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Street style at New York Fashion Week Fall 2024
Street style at New York Fashion Week Sophie Sahara/WWD

New York Fashion Week 

New York Fashion Week in its modern iteration was started by Fern Mallis and Stan Herman in 1993.  

New York Fashion Week kicks off fashion month, and is followed by fashion weeks in London, Milan and Paris in February and September. Spring collections are historically shown in September, while fall collections are historically shown in February. 

New York Fashion Week evolved from Press Week, which began in the '40s. Eleanor Lambert founded Press Week to showcase American fashion during World War II when editors couldn't travel to Europe. The event helped promote American fashion when many major European fashion houses were on hiatus during the war. 

Press Week went on for decades. Then in 1993, the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) took over the event, and then-president Stan Herman and executive director Fern Mallis consolidated the citywide events into what became known as New York Fashion Week. It was initially rebranded with the trademark "7th on Sixth." 

Throughout the '90s and 2000s, New York Fashion Week was held at Bryant Park in pop-up tents. In 2011, New York Fashion Week left Bryant Park and migrated to Lincoln Center. In 2015, after New York Fashion Week's organizer WME/IMG's contract with Lincoln Center ended, the event was split between Skylight Moynihan and Skylight Clarkson. After Moynihan underwent construction for Penn Station to expand in 2017, Clarkson was the primary venue until 2018. From 2019 until the present, Spring Studios has been the main venue for New York Fashion Week, though a large percentage of designers choose to show off site. 

Major American designers have made their runway debuts at New York Fashion Week, including Michael Kors, Christian Siriano, Ralph Lauren, Tommy Hilfiger, Prabal Gurung and Anna Sui.  

The event has seen some historic fashion moments, such as Ralph Lauren's 50th anniversary show in 2018, when he transformed Central Park's Bethesda Terrace into a runway, drawing everyone from Hillary Clinton to Oprah to watch. There was Marc Jacobs' show for Perry Ellis in 1993, which many saw as the birth of '90s grunge. The show ultimately got Jacobs fired, but the pieces were so popular he reissued them in 2019. In 2000, Alexander McQueen hopped Stateside for a collection he showed on the West Side of Manhattan, famously dropping his jeans at the end of the show to reveal American flag boxer shorts. 

New York Fashion Week

Former Helmut Lang Designers Launch Colovos

Two years after exiting Helmut Lang, Nicole and Michael Colovos are launching their own collection.

Cristina Ruales RTW Fall 2016

Cristina Ruales played with the architecture of clothing, showing a cohesive collection filled with Nineties…

Apiece Apart RTW Fall 2016

Laura Cramer and Starr Hout continued to take cues from New Mexican landscapes for Apiece Apart.

McQ RTW Fall 2016

Sarah Burton took cues from the clubs of Tokyo's Shinjuku district in the late Seventies and early Eighties…

Escada RTW Fall 2016

Daniel Wingate reiterated Escada's premise as a "sporty luxury" house with a fall collection focused on…

Rebecca Minkoff RTW Fall 2016

Rebecca Minkoff channeled the "gypset" lifestyle for fall with lineup of retro-inspired motifs and…

Veda RTW Fall 2016

Lyndsey Butler juxtaposed boyish, tailored jackets and suiting with looser, unstructured silhouettes.

Sachin & Babi Noir RTW Fall 2016

Sachin and Babi Ahluwalia presented a charming fall lineup with plenty of Spanish flare — all done in a…

Houghton RTW Fall 2016

Katharine Polk went back to her roots for fall with feminine yet edgy lace treatments in casual silhouettes.

Trina Turk RTW Fall 2016

Trina Turk mixed Seventies-inspired colors, prints and textures with exuberance in her fall collection.

Claudia Li RTW Fall 2016

Knots, bows and panels gave a twist to this collection, which focused on comfortable silhouettes.

Haus Alkire RTW Fall 2016

Julie Alkire's fall collection was based on a human-bird hybrid concept translated into feather motifs.

Red Valentino RTW Fall 2016

Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli reworked a maritime inspiration for this appealing fall…

Haney RTW Fall 2016

Mary Alice Haney introduced separates for pre-fall and continued to amp up her daywear in her fall collection.

Derek Lam 10 Crosby RTW Fall 2016

The tried-and-true contrast between masculine and feminine drove Derek Lam 10 Crosby for fall — without…