I’m officially back from New York Fashion Week, and though my trip was cut slightly short due to “fear of terrorists” (full on explanation to come…) I am here to spill all the details of Fashion Week & the Independent Fashion Bloggers Conference.
First up is my experience via the Independent Fashion Bloggers Conference. If you’ve ever been to a conference you might recall that overwhelming feeling of “I want to get the H*ll out of here” when you walk in. It seems conferences are made for chaos or chaos is made for conferences, but whichever way it goes is exactly how I felt entering the IFB Conference at Milk Studios in Chelsea, New York. Once I got settled in, and by that I mean sat down to take a look at my surroundings, I realized I was in the center of the blogosphere. It’s as if I had taken a space ship and landed it on the core of fashion meets technology. Instead, I took the Red Line to the L, asked a guy for directions, changed shoes twice, & walked my butt two blocks to Chelsea. A space ship would of been a lot cooler.
IFB Conference
The perks of any conference is meeting, networking, and passing out shiny new business cards with people you read about, literally. At this particular one I just so happened to meet and/or see the uber famous model Coco Rocha (google her) as one of the guest panelists, Ari Goldberg marketing guru of StyleCaster, Jeanine the creator of IFB, & many more throughout the shindig. The downside of being at a conference by yourself is having your inner extrovert prepped and ready. Otherwise, you’ll sit on a plastic seat like a bump on a log wishing you hadn’t paid $6o to attend. Besides you’re itching to hand out those business cards that took over an hour to design! Overall a conference is, what a conference is. I know…these are deep inspirational words of wisdom (sarcasm). What you put into a fashion bloggers conference is what you can get out of it. Simple as that. Network, enjoy, but most of all grab the free stuff and run!! Alright…so I’m only kidding.
Coco Rocha
Next up, New York Fashion Week the meca, the holy grail, and the right to pretend that you’re Carrie Bradshaw for at least an hour or so. After getting press credentials and a New York bagel I was ready to attend fashion week for the second year in a row. Fashion week may be all glamour for those who are the interviewees, but for those of us doing the interviewing and wearing shoes from Target it’s only half glamourous. Ask my feet.
Reality Chic Runway Debut- Backstage
Walking into Lincoln Center is simply living out your Project Runway moment in full force. All you must do is wave your credentials and walk past the policemen trying not to squeal like a little girl. You can find bloggers and journalists located at the AOL Media table where you’ll meet an interesting group of people typing away but mostly complaining about how awful the WIFI is, an important asset to those relying solely on computers. You may also find celebrities schmoozing around the lobby and having their photos taken along with important fashion people such as editors, pr presidents, and stylists all acting as if they do this sort of thing every day which in all seriousness, they probably do!
So here’s the recap of Reality Chic’s experience at New York Fashion Week. After blogging about BCBGMAXAZRIA, seeing pr guru/Peoples Revolution founder Kelly Cutrone, and taking photos of random fashion week attendees in heels I stepped foot backstage at the Tadashi Shoji show.
Erin Wasson (model, designer, & recent guest judge on Project Runway) couldn’t have been any nicer or more down to earth! We chatted it up for about 5 minutes about reality tv, how hot Dwayne Wade is, & small town life. The girl is kind of awesome! Then I met Carrie Preston (the real one & waitress on True Blood) I took a photo for her and her friend then we exchanged tweets. I also talked with hair stylists & MAC make-up artists primping the models. Did you know it only takes 20 minutes to get the models ready? I ran into Betsey Johnson (designer), Tadashi (designer), Julia Jones (Twilight), & JoJo (she’s apparently no longer 12). All nice and no drama. Who would of thought? It seems celebrities aren’t all that different from everyone else…
The Real “Carrie Preston” from True Blood
Erin Wasson Model & Designer
Tadashi
Fashion Week- Tadashi Shoji Runway Clip
After attending shows it was then onto blogging about it…
Hello…And Welcome to the Holy Grail of Fashion
What’s Hot at Fashion Week? (Mega High Heels)
Then comes the part that a die hard fashionista would kill me for. After stressing out over being in New York for the September 11th anniversary, the ultimate news that ended up being the straw that broke the camel’s back hit. There was a terrorist threat for New York & D.C. While I’d like to have ignored this news, as a blogger I’m sort of on Twitter all the time. So when something is trending that says all caps TERROR THREAT it kind of grabs your attention.
After a short freak out moment I then heard that Mayor Bloomberg would be giving a press conference. Needless to say my small freak out moment turned into full on panic mode. As a non New Yorker, when Bloomberg said “I expect you to continue on your daily routine” I couldn’t help but think that my daily routine didn’t involve fearing terrorists in New York. So…with that awful pit in my stomach and a rather stressed out version of myself going on 4 hours of fashion week sleep, I decided it was best that I truck my way 2 hours back to my so-called safe place, in other words, where my puggle & husband happen to have been. Call me crazy, call me small town, but covering the rest of fashion week wasn’t worth my stressing out over seeing extra police with guns in the subway.
While my fashion adventure turned out to be quite the whirlwind, it was everything I’d hoped it would be. For all the photos, tweets, & inside scoop be sure to check out Reality Chic’s Facebook page & Twitter handle @realitychicblog.
Stay tuned for more Fashion Week coverage to come…
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