Designers can’t just have any old celebrities sitting front-row at their fashion shows these days. They need to get the celebrity, the face that will launch one million retweets. Jason Wu nailed it this afternoon at his Boss show, with Dakota Johnson, the buzziest actress of the moment thanks to the runaway success of Fifty Shades of Grey, front-row beside Julianne Moore, the woman most likely to walk away with the Best Actress Oscar this Sunday night. This isn’t Wu’s first A-list get, either—in his three-season tenure at Boss, he’s also landed Gwyneth Paltrow, Reese Witherspoon, and Diane Kruger to sit front-row.
At Kanye West x Adidas Originals, the front row was so packed with big-name stars (Jay Z, Beyoncé, Rihanna) that Justin Bieber was relegated to the second row. West himself showed up at several shows this week, from Alexander Wang (Kim and Nori in tow) to Jeremy Scott, overshadowing any other stars in the room—even Nicki Minaj didn’t see as many flashing bulbs as the West family did on Wang’s runway. Meanwhile, Rihanna’s appearance at Zac Posen almost rendered the fact that Naomi Campbell walked the runway moot.
While last season brought out fashion favorites like Kim Gordon and Lauren Hutton (both at Alexander Wang), this season is only about household-name stars. Blame it on the success of stunt-casting in Spring campaigns. The results of having an A-lister present are immediate and expose new markets to a brand more than any industry insider ever could. Better get used to seeing bodyguards and flashbulbs at fashion week—this trend isn’t going anywhere.
—Steff Yotka, Style.com
