New York Times: Beyonce is not a fashion icon!

[Bebe 16,562]

Interesting piece by the New York Times about Beyonce's status as a fashion icon. Do you agree or disagree with the author?

 

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/31/fashion/beyonce-discounts-the-fashion-icon.html?_r=0

 

LAST WEEK, music history of a sort was made when Beyoncé became the first subject of an exhibition in the Legends of Rock section of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland not to actually be in the Hall herself.

 

You can’t be inducted until 25 years after the release of your first record, and given that Destiny’s Child’s first album came out in 1998, Beyoncé hasn’t yet made the cutoff. But she is so famous that I guess the museum wanted to get her in anyway, and if it couldn’t officially have her, it decided to have ...her clothes.

 

Thus seven outfits, including the 2008 “Single Ladies†leotard (designed by Beyoncé’s mother, Tina Knowles), the Thierry Mugler robot outfit from “Sweet Dreams†(2009) and the 2012 Givenchy Met ball dress are on display in Ahmet Ertegun Hall, where they are joining pieces from Michael Jackson and David Bowie, among other artists. They have been lent for two years.

 

As to why the museum made the decision, Todd Mesek, the vice president for marketing and communications, wrote of Beyoncé in an email, “She’s taken her natural talent and used it to influence the sound, fashion and business of music.â€

 

True enough. But just the fact of her clothes being in a museum, even if it’s a music museum as opposed to, say, a costume institute, has also had me mulling over the question of Beyoncé and how she has influenced the fashion of ... fashion. Or rather, how she hasn’t.

 

Because despite all the accolades that Beyoncé has garnered  most powerful celebrity in the world, according to Forbes; No. 1 on People’s Most Beautiful list; the artist behind the fastest selling iTunes album ever; a global juggernaut; subject of her own documentary  the one she does not seem to actually merit is “fashion icon.â€

 

I know, I know: blasphemy. One does not criticize the most feted woman on the planet. But think about it.

 

Beyoncé hasn’t moved, or influenced, the direction of fashion writ large in the way that, say, Rihanna, the winner of this year’s CFDA Fashion Icon award, has. (See, for example, the luxe athletic pieces peppering collections like Pucci, Balmain and Tom Ford.) She doesn’t wear things and spark a million trends, like Madonna once did with her jeweled crosses and lace minis, not to mention her bullet bra corsets. She doesn’t cause items to sell out overnight, like wee Prince George.

 

She doesn’t worm her way into designers’ imaginations, the way Patti Smith and Courtney Love did. Her stylist has not become a well-known name in his own right, the way Nicola Formichetti has moved from working with Lady Gaga (who also won the CFDA Fashion Icon award in 2011) to becoming the creative director and frontman of Diesel.

 

Her megafame could not even sustain her own fashion brand, House of Deréon, which appears to have been suspended (the Facebook page links to a website, houseofdereon.com, which the Internet says “cannot be found,†though some jeans and shoes are still sold on third-party sites), unlike, say, that of Jessica Simpson, which has revenues of about $1 billion, according to Forbes. Li & Fung, which owns House of Deréon, did not respond to requests to clarify the situation.

 

Yet Beyoncé has at least 13.5 million Twitter followers and 14.4 million Instagram followers, all of whom are treated to selfies of her in assorted outfits both on duty and off. In her surprise megahit “visual album†last December, she wore garments from multiple different name brands, from Maxime Simoens to Ulyana Sergeenko and 3.1 Phillip Lim. On her “Mrs. Carter†tour, she modeled looks from Pucci, while on her current “On the Run†tour with her husband, Jay Z, she is wearing costumes by Atelier Versace, Alexander Wang and Diesel.

 

Her regular appearances in Givenchy at the Met ball (2013 and 2014, as well as the above-mentioned 2012) end up as featured red-carpet moments everywhere, including most recently on the cover of Vogue’s Met ball special  a cover that, granted, she shares with Rihanna, but she has had two other covers of the main mag all to herself. Beyoncé should, by all objective measurements, be a fashion influencer extraordinaire.

 

So how is it that all ages of women want to be like her, but that does not include, for any of them, what is normally the easiest way into the fantasy: dressing like her? How is it she drives audiences into stadiums but not clients into stores? It looks like a paradox.

If fact, let’s call it the Beyoncé Paradox. And here’s the thing: I think it is actually a construct. One that has been strategically made.

 

After all, by opting to build her celebrity on a carefully chosen set of proprietary symbols  in this case, smile and hair and body (and voice, of course)  as opposed to a carefully constructed, apparel-related look, Beyoncé & Company have ensured that the only brand that really has any real staying power is brand Beyoncé; that everything she is selling comes back to her. Spreading the wealth, so to speak, among so many designers, which at first looks like an effort to woo the fashion world, actually works to create a situation in which no one name is permanently associated with her other than her own. It’s a question, as it always is, of power and cui bono. And cui bono here is her.

 

It has become conventional wisdom that fashion is a platform that is increasingly crucial as either a springboard to stardom (see: Kerry Washington and Lupita Nyong’o, both of whom have discussed the red carpet as a key tool in an actress’s arsenal) or a way to sustain a career beyond stardom (see: Kate Hudson and Sharon Stone). But what the Beyoncé Paradox suggests is that this may not, in fact, be entirely true. Because lose the “fashion,†and what do you have left?

 

Icon. No qualifier necessary.

[Gov Hooka 8,008]

as cool as the models are and as important it is for them to display the work, I consider the designers and stylists the true fashion icons

[Jenniferella 2,774]

Okay ? I don't think it's THAT important, she's an icon anyway as they said

[Levine 18,373]

I agree

[Jjang 2,262]

She's definitely a fashion icon as in a big amount of girls look up to her sense of style and fashion, you don't need a museum to prove that status.

[Bebe 16,562]

as cool as the models are and as important it is for them to display the work, I consider the designers and stylists the true fashion icons

Well if you have an artist that is able to start fashion trends, launch fashion brands into the mainstream and influence the style of clothing from designers and clothing retailers then it's fair to say that models or singers can be considered fashion icons.  

Okay ? I don't think it's THAT important, she's an icon anyway as they said

It's just interesting to see how Beyonce has built her brand

[Gov Hooka 8,008]

Well if you have an artist that is able to start fashion trends, launch fashion brands into the mainstream and influence the style of clothing from designers and clothing retailers then it's fair to say that models or singers can be considered fashion icons.  

It's just interesting to see how Beyonce has built her brand

But it's not them directly starting these trends. It's the designers making the trends for them.

[Sam Dey 1,847]

agree!

[Neptune 156]

She wasn't even considered an icon before her latest album, so. All I know is that she's boring in every sense of the word. At least to me. There's nothing inspiring, iconic or interesting in her.

[Dayman 5,903]

But it's not them directly starting these trends. It's the designers making the trends for them.

If someone doesn't wear it though than it's not a trend. The designers don't make trends - they make wearable art. The trends are all up to everyone else beacuse for every trend that has caught on there are hundreds of others that didn't.

[Bebe 16,562]

But it's not them directly starting these trends. It's the designers making the trends for them.

Not always. 

Artists like Madonna popularised this look

 

And suddenly everyone was buying big bangles and jewelry. People can start mixing and matching vintage pieces with modern pieces from unknown and known designers like the character 'Carrie Bradshaw' from Sex in the City did.

Sex in the City basically launched the Manolo Blahnik shoe and introduced it to the mainstream it also helped popularise the Fendi Baguette bag. The show's stylist at one point even said that they were creating entire outfits around the Fendi bag.

 

She wasn't even considered an icon before her latest album, so. All I know is that she's boring in every sense of the word. At least to me. There's nothing inspiring, iconic or interesting in her.

Are you joking? Ever heard of Destiny's Child? Crazy in Love? Single Ladies?

Surely you have heard about her collaboration with Lady Gaga in her iconic Telephone video?

Beyonce was an icon way before her self titled album dropped.

[Gov Hooka 8,008]

Not always. 

Artists like Madonna popularised this look

 

And suddenly everyone was buying big bangles and jewelry. People can start mixing and matching vintage pieces with modern pieces from unknown and known designers like the character 'Carrie Bradshaw' from Sex in the City did.

Sex in the City basically launched the Manolo Blahnik shoe and introduced it to the mainstream it also helped popularise the Fendi Baguette bag. The show's stylist at one point even said that they were creating entire outfits around the Fendi bag.

 

i suppose. but it just bugs me that the people who put the sweat into designing and making the looks for an artist get snubbed from being called a fashion icon. For example, Lady Gaga received the fashion icon award, Nicola Formichetti was merely mentioned as her stylist, even though it couldn't have happened without his creative input.

[GagaDragon 10]

She wasn't even considered an icon before her latest album, so. All I know is that she's boring in every sense of the word. At least to me. There's nothing inspiring, iconic or interesting in her.

This!

 

I do respect her but the way people talk about her would make her seem like the greatest human being ever. It's cringe worthy and i find myself disliking her because of the way people bow down to her.

[Gov Hooka 8,008]

If someone doesn't wear it though than it's not a trend. The designers don't make trends - they make wearable art. The trends are all up to everyone else beacuse for every trend that has caught on there are hundreds of others that didn't.

but they should at least give more credit and fashion icon awards to the people who designed the trend, not the person who just decided "ooh, that's pretty, i want that" (as probably was the case with Rihanna and a bunch of other "fashion icons"

[Neptune 156]

Are you joking? Ever heard of Destiny's Child? Crazy in Love? Single Ladies?

Surely you have heard about her collaboration with Lady Gaga in her iconic Telephone video?

Beyonce was an icon way before her self titled album dropped.

 

She was basically no one during 4. Sure, she's successful in America, but her impact all over the world is probably still at the same level of Katy Perry.