milan fashion week

[POLL]: Does Pre-Fall Need a New Name?

By in Clients Tags: ,

As we speak designers around the world are rolling out Pre-Fall collections for 2011, but unless you are looking for them you aren’t likely to see much coverage. The collections are often shown presentation style and sans the flashy events and parties that many have come to associate with fashion shows. So it’s easy to see why these new offerings don’t garner mass attention. Designer Michael Kors, however, has another theory on why people don’t drool over Pre-Fall fare.

“Everyone knows now that resort is important, but because the name ‘pre-fall’ is so ugly no one wants to acknowledge that these are the clothes you actually put in your closet,” said Kors. The sportswear king also lamented the premature wearing of heavy winter items at fashion week, saying the Pre-Fall items are more appropriate to the occasion. “You see everyone in the front row bundled in furs and tweeds in September and it looks insane!”

Above: Pre-Fall looks from (L to R) Pringle of Scotland, Oscar de la Renta, Jason Wu, Reed Krakoff, and Elie Tahari. Read the rest of the above article and take the poll at the FashionStake Blog

Blogs Move Fashion from Dictatorship to Democracy

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***The following has been republished from FashionStake Blog***

This year Milan Fashion Week was shook with the news that US Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour would only be attending three of the five days of shows. Labels were in a panic, trying to rearrange their schedules to make sure the real life “devil” in Prada would be able to attend their presentations. Why would an entire city of fashion elite get their collective panties in a bunch for one tiny woman?

For decades, fashion magazines were the ultimate bridge between the fashion world and the all-important consumer. This system created centralized powers like Anna Wintour who can make or break a brand with one swipe of their editor’s pen. But with steady cultural and technological changes, the tide is shifting away from the oligarchy of print and other “old” media and toward the democracy of online media like blogs.

Blogs are like the lighter, faster cousin of the magazine. Consumers no longer have to wait six months for fashion rags to publish a sliver of what they deem to be worthy from a new season of collections. Instead, fashion fans can turn to the agile blogosphere and see new collections the same day the mighty EICs see them. More importantly, blogs invite readers to participate in the dialogue of fashion, making the comment section as much a part of an article as the contents of the post. While a magazine dictates, blogs allow readers to be a part of the determination of what’s “in” fashion. In this way blogs are helping democratize the fashion industry.

Smart brands have picked up on this new power and have given bloggers access to the holy grail of fashion influence, previously exclusive to the most important magazine editors and celebrities: The Front Row Seat. Placing bloggers in these highly coveted spots has created a small backlash from a few members of the old guard, as when Grazia magazine’s style director Paula Reed lashed out at 13-year-old blogger Tavi Gevinson who was seated in front of her at a Dior couture show. The blogger wore an over-sized bow in her hair, which became the object of Reed’s public ire. Still, the entire industry seems to recognize the power of harnessing public opinion using the online arena and, accordingly, blogs are here to stay.
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Pictured above is blogger Susie Bubble, who is a virtual celebrity in the fashion blog circuit. See her very popular personal style blog at www.stylebubble.co.uk