Ever wondered what life was like before NY Fashion Week?
On Tuesday, February 16, 2009, we caught up with FERN MALLIS, Senior Vice President of IMG Fashion. Ms. Mallis not only coordinates Fashion Weeks around the world, but successfully organized 7th on 6th, the first NY Fashion Week event held at the Tents in Bryant Park. Life before Fern Mallis was hectic! Before 1993, New York City designers actually produced their own fashion presentations in about 50 separate locations throughout New York City! Whew.
Simone Butterfly (SB): Reading about your career in fashion gives me goose bumps. It is very hard to imagine that New York Fashion Week is only about 15 yeas old. For those that don’t know, how did 7th on 6th get her start?
Fern Mallis (FM): Well it was an accident. There was a ceiling crash at Michael Kors’ loft space in 1991. The models [Linda, Naomi, Cindy] came down the runway just as pieces of plaster started to fall.
The foreign journalists wrote the next day “We live for fashion; we don’t die for it.” The director of the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CDFA) said, we better get this organized!
SB: We consider you to be the Fashion Ambassador. How many cities around the world are hosting Fashion Week a la IMG?
FM: Well IMG does a number of Fashion Week events around the world. Some are a little more marginal and regional and local to their markets. But, we do Mercedes Benz Fashion Week here in New York [twice a year]. We produce Fashion Week in Miami and Berlin. We do Fashion Fringe in London. We have Rosemont Fashion Week in Sydney, Australia. We do Luxury Week for Hong Kong. We also do [an event in] Kuala Lumpur. We are adding Istanbul Fashion Week and we do a Fashion Week in Moscow.
SB: Do you think the Fashion Week concept can work anywhere?
FM: Well apparently the answer is …yes. (smile)
SB: What about the Washington, DC market?
FM: Well, [Fashion Week for] DC would not be an industry tradeshow. But, I mean Cleveland has [a Fashion Week]! And if Cleveland can have a Fashion Week anybody can. The Cleveland Fashion Week is really more of a consumer event with shows for customers. This is a good concept for some cities.
SB: I remember a Press Release about a year or two ago announcing the launch of a Consumer Fashion Week…
FM: We did something for a couple of seasons in San Francisco and Houston called Fashion Week Live.
SB: How did it do?
FM: It did very well. But it was a very expensive proposition. We are going to look at some new models for this event going forward.
SB: Mayor Bloomberg seems to be very supportive of Fashion Week and the new move to take Fashion Week from Bryant Park to Lincoln Center. Was it difficult to get New York government officials to support the Fashion Week concept?
FM: No this event brings in about four hundred thirty five (435) million dollars a season in related spending. It brings in over a billion and a half dollars in tax revenue and salaries for the fashion industry in the garment center here. Annually it brings in close to nine hundred (900) million dollars. This is an economic engine for one of New York’s most important industries. So, the city, very smartly, is supportive. But, [the city] also needed us to be out of Bryant Park and they wanted to make sure that Fashion Week found a new home and did not just fold up its tent and move on.
SB: Well Darling, there you have it!
Not only can fashion generate GOOGABS of money for our beleaguered cities, it can bring fashion mavens from competing houses together under one roof!
FEEL THE LOVE,
Simone.
