Karl Lagerfeld - Designer

[susseinmcswanny]

Just wait until it's Galliano's turn ...

 

[susseinmcswanny]

Celebrity worship culture get's more insane on the daily. Mashed potato brains talking like "ugh it's getting harder and harder to stan any fashion brands anymore" ? Literally get a job. Water a plant. Look up in the sky. How hard is it to think about fashion, art, people, whatever, in a more nuanced way? Go abolish the regular law enforcement and install the morality police already.

 

[blueorchid]

But... but... he was... "problematic"!! One of the most intellectually lazy terms invented. I mean you can critically assess his work and him as a person, but there is such a laziness to most of the hot-takes.

 

[Kimihiro]

Just wait until it's Galliano's turn ...

For that exact reason why I think it will never happen, unless it’s packaged with someone else a la Prada/Schiaparelli. It was too public. Which is sad because I think he deserves it.

Re Karl: nobody really cares or surprisingly many people agree with him. The world is far bigger than echo chambers.

 

[fenty]

He just reeked of arrogance and privilege. Racism wasn't unknown to him, and I think he played a large role in the unhealthy weight trends of the 90s/00s.

You guys use racist very loosely and it's actually scary, may he have been extremely ignorant? HELL YEAH but who isn't especially in an industry thats ran by trend cycles. Now don't get me wrong, I am not saying he's a saint but lets be real.

 

[Nimsay]

Can someone illuminate Karls racism?


Casual googling reveals literally no examples. He is more controversial for talking about fat people and since he used to be fat wouldn't he be 'allowed' to per the rules of ridiculous insecure people?

This is prob what they're mad about- Karl read them;

“Those social networks, there’s something sad about them … It’s like a talkative mirror where people talk to themselves. And what I hate most in life is selfies.”

 

[Caffeine]

Can someone illuminate Karls racism?


Casual googling reveals literally no examples. He is more controversial for talking about fat people and since he used to be fat wouldn't he be 'allowed' to per the rules of ridiculous insecure people?

This is prob what they're mad about- Karl read them;

“Those social networks, there’s something sad about them … It’s like a talkative mirror where people talk to themselves. And what I hate most in life is selfies.”

This is how woke culture works. Name calling without any concrete evidence and you are guilty unless you are proven innocent. It is ruining western civilization in real time.

Guess what, Karl was right. Don't give a sht about any of these. Live genuinely and design genuinely. Haters will hate, but let them stare in their own mirrors and talk in their own echo chambers.

 

[Mutterlein]

Lagerfeld was as problematic as anyone else of his generation.

Was he racist? I suppose he was in the sense that everyone is a little, but his personal and professional relationships over the years don't suggest so. Not in any egregious or scandalous way.

Did he promote extreme body ideals? of course but none that he himself didn't subscribe to. And neither was he alone.

Was he a nice person? Perhaps not but that is not a sin.

 

[Gonzalo]

Pat cleveland,Brandi Quinones ...

 

[Salvatore]

Adut and Alek were brides.

 

[TianCouture]

In the stratosphere of "bad" Karl is very, very low on the totem pole. He just said truth's people thought but could never vocalize. Adele did lose all that weight after all...

 

[Lola701]

Adut and Alek were brides.

I don’t even think mentioning models means anything really because he after all came from that generation of designers who started working with non-Caucasian models. In a way he took it maybe further because he included Antonio Lopez and co in his creative process…

I remember when I started working in fashion, it was very difficult in a way to imagine working for brand as a black girl. Ultimately I worked for an American designer but at the time except for Edward Buchanan who was at Bottega Veneta, Eric Wright, who was the N2 of Karl at Fendi and his own brand and who was part of his entourage was really an inspiring figure.
Ultimately he ended up having a black girl as one of his PR for his own brand and she is still there. There’s an Asian woman in his team at Chanel who was instrumental for example in his connection to K-pop stars.

‘I realized he was really inclusive when I saw a lot of friends of his bodyguard (who comes from the subburbs of Paris) at some Chanel/Fendi/KL related events.

He was a privileged man but I think he was open minded but also with a lot of contradictions like a lot of us as humans.

That doesn’t mean that he didn’t made a lot of mistakes, bad judgement and all but this idea that humans must be monoliths is super draining.

‘I think ultimately, a lot of people loved him in the fashion industry because he didn’t fake it. There are many designers, my god, who take themselves so seriously and who aren’t at all what we think they are. And more than designers…
We see it with public figures!

‘Everybody loves Naomi Campbell. She is a fabulous model and an icon but as a human being, I find her more questionable than Karl has ever been. And I find it funny to see her playing mother teresa today.

The thing that I’ve always appreciated about Karl was how welcoming he was with new talents. He send flowers to designers he loved the collections from at the end of the season with generally a nice note, when some of his contemporaries were criticizing them in the press for example…

He is a public persona so criticism is expected but then again I’m happy that my judgement of people is not based solely on some stupid statements made in the media. Maybe it’s important for me because I worked in fashion and he is an important figure..

I’m never sold on the « nice » thing. I have more respect for Bernard Arnault, as shady as he is, that I have for Francois Pinault for example…But people sees Francois Pinault as the Saint!

 

[Nimsay]

IN MY OPINION

Karl was way too sophisticated to actually be a bigot. Bigots are the lowest form of any group; regardless of how you slice the group. As KARL said himself 'the best get the best' so the proof is in the pudding, he was the best

Karl really suffering from noticing patterns, and people who participate in those patterns get offended when they are called out on it.

 

[blueorchid]

Also, I think Karl was pretty supportive of André Leon Talley when John Fairchild fired him from Women's Wear Daily after Pierre Bergé threw his weight around and accused ALT of stealing Yves' sketches!! Even supporting him financially, too.

 

[Nimsay]

Also, I think Karl was pretty supportive of André Leon Talley when John Fairchild fired him from Women's Wear Daily after Pierre Bergé threw his weight around and accused ALT of stealing Yves' sketches!! Even supporting him financially, too.

That may have been fueled by his long going rivalry with YSL.

 

[blueorchid]

Well... yes... but the ways he supported ALT sounded much more like friendship and actual moral support, than supporting someone out of spite. Like, Karl even gave ALT spending money when he was unemployed in Paris (according to an interview with ALT in the latest Karl biography). I'm just saying, he was friends with ALT before the drama happened, too. (Until he cut him off, but that's neither here nor there.)

 

[Mutterlein]

I think Karl and ALT were genuine friends... although for Karl that didn't always ensure eternal loyalty.

Conversations I've had with Carlyne Cerf gave me the impression that all of them, along with Anna and some others, were a very tight group.

But having a black friend doesn't mean that you aren't racist .

 

[blueorchid]

Well of course not, lol. I should have known better than to make that comment and fall into this trap.

 

[Mutterlein]

Well of course not, lol. I should have known better than to make that comment and fall into this trap.

Is it a trap if you set it yourself?

 

[Nimsay]

Why would a racist want to socio-economically align themselves with someone they view as inferior? Having a black friend does carry weight.

off-hand Miuccia always struck me as the most racist since she DID have the runway show where the porters were all black and the actual models were white. That was no mistake.

Also - Karl was a serious snob and I think that is what many people are characterizing as racism. Karl was an elitist and didn't care who you were as long as you were someone he wanted to know.

In my short time here I found out that most racists act just like the race they despise, thats why they don't want to be around them. If they were together with the other race people would be able to see the similarities between the two. It's a psychological cope and I think Karl would hate that.