Is Los Angeles Fashion Week a Dying Breed? August 20, 2008 11:47 am >> In the past few years, our attention has been on New York Fashion Week and where it will move after the Bryant Park lease runs out in 2010, but new revelations about the future of Los Angeles Fashion Week bring it temporarily to the forefront.
Sources told Los Angeles magazine that the five-year LA Fashion Week partnership between IMG, who also runs NY Fashion Week, and Smashbox Studios in Culver City, where LA Fashion Week is held, will end after the Spring 2009 presentations in October. When asked for comment, an IMG spokesperson merely said: "The focus of IMG and Smashbox continues to be the October shows and we won’t comment further on what is currently only rumor and speculation."
If IMG does pull out, ownership of LA Fashion Week would be up for grabs — Smashbox Studio owners Dean and Davis Factor could go it alone or look for a new partnership. Several options have been suggested, not in the least of which involves moving the shows to Hollywood. But as Racked LA puts it, "The truth is the application of the NY Fashion Week structure on LA has never quite worked.
Matthew Williamson
Haurex