I honestly never thought I’d write a post like this, but this season’s fashion week, for some reason, highlighted the blogger take over – and not in a good way.
It’s maybe the change of venue – LFW used to be at Somerset House which was somewhat more spacious than a car park in Brewer Street in Soho, so maybe it’s just that there had to be more people in less space. But, not only was it very difficult to push through the on-lookers to get to the space (and god help you if you were in a car!), but it intensified the fact that we’ve forgotten what fashion week is all about.
When bloggers first started attending fashion weeks, they energised it; they stopped it being so elitist and stuffy and opened their reader’s eyes to a world that was hitherto closed. But, slowly, slowly, it’s stopped being about encouraging and supporting fabulous fashion and engaging audiences with an exciting new take on the previously unreachable. It’s stopped being about the designers and become all about the selfies. Fashion week, blogger style, is about being seen, being able to say you were there, Instagramming and Snapchatting yourself on location. Obviously, this doesn’t apply to all – we have some incredibly good and serious fashion bloggers in the UK who understand fashion brands to their core; and they really couldn’t care less if they get their picture anywhere or if they made ‘frow’. They just want to see and appreciate the threads.
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The point of Fashion Week is basically to act as a trade show – fashion shows cost a fortune to put on (although many fashion brands wouldn’t be able to fund a show at all if it wasn’t for beauty brands sponsoring them, but that’s another story) and it’s the designer’s time to show all the buyers from all over the world what they’re made of. Buyers buy. If they can’t get into a show because they can’t break through a crowd of selfies, they’re buying nothing. If it just becomes too difficult to attend what is essentially a business deal, and buyers stay away, the fashion business could break.
I went to one show this year – and please bear in mind that for most of us, ‘doing a show’ means being allowed backstage to take some pictures, not sitting next to Anna Wintour on the front row, and it was one that was entirely relevant for my site. As I watched the models going down the runway, the front row was studded with MIC. In my view, that’s a row for fashion trade journals, buyers and industry movers and shakers – people who can keep the financial aspect of the fashion industry going.
This is the first fashion season where I’ve thought that it’s maybe not appropriate for it to be blogger bagged when the bloggers have forgotten the roots of the event. Or, maybe never knew it in the first place. I wish now that I’d stopped and asked a few of them if they knew exactly what Fashion Week is for. I’m just guessing that maybe the financial and business future of designers and brands maybe wouldn’t have been the answer.
I used to be so scathing about journalists who complained bitterly about the blogger take-over of fashion week; now I think they had a point although it will never be clear whether it was a case of ego-bruising or a real concern for the fashion trade.
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14 comments
It makes me cringe to think it may be true, but if someone’s allocated an important seat presumably they are influential to that designers potential demographic. It sounds daft to me that someone from MIC could be as important as a major fashion editor – but I’m a 43 year old who’s rarely out of my pyjama bottoms, so what do I know?!!
The times they are a-changing I guess…
From the sound of it nothing has changed! LOL I remember the attitude back in the 80’s and mind you it was emphasized more with those shoulder pads! Besides, I think you know, Fashion week for the spectator is fun but to the people involved, talk about pins and needles and I don’t mean in the sewing sense!
That’s certainly an interesting take as I personally didn’t know the real purpose of Fashion Week, even though it seems obvious now that you’ve said it.
MIC?
Made in Chelsea.
Sadly, sometimes democratisation and dumbing down go hand in hand.
Great post Jane. I know what you mean. I tried to go to Fashion Week once I couldn’t deal with the craziness, too many people!! It’s important that Fashion Week remains about fashion and not about the show offs being seen and digital coverage. It seems so easy for bloggers to get involved now and not just with fashion week that I feel like it is diluting the industry as a serious trade. Will be interesting to see how things develop.
Blame the PRs for inviting celebrities – that’s what started the whole thing off. Bloggers (or ‘influencers’ if you want the more up-to-date iteration) help to up the profile of fashion week and of course, many are ‘wardrobed’ by said designers and have their photos published in street style roundups thereafter which is akin to a celebrity being featured in Grazia wearing – for example – Giles at the Giles show. It must be galling for designers to have more attention focused on the celebs and influencers than the actual clothes but it’s nothing new. Look at Burberry, they actively court it so it must be working for them.
That’s absolutely true but it’s kind of indiscriminate and not thought through I think – what’s the point of someone on FROW whose followers have an average age of 9? I’m pretty sure that the change of venue has had an impact.. it was all cool when everyone was milling around Somerset House courtyard having coffees and snapping, but outside the car park was just a scrum. Maybe lack of space just intensified the feeling of being overwhelmed by people. It just felt different this year, somehow.
I am definitely one of those fashion bloggers who attend and actually cover the shows, it is not about being seen for sure, so great point, but Bloggers are not to blame as I assume most of the hoards outside that ridiculous car park space are on lookers, and wannabes.
When it comes to the shows it is the PR who issue the tickets, so more ‘blame’ should be geared towards them as they organise the shows, they are the ones who decide on that coveted seat allocation. it is very tough to get that accreditation to attend and it doesn’t mean you get to go to shows. Even though I don’t agree with the posers its their prerogative to go, because true insiders know they are not really part of London fashion week.
There are amazing fashion and beauty bloggers who totally get the whole element of fashion week – you are there to do a job, right? To cover the fashion and I’d never suggest that anyone doing their job at fashion week shouldn’t be there. It’s more that I really felt the vibe had changed this year.. every corner I turned there was a blogger taking pictures of themselves and what they were wearing and it was nothing to do with anyone else’s fashion but theirs. I have a commenter in this thread who genuinely didn’t know that fashion week is a commerce and business event and my point is that a lot don’t know the root of what it’s actually for. This year just polarised the issue and I don’t know why. I get it that everyone wants to feel a part of it and you’re right, they have every right to do so, but me-at-fashion-week and fashion week are different things, I think. I haven’t looked, but I’d be interested to see if there are any show reports or designer profiles as blog posts – because that seems a very fair exchange. But, if it all turns out to be ‘here’s what I wore at fashion week’, then it was really a misunderstanding of why fashion week exists.
I’ve been thinking this for years. The bloggers who stand outside on the streets causing traffic while they take several hundred photos drive me insane!
Emily x
http://www.emandthem.co.uk
I’m not one to leave messages usually, however this piece really did make me stop and think and everything you said I was like…YES!!! Personally I don’t go to events like this for those reasons alone. I love going to blogging events more for the social aspect really as well as the interaction with brands but these kinds of events are not about the who’s who in the blogging world, endless look at me, look where I am and selfies its about the fashion!! Thanks for writing this xx
A fashion trade show in a car park? Sounded a bit Heath Robinson and not at all inviting. I had to Google Brewer Street car park. Hope someone scented the staircase with Jo Malone.