Fashion Month SS24 Was Messy
From robberies to the invite black market to runway crashers, dishing dirt on the industry’s holier-than-thou fashion month spectacle
Now fashion month is over we can get into it. From PETA invading the runways to more than 50 Balmain pieces being stolen to Anna Wintour snubbing Kim Kardashian front row and the Paris Fashion Week invitations black market doing the rounds, this past fashion month was messy.
I will admit I like the chaos. Working on and off in the industry for the past decade I’ve often wondered, are fashion shows relevant anymore? But at this point, the madness is what's keeping fashion month interesting as the biggest talking point of the SS24 season was definitely the drama.
In the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it fashion spectacles we are now prone to witness every fashion month, and especially in an intoxicated social media hungry fashion realm, a fake Ariana Grande on the runway and bouncers not taking shit from influencers were just a few of the standout moments that got people talking this season. Just a few.
PETA’s runway crashing world tour
Who’s giving the PETA girlies access to all of the major fashion month shows? And can that same person hook me up? Please and thank you. Anyway, I digress, as the SS24 fashion month circuit really belonged to PETA. Protesters and activists from PETA embarked on a world tour of runway invasions, making catwalk crashing all the rage.
Their journey kicked off at New York Fashion Week, where a duo disrupted the Coach show. One held a sign declaring "Coach: Leather Kills," while the other sported full-body paint resembling the anatomy of a skinned animal. Days later, a PETA supporter crashed a Michael Kors VIP event, armed with a sign denouncing Angora as torture — but they didn’t stop there.
Across the pond in Europe, PETA crusaders at Burberry and Gucci held up signs proclaiming "Burberry: Animals Are Not Clothing" and "Gucci: Ban Exotic Skins." As the grand finale, a lone PETA warrior stormed the Hermès runway in Paris, only to have fashion editor and influencer Bryan Yambao (@bryanboy) snatch the protester's sign mid-strut. Here’s a video of another angle.
Meanwhile, outside Louis Vuitton's hyped-up Paris show, French YouTuber Jeremstar got carried away by police for protesting exotic skins, narrowly avoiding yet another runway ruckus.
The fashion show invite black market
Can you put a number on the velvet rope separating average Joes from runway shows? Apparently yes, yes you can. And it’s a big price tag at that. Fashion weeks are an elusive sanctuary usually reserved for editors, buyers, and now social media stars with big followings (yawn), but now you can buy your way in if you have the funds.
Fashion editor Louis Pisano tweeted an expose of a VIP Manager from one of France's top luxury fashion houses peddling tickets to shows. The offer? A snug seat within the first three rows, red carpet sauntering privileges, and exclusive after-party access. Cash transactions only.
And Bryanboy came to the rescue once again, weighing in on the fashion show black market debate by sharing a screenshot of an undercover ledger from a previous Paris Fashion Week. Dior seats were being sold for a cool $6,200, Balmain for $3,800, and Louis Vuitton for a crisp $6,000. That’ll burn a hole in your pocket.
Forget traditional invitations; securing a spot at today's hottest fashion shows is no longer frowned upon but glamorously hailed as a glorified bribe where money does the talking. The catwalk has become a cashwalk, and it's time to admit that, in fashion, money can indeed buy you the runway seat of your dreams.
Balmain’s runway collection robbery
Just days before Balmain’s SS24 grand unveiling, the fashion world was hit with a major plot twist. Olivier Rousteing, the creative director of Balmain since 2011, revealed on Instagram to his 9.8 million followers that about 50 designs due to be included in the upcoming runway show had been stolen.
As the collection travelled from a Parisian airport to the brand's headquarters, thieves seized the vehicle en route and took what they could — which was pretty much everything. Rousteing said that the lorry driver was safe, thankfully, but the soon-to-be debuted collection was long gone.
This wasn’t about to stop the Balmain crew, however. “So many people worked so hard to make this collection,” he wrote. “We are redoing everything but this is so so disrespectful.” Fast forward to showtime and it was business as usual. A-listers Cher, Jodie Turner-Smith and Kim Cattrall sat FROW, champagne did the rounds, and the Balmain suppliers remade about 70% of the stolen pieces in time.
But to add insult to injury, the Parisian police managed to track down the stolen van and its now-empty treasure trove of Balmain goods. In the show notes for the collection, Rousteing paid tribute to the hard work and dedication of his team, along with people who offered support as this fashion month drama made headlines.
Many other dramas unfolded over the course of the SS24 fashion month season, such as a model dressed as a giant furball getting lost on the Christian Cowan runway and Tommy Cash’s offensive, distasteful cosplay as a homeless person at the Diesel SS24 MFW show. The drama this past fashion month just kept on drama-ing.
Fashion month used to happen just twice a year. Then as more and more collections were churned out left right and centre, this led to multiple fashion shows in multiple cities across the globe, with some type of fashion week happening on a near-constant basis. At some point, it became too much. Is it any wonder this past season was a mess?
Fashion is on a never-ending world tour and there's always some spectacle of performance in the works. Yes, today's fashion playbook calls for more. But amid all the sartorial stress fatigue is setting in. Is the fashion calendar due for a refresh? And could that calm the chaos a little? Perhaps. But whether this will happen or not is a different story.
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exactly.