New York Fashion Week cheat sheet: Autumn/Winter 2024
With roughly half of this season’s brands holding a runway show, alternative formats that keep names on the schedule are rising to the forefront. “Not everything has to be a runway show,” Fasting Berg says. “It’s very important for designers to create moments that work for them.”
Part of the equation is who’s sitting in the audience. The CFDA’s travel fund, with brand support, is back for a fourth season to help fund the attendance of international editors during fashion weeks. Whether this can make up the difference is another story. “Media budgets have been cut, so it’s hard,” Fasting Berg says. As global retailers and e-commerce platforms face a reckoning, some worry as many buyers won’t be in attendance in New York. Rachel Scott of Diotima, a CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund finalist, hosted appointments in Paris ahead of her New York presentation to garner as much visibility as possible.
IMG is focusing on its live-stream offering in hope of reaching those who don’t make it to New York. Shows including Thom Browne, Helmut Lang, Diotima and Theophilio will live on the official NYFW website. “Understanding financial issues, this will provide a home where [editors and buyers] can go to see what they need to see,” Fasting Berg says.
For its part, the CFDA serves as a sounding board for young designers navigating whether or not it’s the right time for the runway. “We often discourage them, if they’re not ready. There’s more licence in the by-appointment format.”
Getting there
New to AW24 is the loosely held NYFW home base organised by IMG, which has moved from Spring Studios in Soho to the Starrett-Lehigh Building in West Chelsea on the island’s edge. It’s a near 20-minute walk from the closest subway station, and its location adds to the echoing refrain that New York Fashion Week has become too difficult to navigate efficiently from show to show.
Organisers are doing what they can. IMG’s second venue, Chelsea gallery High Line Nine, where Diotima and Agbobly will present, is a short walk from Starrett-Lehigh Building. The Proenza show is next door at the Chelsea Factory. “We wanted to keep some things together, which is more convenient, obviously for people who run back and forth between venues,” says Dominic Kaffka, SVP and managing director of IMG Focus, which produces many of the shows. But with the likes of Chavarria and Jason Wu out in Greenpoint, convenience is a luxury NYFW-goers simply do not have.
