to become more popular in the industry, New York fashion week gained international attention. Today, it is known as one of the four major fashion weeks.
Personally, I think that New York's fashion scene may have it's flaws but it's also progressive and distinct. The following are three of my favourite spring-summer 2014 womenswear collections from New York fashion week:
Alexander Wang
Proenza Schouler
Helmut Lang
-SFH
A lot of this seems really over the top and I probably wouldn't wear most of it :P, do you have any fave. menswear designers? I sold a lot of this stuff when I worked at The Bay, and even though I was working I still couldn't afford the stuff I was selling haha
ReplyDeleteHaha, well everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I hate having to choose one favourite designer because I love so many, and my tastes change from season to season. But over all my favourite menswear designer is probably Raf Simons.
DeleteI agree - I'm more of a hoodie person myself, but some of the clothes still look kinda cool...but I probably wouldn't wear most of them off the runway. Do you think the commercialism of the NYC Fashion week is a plus or a minus compared to the european versions?
ReplyDeleteWell it's a minus for me. I think I'm just kind of down on commercial American fashion, for the most part. For example, NYC Fashion Week is now sponsored by Mercedes Benz. So their logo is everywhere, which just isn't a thing at European fashion weeks. European fashion is much more interesting and beautiful in my opinion. But to be fair Europe was producing fashion centuries before the United States. Some of the fashion houses are twice as old as NYC Fashion Week.
DeleteAlexander Wang is actually one of my favourite designers. I also recently had the opportunity to visit New York City this past weekend and I adored how the people dressed over there. I do agree that there is a bit of a french element to their clothing and a lot of the clothing in NYC seemed pretty 'chill' but I also was born in Europe so I could see the bits of European fashion in each persons outfit.
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