BerlinRocks
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Do you think fashion critics write something real instead of compliments?
- Thread starter balmain1914
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ffashionist
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I'm not even sure that there are any fashion critics left today. It's all about buying and selling ads, no publishing house wants to risk making some designer furious over a critic of his/her collection. I remember reading a funny, but true, story how D&G treatned to pull all their ads from a major Italian newspaper only because their food journalist wrote a negative critic of the steak he tasted at D&G restaurant (in Milan) called Gold. Then this newspaper had to write another, this time positive critic, and it was all forgotten. Who knows what would have happened if they had talked about clothes. To me it's just hilarious...
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softgrey
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Fashion Week: The beleaguered art of fashion criticism
Published On Wed Mar 07 2012
Robin Givhan, special correspondent for style and culture for Newsweek and The Daily Beast, dared ask recently, “Is Chanel Designer Karl Lagerfeld Spread Too Thin?” Lagerfeld showed Chanel's latest collection at Paris fashion week Tuesday. Did Givhan get a seat? Read on.
By David Graham
There was a time when fashion designers feared the critics who populated the front rows of their fashion shows.
A bad review could mean a collection was ignored by the fashion magazines. Stores might turn elsewhere for the clothes to fill their racks next season.
Newspapers and magazines sent their fashion experts around the world to critique the bi-annual ready-to-wear collections and bring back important news to discerning readers. These journalists were more than arbiters of style. They were tough critics bulldozing their way through an effete world of air kisses and crinolines. They gushed when it was deserved. They were harsh when all was not right.
That world barely exists today, says Robin Givhan, special correspondent for style and culture for Newsweek and The Daily Beast, who dared ask recently, “Is Chanel Designer Karl Lagerfeld Spread Too Thin?”
It’s a fair question: The 79-year-old designer is creative director of Chanel in Paris, Fendi in Milan and of his own eponymous collections. He’s a photographer and book publisher. He has also created miniature collections for fast-fashion chain H&M as well as Macy’s.
Givhan knew she was poking a sacred cow: “Such a statement rings like heresy within a fashion universe where the highly acclaimed designer struts upon his lofty stage as creative director of Chanel – but it’s true,” she wrote.
Lagerfeld was not amused, saying dismissively that he’d never heard of her, which is strange, given that she had been on the fashion scene for years with the Detroit Free Press and more recently won a Pulitzer Prize for her work as a fashion critic at the Washington Post.
Yet it’s not surprising Lagerfeld reacted as he did. Designers have become accustomed to fawning coverage from the fashion press, rarely subjected to the scrutiny applied in Givhan’s article.
There are several forces at work here.
Design houses that receive unflattering reviews can be vindictive, banning the offending journalist from their shows. This is serious. Unlike movie and theatre critics, who can pay for a ticket on opening night, a fashion critic has only one chance to see a collection live. Even restaurant critics can wear a disguise and dine unnoticed.
Givhan says watching a fashion show, even on a live video stream, dilutes the experience. “Fashion critics need the co-operation of the design houses,” she says.
Thus, some fashion commentators have found it prudent to curry favour, soften their criticism and continue to receive their invitations to the shows.
A second issue is that reduced print-media budgets have resulted in fewer fashion critics in the bleachers at fashion shows and more bloggers taking their places — often young women untrained in the craft of criticism. And general interest magazines and newspapers — the very ones now contracting their coverage — as Givhan observes, have always been “the best place for a critical conversation about the fashion industry.”
Moreover, the ranks of fashion-show critics who will write honestly and damn the consequences is thinning.
Amy Spindler, fashion critic for The New York Timesdied in 2004 at age 40. She is still considered one of the best. “Ms. Spindler was never interested in simply putting a dress on a page or talking about hemlines. She recognized that fashion was as important a cultural barometer as music or art and that it should be — demanded to be —covered as rigorously as a political campaign, wrote Cathy Horyn in an obituary in the Times.
And rumors abound that, approaching 70, Suzy Menkes, the fashion critic for the International Herald Tribune, may be contemplating retirement.
For the most part regional newspapers have withdrawn from the conversation. Some of the smartest critics have fallen away simply because their publications regard fashion criticism, particularly international fashion, as expendable.
The Los Angeles Times, most likely for financial reasons, no longer sends its critic, Booth Moore, to the European collections, even though its Hollywood constituency has an appetite for high fashion.
The brave independent voices remaining include Virginie Mozart at Le Figaro, Vanessa Friedman at the Financial Times, Colin McDowell at the Sunday Times, Bridgette Foley at Women’s Wear Daily, Horyn at the Times.
And of course Givhan herself.
“I started in Detroit as a kid. The Detroit paper sent a fashion writer to Europe because they wanted someone to see the collections through the eyes of their readers.” There was an understanding that Detroit was different than Dallas — and Washington was different than New York.
Fashion magazines, for their part, have always been in passive collusion with the fashion industry. They are notoriously submissive — unwilling to criticize because they are wed inextricably to advertising dollars. Knock a Marc Jacobs collection and the fragrance ads are summarily pulled. And when fashion magazines take an honest look at their own industry — on subjects of racial diversity on the runways or eating disorders, for example — it is understood that they will do this infrequently and then get back to the business of cheerleading.
“The rule of thumb at magazines is that if they don’t like something it will be omitted,” says Givhan. “So it’s up to the savvy reader to see what’s missing — who didn’t get on the cover.”
Bloggers are the new critics. Often dazzled by celebrity culture, at best they offer snappy if uninformed commentary. Mostly it comes down to stating the obvious — short hemlines, bright prints etc. And as social media (including tweeting) insinuates itself in the front row, considered opinion is more often a simplistic rush to judgment.
“It’s got to be more than just ‘I loved it or I hated it,’ ” says Givhan. “You’ve got to explain your thinking — how you got there. Criticism is not personal opinion. At its best it’s opinion based on a set of facts that are set in context. I’ve seen shows that I’ve loved but I knew that critically they were not great. And vice versa.”
Givhan says she doesn’t follow bloggers and it irks her that so many don’t blog under their own name. It’s hard to trust anonymous opinions.
But her biggest rap against them is that they are too cozy with the designers on whom they report. “I like to think that journalists understand the importance of keeping an arm’s length between critics and designers.”
Givhan has read blog posts that wax enthusiastic about an item the blogger has received as a gift from the design house (bloggers are compelled by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission to disclose gifts). So it annoys her even further that a platform for fashion conversation bypasses both criticism and opinion — and goes straight to advertising.
Givhan has seen them at the shows, flown in by the designer and dressed by the designer on the understanding that the payback will be cheery, enthusiastic coverage.
“The bloggers are doing very well,” she says.
At the sacrifice of reasoned opinion. Smart designers know that thoughtful criticism can help them. No one’s interests are served — not the designer, reader or consumer — when the fashion press sings out in unison, “Fabulous!”
But an important question lingers. Is Givhan concerned that her Newsweek article — it was the cover story in the international edition — has sabotaged her relationship with the powerful Lagerfeld.
Givhan seemed unconcerned when she talked to the Star a week before the shows began: “I’ll wait till I get to Paris and see if a dead fish arrives at my hotel instead of an invitation to the Chanel show.”
Contacted yesterday, she said that she had been invited. There was no dead fish, she wrote, though “a pair of binoculars might have helped.”
Lagerfeld had invited her but meted out a punishment nonetheless. She had been banished from the front row.
thestar.com
Published On Wed Mar 07 2012
By David Graham There was a time when fashion designers feared the critics who populated the front rows of their fashion shows.
A bad review could mean a collection was ignored by the fashion magazines. Stores might turn elsewhere for the clothes to fill their racks next season.
Newspapers and magazines sent their fashion experts around the world to critique the bi-annual ready-to-wear collections and bring back important news to discerning readers. These journalists were more than arbiters of style. They were tough critics bulldozing their way through an effete world of air kisses and crinolines. They gushed when it was deserved. They were harsh when all was not right.
That world barely exists today, says Robin Givhan, special correspondent for style and culture for Newsweek and The Daily Beast, who dared ask recently, “Is Chanel Designer Karl Lagerfeld Spread Too Thin?”
It’s a fair question: The 79-year-old designer is creative director of Chanel in Paris, Fendi in Milan and of his own eponymous collections. He’s a photographer and book publisher. He has also created miniature collections for fast-fashion chain H&M as well as Macy’s.
Givhan knew she was poking a sacred cow: “Such a statement rings like heresy within a fashion universe where the highly acclaimed designer struts upon his lofty stage as creative director of Chanel – but it’s true,” she wrote.
Lagerfeld was not amused, saying dismissively that he’d never heard of her, which is strange, given that she had been on the fashion scene for years with the Detroit Free Press and more recently won a Pulitzer Prize for her work as a fashion critic at the Washington Post.
Yet it’s not surprising Lagerfeld reacted as he did. Designers have become accustomed to fawning coverage from the fashion press, rarely subjected to the scrutiny applied in Givhan’s article.
There are several forces at work here.
Design houses that receive unflattering reviews can be vindictive, banning the offending journalist from their shows. This is serious. Unlike movie and theatre critics, who can pay for a ticket on opening night, a fashion critic has only one chance to see a collection live. Even restaurant critics can wear a disguise and dine unnoticed.
Givhan says watching a fashion show, even on a live video stream, dilutes the experience. “Fashion critics need the co-operation of the design houses,” she says.
Thus, some fashion commentators have found it prudent to curry favour, soften their criticism and continue to receive their invitations to the shows.
A second issue is that reduced print-media budgets have resulted in fewer fashion critics in the bleachers at fashion shows and more bloggers taking their places — often young women untrained in the craft of criticism. And general interest magazines and newspapers — the very ones now contracting their coverage — as Givhan observes, have always been “the best place for a critical conversation about the fashion industry.”
Moreover, the ranks of fashion-show critics who will write honestly and damn the consequences is thinning.
Amy Spindler, fashion critic for The New York Timesdied in 2004 at age 40. She is still considered one of the best. “Ms. Spindler was never interested in simply putting a dress on a page or talking about hemlines. She recognized that fashion was as important a cultural barometer as music or art and that it should be — demanded to be —covered as rigorously as a political campaign, wrote Cathy Horyn in an obituary in the Times.
And rumors abound that, approaching 70, Suzy Menkes, the fashion critic for the International Herald Tribune, may be contemplating retirement.
For the most part regional newspapers have withdrawn from the conversation. Some of the smartest critics have fallen away simply because their publications regard fashion criticism, particularly international fashion, as expendable.
The Los Angeles Times, most likely for financial reasons, no longer sends its critic, Booth Moore, to the European collections, even though its Hollywood constituency has an appetite for high fashion.
The brave independent voices remaining include Virginie Mozart at Le Figaro, Vanessa Friedman at the Financial Times, Colin McDowell at the Sunday Times, Bridgette Foley at Women’s Wear Daily, Horyn at the Times.
And of course Givhan herself.
“I started in Detroit as a kid. The Detroit paper sent a fashion writer to Europe because they wanted someone to see the collections through the eyes of their readers.” There was an understanding that Detroit was different than Dallas — and Washington was different than New York.
Fashion magazines, for their part, have always been in passive collusion with the fashion industry. They are notoriously submissive — unwilling to criticize because they are wed inextricably to advertising dollars. Knock a Marc Jacobs collection and the fragrance ads are summarily pulled. And when fashion magazines take an honest look at their own industry — on subjects of racial diversity on the runways or eating disorders, for example — it is understood that they will do this infrequently and then get back to the business of cheerleading.
“The rule of thumb at magazines is that if they don’t like something it will be omitted,” says Givhan. “So it’s up to the savvy reader to see what’s missing — who didn’t get on the cover.”
Bloggers are the new critics. Often dazzled by celebrity culture, at best they offer snappy if uninformed commentary. Mostly it comes down to stating the obvious — short hemlines, bright prints etc. And as social media (including tweeting) insinuates itself in the front row, considered opinion is more often a simplistic rush to judgment.
“It’s got to be more than just ‘I loved it or I hated it,’ ” says Givhan. “You’ve got to explain your thinking — how you got there. Criticism is not personal opinion. At its best it’s opinion based on a set of facts that are set in context. I’ve seen shows that I’ve loved but I knew that critically they were not great. And vice versa.”
Givhan says she doesn’t follow bloggers and it irks her that so many don’t blog under their own name. It’s hard to trust anonymous opinions.
But her biggest rap against them is that they are too cozy with the designers on whom they report. “I like to think that journalists understand the importance of keeping an arm’s length between critics and designers.”
Givhan has read blog posts that wax enthusiastic about an item the blogger has received as a gift from the design house (bloggers are compelled by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission to disclose gifts). So it annoys her even further that a platform for fashion conversation bypasses both criticism and opinion — and goes straight to advertising.
Givhan has seen them at the shows, flown in by the designer and dressed by the designer on the understanding that the payback will be cheery, enthusiastic coverage.
“The bloggers are doing very well,” she says.
At the sacrifice of reasoned opinion. Smart designers know that thoughtful criticism can help them. No one’s interests are served — not the designer, reader or consumer — when the fashion press sings out in unison, “Fabulous!”
But an important question lingers. Is Givhan concerned that her Newsweek article — it was the cover story in the international edition — has sabotaged her relationship with the powerful Lagerfeld.
Givhan seemed unconcerned when she talked to the Star a week before the shows began: “I’ll wait till I get to Paris and see if a dead fish arrives at my hotel instead of an invitation to the Chanel show.”
Contacted yesterday, she said that she had been invited. There was no dead fish, she wrote, though “a pair of binoculars might have helped.”
Lagerfeld had invited her but meted out a punishment nonetheless. She had been banished from the front row.
thestar.com
IloveDiorHomme
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I think designers should spend more time here, on TheFashionSpot, because us members don't get treats to seat front row at their showas to praise them afterwards.
I am disgusted by this system. A few bloggers are talented, but most of them are parasites...For instance, Bryanboy. This guy is not charming, he has no style, he is tacky and quite vulgar but he gets invited to shows just because outside the show he will be wearing the item he would have received via UPS and get photographed with it. I never something constructive on his stupid, shallow and childish blog.
I am disgusted by this system. A few bloggers are talented, but most of them are parasites...For instance, Bryanboy. This guy is not charming, he has no style, he is tacky and quite vulgar but he gets invited to shows just because outside the show he will be wearing the item he would have received via UPS and get photographed with it. I never something constructive on his stupid, shallow and childish blog.
prosperk
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Therein lies the rub. Many stylists and editors are retained by designers and houses, often in blatant contravention of the contracts they have with the publishing houses employing them as magazine or webzine editors and some of them use their positions to promote their clients. It is unethical, to say the least, and were this to happen, say, in the context of financial magazines and institutions, the guilty parties would find themselves facing criminal charges. But blind eyes are turned in the fashion and fashion media industry, except, of course, when a publisher decides it's time to get rid of an editor, in which case any such relationships can be and are used as a pretext for the sacking.
And then there are the inducements, in the form of endless 'gifts' from fashion houses to influential editors, stylists, journalists, bloggers and, sometimes, ad sales managers and other administrative executives. There are several shops and market boutiques in Paris alone stocked to the rafters with hundreds of thousands of bucks-worth or more of never-used handbags, shoes, clothes and accessories sourced from said magazine and webzine people seeking to turn their gifts into hard cash, often because they are very badly paid. I have never heard of any of them having problems with the tax inspectors.
Add to this the pressure from the publishers to keep the advertisers happy and you can see why so few fashion journalists ever write tough reviews. The main exceptions are Cathy Horyn, Suzy Menkes and, back in the day, The Independent's Marion Hume, who ended up getting canned from Australian Vogue because she was just a bit too honest in her opinions. Horyn and Menkes have an advantage in that they write for newspapers, which aren't as dependent on ad revenue as the glossies. However, as copy sales revenue falls, newspapers are taking in more fashion ads so we can expect to see a toning down effect there too in due course.
PK
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prosperk
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I got my start in journalism on motorcycle and skateboard magazines, which was a better start than most. Anyway, one of the major Japanese firms launched a new model with a fuel injection fault that would cause the bike to stall, often in corners, spitting the rider off. Not good. My editor was one of them and wrote a scathing review, which he dictated to me over the phone from hospital. In it went. Someone at the printers, doubtless paid a retainer to warn firms of any negative coverage, must have earned his bribe as the deputy ed got a call from a screaming UK sales manager, threatening to pull the firm's back cover advertising forever if this review appeared. Cool as a cucumber, he asked the screamer to fax the ultimatum over so he could show it to the publisher, who was something of a maverick. Later that afternoon, the publisher biked a mock-up of the proposed new back cover over to the MD of the Japanese firm's UK filial. It consisted of a blank space with a paragraph explaining precisely why the firm's ad wasn't appearing and the page reference for the review.
The advertiser backed down quicktime. I am pleased to confirm that during my time on fashion magazines, I did once work for an editor with the same kind of attitude, who was supported by the local publisher, and we got away with murder, so to speak, and never a peep out of the advertisers who can normally be relied upon to bleat and moan about content in the hope of getting cheaper ad rates next time around, or some free FOB puffs. But most of the time, editors and publishers flinch and fold when advertisers bark, which is a shame because bullying can only be effectively countered by a good punch on the nose, so to speak, or a boot somewhere more sensitive.
PK
fashionista-ta
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Agreed, I've definitely noticed that the bad reviews are generally of less important designers.
I think the value of a good review is the perspective of the reviewer, both in terms of having been there, gotten to go backstage, and likely had a few words with the designer, but also in terms of a broader perspective of fashion. I'm sure Suzy Menkes knows a lot more than I do, so I'm interested to hear what she has to say, even if I violently disagree.
I guess I don't feel that critics' opinions taint anything. Sometimes it's clear to me that even the great Suzy just doesn't get it. That may tick me off, but it doesn't cloud my own view of the collection.
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