The Designer Diagnosis

The Designer Diagnosis

Written by jagger van vliet

art by Rebecca calvar

The year is hardly underway, and already Paris Fashion Week has confirmed much of what careful aesthetes feared—fashion still has no direction. 

In recent months, the world of high fashion has experienced a clear game of musical chairs; countless creative directors making unexpected departures from longtime mainstays in the industry. Hedi Slimane will no longer reign over Celine, Haider Ackermann has assumed a new directorship at Tom Ford, and Chanel has now welcomed Matthieu Blazy’s talents. All over, from Antwerp’s Dries Van Noten HQ, to Loewe’s Place Saint-Sulpice, the scene appears focused singularly on one concern—what is the next move?

But if this really is the pressing question on everyone’s minds, then the fashion world is clearly going about it all wrong. Instead of welcoming unsung talents, luxury houses have been turning their attention to the red carpet. A recent string of A-listers have been appointed at historic maisons, marking a sharp turn away from true craftsmanship. Any good fashion-head can easily diagnose the clearest symptom of the current limbo-restless-state-of-inaction. All these celebrities have got to go. 

Of course, it’s never been uncommon in fashion, or in any space for that matter, for celebrities to wield a near-divine command over brand-name clout. But consider that the celebrity culture of past decades relied mainly on endorsements above all else. The supreme weight of a celebrity cosign used to satisfy corporate demands. Now, the culture has unavoidably shifted away from this older model. Audiences have witnessed, in real time, the fall of the influencer and the rise of the blessed content-creator. The culture now demands some bizarre personhood from the favorite brands; no matter how warped, or otherwise insincere. 

The age of the celebrity creative director is upon us. Pharrell Williams succeeds Virgil Abloh at Louis Vuitton. Jack Harlow surprises all with a new directorship at New Balance. Left and right, fashion houses are embracing the allure of celebrity and that possibility of a viral headline. It’s irresistible. This is exactly how we find ourselves watching helplessly as seasons pass in a slew of unchanged trend cycles. 

This is not to say that celebrities are innately uncreative. It’s true that Pharrell is an undeniable genius, a vanguard musician, and an intensely driven creative. It’s also true that Pharrell is, and has always been, one of the best dressed men in music. But the truth of the matter lies in artistry—fashion is an art rather than an attitude. 

Virgil Abloh’s historic rise paints perhaps the clearest case for earning your stripes in the world of fashion. Abloh first studied architecture, transforming his mastery of shape and spectacle into a string of false-start brands, one-off projects, and even brief stints as a DJ. Only after this formative run through the underground did Abloh break finally into prominence as one of the most eminent designers of the 21st century. 

Through his tenure as Off-White creator and Louis Vuitton creative director, Abloh handedly reinvented the scene—reshaped the very landscape that luxury houses thought they knew. 

Only a year before his untimely death, Abloh sent ripples through the industry, claiming that streetwear would soon be dead. It seemed unthinkable at the time—impossible to imagine that there would ever be a moment when Off-White sneakers, and luxury hoodies, would ever go out of style. Yet, in the year 2025, we are certainly living in Abloh’s prophecy. Virgil Abloh is now a name synonymous with fashion itself—a true testament to what happens when luxury brands put their trust in young inspired artists.

Conversely, though Pharrell still manages to draw star-studded crowds, the designs coming out of the new Louis Vuitton are, in one word, unremarkable. A superfluous 84 models stalked the runway in familiar Louis Vuitton checker-print logos—more of the same silhouettes, and none of the intrigue. The clothes are tailored, wearable, and trendy, but at the end of the day, they lack any of the fashion-forward thinking that actually moves culture in any sort of direction. 

Here, the question of fashion as a skill versus fashion as an attitude arises once again. 

Celebrities are well within their rights to develop certain tastes, aesthetics, and interests, but this does not automatically mean any A-lister is ready to assume the sole voice of an art based largely in craftsmanship. Merely curating an aesthetic isn’t enough. What makes fashion a genuinely unique art form is its ability to bring out the most prescient among us—those who see five steps ahead and aim to predict the next five after that. 

Look no further than the grassroot designers—not classically trained, but more in touch with the art of fashion than any career celebrity could ever hope to be. Often these independent designers are one-person acts: designing, producing, and distributing. Working night and day to pursue a higher creation. These are the types of creators that can put the fire back in fashion. These are the designers who actually know how to sew and stitch, who study how proportions set themselves about the body, who find themselves lost in the beauty of creating.

As if to show their own inept hand, uninspired fashion labels are often caught stealing from these grassroot designers. In 2020, a New York designer, Romeo Hunte accused Burberry of directly ripping off his own line from a year prior. Similarly, Scottish designer Mati Ventrillon found his products directly copied by Chanel, after they purchased his clothing “for research purposes.” 

It would seem that most of these noxious business practices can all be chalked up to a renewed corporate interest in the fashion industry. Courtesy of the visionaries that helped propel high fashion into the mainstream, businesses now see a way to double profit margins and expand commercial empires. So, it is entirely unsurprising that we will continue to see young, aspiring designers, passed-up, cheated, and poorly copied. 

For those panicked that they may soon be seeing Justin Bieber’s name leading Balenciaga, or Drake at the helm of Dior, there is still hope. Fashion is still very much unsure of where it is meant to go, and reshuffling creative directorships can only bring about so much change. The dream of any like-minded creative should be that this perpetual winter will open the industry’s eyes. Celebrity status can only bring so much buzz. Real fashion—the fashion that moves culture—demands undeniable skills, ongoing work ethic, and a vision built through experiencing life through art.