The number of labels participating in New York Fashion Week dropped this season, with around 70 brands participating, down from roughly 100 a year ago.
Among those opting out was designer Robert Rodriguez’s sustainable luxury eveningwear label. Established earlier this year, Koltson showcased its debut Fall 2023 collection in February at NYFW but decided to skip the event this time around due to financial limitations, Rodriguez said.
“This season, only because we’re such a new company, we really didn’t want to have the expenses,” the designer told Sourcing Journal. “It’s not cheap to put on shows.”
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For young designers especially, Rodriguez said, the cost of hosting a runway show has made it “really hard” to participate in NYFW. Instead, big brands with high budgets for such events “have taken over,” he added.
Alternatively, Koltson is showing its new collection privately, inviting its accounts over rather than paying to rent a larger, more public space. “They seem to love it, because it’s kind of more of an intimate setting,” Rodriguez said.
“Our collection’s also a sustainable eveningwear collection, so fabrication is important,” he added. “They’re liking the fact that there’s a whole story behind it and it’s up front, up close and they can see it and they can feel it.”
Rodriguez acknowledged that not all companies are pulling back from NYFW. Designer Phillip Lim, he noted, returned to the event this season for the first time since 2019. “I think all of it has to do with economics,” he added.
Rakuten hosts first NYFW sales event
Lim’s 3.1 Phillip Lim label was one of several brands to partner with Rakuten as part of the “Wear the Runway” event the shopping platform launched last week. The promotion offered Rakuten members access to hero pieces from participating labels like Altuzarra and Rebecca Minkoff, months before styles reach stores. Afterpay ended its NYFW sponsorship earlier this year after several seasons.
Each designer selected an exclusive piece to be made available as part of the Rakuten event. Immediately following their collection debuts, the pieces were revealed and became available to shop on Rakuten’s website until Sept. 25. Members could shop the designer’s current collections and receive an extra 10 percent cash back from Sept. 7-13.
From Sept.11-13, Rakuten offered 10 percent cash back on items from more than 40 luxury fashion brands. Labels included Alice + Olivia, Bloomingdale’s, Maje, Neiman Marcus, Net-a-Porter, Saks, Sandro and Shopbop.
“Our recent research shows that almost one third of women say that their shopping decisions are influenced by runway fashion at New York Fashion Week,” Vicki Wagner McRae, senior vice president of brand, creative and communications, at Rakuten, said in a statement. “We also know that today’s consumer is more cost conscious than ever when they shop. This informed our primary goal: open up designer fashion to be even more accessible for a broader audience of shoppers, many of whom are already following runway trends.”
