Category: Fashion Week

Julia Kolesnikova Wants LA to Wear Every Bright Color at Once. Here Are Her Five Hot Seat Answers.

Five questions, printed exactly as she wrote them. A Los Angeles model on the color rules worth breaking, what the city’s sidewalks are missing, and the small change that would make Fashion Week better for every guest.

Most people asked to name the most overrated thing in fashion reach for a target. A trend. A brand. A silhouette they are tired of seeing.

Julia Kolesnikova reached for a paint box.

She is a model in Los Angeles, and she goes by @julia_kolesnikova_psy on Instagram. She was handed the Golden Apple, which means she was handed the Hot Seat: five questions from Nightlife Report, about three minutes, and a promise that her words would run exactly as written. No rewrites. No polishing. No quotes we made up to sound better.

What came back reads less like an interview and more like a manifesto for a brighter city. She wants more color, more nerve on the sidewalk and more kindness at the shows. And she wants it said with hearts.

Here are her five answers, each one checked against what the public record says about the city she is talking to.

How the Hot Seat works

The format is simple on purpose. One person answers five questions: what is overrated in fashion, which style rule everyone should break, what LA gets wrong about style, an unpopular opinion, and the first thing they would change if they ran Fashion Week. Then they pass a golden apple to people they think deserve the seat next.

We print the answers as submitted. Where we add context, it comes from published research or public data, and we cite it at the end. Anything we could not verify is marked [UNVERIFIED].

Answer one: “Overrated” is the wrong word for it

The first question was: what is the most overrated thing in fashion right now?

Julia did not name a trend. She named a habit, and then she broke it in the same breath:

“Let’s break the color rules and wear all the brightest colors at once! Wear what fills us with love and joy.”

Read that again and notice the move. Asked what to tear down, she answered with what to build. The overrated thing, by implication, is the rule book itself: the idea that colors must be rationed, matched, kept in their lanes.

It is a bigger idea than it looks. Color rules are mostly inherited, not tested. But the feelings attached to color appear to be widely shared. In a 2020 study in Psychological Science, researchers led by the University of Lausanne asked 4,598 people in 30 nations, speaking 22 languages, to link 20 emotions to 12 color words. The patterns were strikingly similar around the world, with an average similarity score of .88 between each nation and the global pattern.

In other words, people largely agree on what colors mean. That makes the rules about how to combine them look less like science and more like etiquette. And etiquette, as anyone who has worked a runway knows, is there to be bent.

Answer two: The rule she would break, now with hearts

The second question asked for one style rule everyone should break. Julia gave nearly the same answer as before, but this time she signed it:

“Let’s break the color rules and wear all the brightest colors at once! Wear what fills us with love and joy♥️🧡✨”

Saying it twice is its own kind of evidence. This is not a throwaway line. It is a position.

And the three symbols at the end line up neatly with the research. In the same 30-nation study, the most common color and emotion pairings included red with love, pink with love and joy, yellow with joy, and orange with joy. A red heart, an orange heart and a spark. Love and joy, written in the colors that people across 30 countries most link to those feelings.

One honest caveat. The University of Lausanne has since stressed that this work measures associations: how people connect color words to emotion words. It does not prove that wearing red will make you feel love, or that orange causes joy. So we will not promise that a brighter outfit will change your mood. [UNVERIFIED as a cause-and-effect claim.]

But Julia did not make that promise either. Her rule is simpler: wear what fills you with love and joy. That is not a lab claim. It is permission.

Answer three: What LA gets wrong is the sidewalk

Then came the question built to start arguments: what does LA get wrong about style? (Be honest. That’s the point.)

“There’s plenty of fashion in LA, but I’d love to see more bold, stylish people on the streets.”

Note what she does not say. She does not say LA lacks fashion. She says the opposite: there is plenty of it. Her complaint is about where it shows up.

The numbers suggest she has put her finger on something structural. In the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey for 2024, 62.2% of workers living in the City of Los Angeles drove to work alone. Just 3.6% walked. About 16% worked from home.

A city where most people travel inside a car is a city where most outfits are seen through a windshield. The fashion exists. It is simply parked.

That matters because street style has always depended on the street. The late New York Times photographer Bill Cunningham, who spent decades documenting what people actually wore, put it plainly in the 2010 documentary Bill Cunningham New York: “The best fashion show is definitely on the street. Always has been and always will be.”

Julia’s answer is a quiet challenge to that LA habit. If the best fashion show is on the street, Los Angeles needs more people willing to walk it.

Whether Angelenos actually dress less boldly than people in other big cities is a fair question, and we found no reliable data that measures it. [UNVERIFIED.] What the census does show is the stage problem: fewer sidewalks in use, fewer chances to be seen.

Answer four: The “unpopular” opinion that millions agree with

The fourth question gave her a blank page: your unpopular opinion, about anything, from fashion and nightlife to art and the city.

She used it to write a love letter:

“LA is beautiful in every way—and it has my heart forever.”

It is a gentle twist on the assignment. In a city that loves to complain about itself, saying you love it without conditions can feel like the bold position.

But by at least one measure, Julia is in very large company. The Los Angeles Tourism & Convention Board reported in July 2026 that Los Angeles welcomed 49.5 million visitors in 2025, including 6.4 million from abroad. Those visitors spent about $118 million a day and supported more than 530,000 jobs.

Nearly fifty million people a year do not travel to a city they find ugly. Julia’s “unpopular” opinion may be one of the most widely shared opinions in Southern California. It is just one that locals rarely say out loud.

Put her third and fourth answers side by side and a clear picture forms. She loves this city enough to want more from it. That is not a contradiction. It is how someone who works in front of the camera treats anything she cares about: she wants it to look its best.

Answer five: Champagne, coffee and the wait between shows

The last question asked what she would change first if she ran Fashion Week.

“I’d add a few champagne and coffee bars for guests to enjoy between shows.”

It may be the most practical answer anyone could give, and the reporting suggests why.

Fashion shows are famous for starting late and ending fast. Glossy, the fashion trade publication, put the typical runway delay at 30 minutes in its 2018 breakdown of fashion month, against a typical show length of 7 to 20 minutes. A first-hand account from New York’s fashion week in 2006 described shows starting about 45 minutes after the hour and lasting 10 to 12 minutes, concluding that guests spend longer standing in line than watching the show.

Los Angeles has its own version of the story. Writing in California Apparel News in 2015, a columnist said waits at some Los Angeles shows went up to two hours. That was one writer’s experience, not a measured average. [UNVERIFIED as a typical LA wait time.]

Put those figures together and the guest experience at many shows is mostly waiting. Julia’s fix turns that dead time into something people would actually look forward to: a coffee to stay sharp, a glass of champagne to celebrate, and a place to talk while they wait. She is not asking for a bigger runway. She is asking for better hospitality around it.

It is also, notably, the answer of someone who thinks about the audience, not just the clothes.

The Golden Apple: who Julia passes it to

Every Hot Seat ends with a hand-off. Julia received the apple from @lillithmagic. She passes it to three people:

@makeup_jenny_lv

@thaishalisdeclet

@soleabydarlyn

Asked why, she answered in one line:

“Because they each bring their own bold style and creative energy to LA.”

Notice the word that keeps coming back. Bold. It appears in her answer about the streets and again in her reason for these nominees. Julia is not just describing the city she wants. She is naming the people she thinks are already building it.

What her five answers add up to

Strip away the format and Julia’s Hot Seat says three things.

First, color is not a risk to manage. It is a feeling to share, and the research on color and emotion suggests those feelings are shared more widely than most rules allow.

Second, Los Angeles does not have a fashion problem. It has a visibility problem. The style is here; the sidewalks are just quiet.

Third, the best events are the ones that look after their guests. A coffee bar between shows will not make headlines. It will make people stay.

It is a hopeful set of answers from someone who clearly loves where she lives. And it ends, fittingly, with a heart.

Take the Hot Seat

Think you can answer five questions in three minutes, honestly, and let us print every word? Take the Hot Seat here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScFfR0rTRfRTrqUgVU1EdzhrARfKnnWFlyPPAYG9foOeHUtyQ/viewform

Nightlife Report is independent and reader-supported. If you want more stories like this one, support the desk at patreon.com/aperlas.

Sources

1. Jonauskaite, D., et al. (2020). “Universal Patterns in Color-Emotion Associations Are Further Shaped by Linguistic and Geographic Proximity.” Psychological Science 31(10). doi:10.1177/0956797620948810. Author manuscript (University of Lausanne): https://api.unil.ch/iris/server/api/core/bitstreams/7d6867e0-d9bc-4341-885c-19643911db2d/content. Data used: 4,598 participants, 30 nations, 22 languages, 20 emotions, 12 color terms; average nation-to-global similarity r = .88; prominent pairs include red and love, pink and love/joy, yellow and joy, orange and joy. 2. University of Lausanne, “L’impact réel des couleurs sur nos émotions,” UNIL news: https://www.unil.ch/news/fr/1730964668072. Data used: the findings show associations and do not show that color causes an emotional response. 3. U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2024 1-year estimates, Table B08301, “Means of Transportation to Work,” Los Angeles city, California, via Census Reporter: https://censusreporter.org/tables/B08301/. Data used: drove alone 62.2%, walked 3.6%, worked from home 16.0% (calculated from the table’s estimates). 4. Bill Cunningham New York (documentary, 2010, dir. Richard Press). Quote also reproduced by PBS NewsHour, “Bill Cunningham, whose photographs epitomized street style, dies at 87”: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/arts/bill-cunningham-whose-photographs-epitomized-street-style-dies-at-87 5. Los Angeles Tourism & Convention Board, press release, July 29, 2026: https://www.discoverlosangeles.com/visitors-to-los-angeles-generated-426-billion-in-business-sales-and-supported-more-than-530000-jobs. Data used: 49.5M visitors in 2025, 6.4M international, $118M spent per day, more than 530,000 jobs. 6. Glossy, “Fashion month, by the numbers,” Feb. 6, 2018: https://www.glossy.co/fashion/fashion-month-by-the-numbers/. Data used: typical delay 30 minutes; typical show length 7 to 20 minutes. 7. Omiru, “Fashion Week Notebook: Time in the ‘Fashion Zone,’” Feb. 10, 2006: https://www.omiru.com/index.php/2006/02/10/fashion-week-notebook-time-in-the-fashion-zone/. First-hand account: shows started about 45 minutes late and lasted 10 to 12 minutes. 8. California Apparel News, “Fashion Week Humor,” Sept. 11, 2015: https://www.apparelnews.net/news/2015/sep/11/fashion-week-humor/. A columnist reported waits of up to two hours at some Los Angeles shows. This is anecdotal and marked [UNVERIFIED] in the text.

Julia Kolesnikova’s answers were submitted to Nightlife Report’s Hot Seat on Oct. 23, 2026, and are printed as written under the contributor release.

See the carousel on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/p/De3T9cUkQiQ/

Photos: @jerreell.rolack · Look: @eternalbeen · Makeup: @makeup_jenny_lv

nightlifereport.app | Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app | 1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046

October 24, 2026
The Angel Who Asked for an Answer: Romee Strijd, Victoria’s Secret and the End of the Polite No
The report that sparked this piece: Vanity Fair’s Fit Check, Oct. 16 and Oct. 21, 2026. Card design: Nightlife Report.

The Editor’s Take · Fashion

A former Angel trained all summer, waited six weeks for an answer, and then told the internet what happened. The brand says it released her on Sept. 6. The real story is the gap between those two facts.

By Anthony Perlas · Nightlife Report. Fri Oct 23, 2026 · 8 min read. Every fact below links to its source.

The report that started it

The Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show Casting Drama, Explained

Vanity Fair · Fit Check by José Criales-Unzueta · Oct. 16, 2026, with a follow-up on Oct. 21

LOS ANGELES — There is a particular silence in fashion that everyone who has ever cast, been cast, or waited by a phone knows by heart. It is not a no. It is the absence of a yes, stretched out for weeks, until the date passes and the answer becomes obvious to everyone except the person who has been waiting for it. The industry has always run on that silence. This month, one of its most famous faces broke it on camera.

Romee Strijd, the Dutch model who became a Victoria’s Secret Angel in 2015 and walked the finale of the 2018 show in 27-pound Swarovski wings, posted two TikToks the week before the brand’s Oct. 18 show in Los Angeles, The Daily Beast reported. In them she explained that she had trained all summer, flown to a casting in New York in early September, and then heard nothing for five to six weeks. Then she told her followers she was out.

“They kept me in the dark… Not knowing for so long… I got a lot of mental stress from it,” she said, per The Daily Beast. And then, the sentence that turned a casting decision into a cultural event: “I don’t think I’m gonna cast anymore in the future, because I don’t like the way it went.”

What the brand says

Victoria’s Secret’s answer was precise, and it is worth reading in full. A representative told Vanity Fair that the brand and casting director Piergiorgio Del Moro “communicated directly to her representation and formally released her from the casting process on September 6.” The statement added: “While we cannot speak to the communications between talent and representation, Victoria’s Secret values and respects all talent partners—past, present and future.”

Put the two accounts next to each other and you have the whole drama in a single gap. The brand says it said no on Sept. 6. The model says she was still waiting in October. Somewhere between a casting office and a phone call, five weeks of a person’s life went missing. Neither Strijd nor her agency, IMG, responded to Vanity Fair’s request for comment by its press time.

The brand says it said no on Sept. 6. The model says she was still waiting in October. That gap is the story.

The Nightlife Report take

Then she kept talking

Here is where it gets interesting, and where it stops being a celebrity spat and becomes a case study. Vanity Fair’s José Criales-Unzueta returned to the story on Oct. 21. By then, Strijd had commented on Vanity Fair’s Instagram post and followed up with a statement. And a new date had surfaced: Strijd, Vanity Fair reported, did not attend the casting until Sept. 10, four days after the brand says she was released. Whether that is “a simple mix up regarding dates or a more complicated issue remains a mystery,” Criales-Unzueta wrote.

“I had been on option since early summer,” she said, per Vanity Fair. Then she laid out her request plainly: “If the decision was that I should no longer be considered, I would appreciate an explanation of what happened and why I still attended.”

They have every right to decide whom they invite or book, but after that preparation and planning, I think clear communication is a reasonable expectation.

— Romee Strijd, via Vanity Fair, Oct. 21

“I asked IMG for clarification but still haven’t received an explanation,” she said. Vanity Fair said IMG again had not responded, and Victoria’s Secret did not reply to a follow-up. Then came the lines that should be pinned in every agency in New York, Paris and Los Angeles: “If there is still uncertainty, say that honestly. Keeping someone hopeful because a decision might change isn’t fair when they’re making plans and putting their time and energy into something. That has always been my point.”

Vanity Fair’s verdict was blunt: “This is an age of social-media-induced radical transparency, and Strijd appears to be coming out on top by pure virtue of laying it all out.”

Photo by Anthony Perlas for Nightlife Report. The model pictured is not connected to the Victoria’s Secret casting.

The internet’s jury

The public did not need persuading. Under one viral Instagram post, a fan wrote that “Romee wasn’t just a girl who walked the VS runway; she was an Angel,” and the comment drew more than 35,000 likes in under 24 hours, The Daily Beast reported. Fans in TikTok threads and Victoria’s Secret’s own comment section pushed for other 2010s favourites, including Taylor Hill and Lais Ribeiro, and complained about influencers being cast in their place, Vanity Fair noted.

Bethenny Frankel weighed in on TikTok, and one comment under her video, quoted by Vanity Fair, captured the nostalgia perfectly: “I love inclusivity, we need models that all look different, but there’s something ethereal about the early VS shows, every girl had that IT factor that’s what made it so iconic.”

The Daily Beast reported that some commenters also turned on celebrity offspring in the cast, naming Amelia Gray, and noting that Iris Law and Lila Moss had walked previous shows. It is the same argument that greeted the $50 million Fantasy Bra when it went to Kylie Jenner on show night. Fame, the fans say, is being cast ahead of the work.

The show that needed the drama

Here is the irony. The casting fight may have been the best thing that happened to the show’s visibility all month. The Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show returned in 2024 after a six-year hiatus, with Tyra Banks back as a closer, and the brand has spent the time since trying to marry nostalgia to a new generation, per Vanity Fair. The cast now mixes Candice Swanepoel and Adriana Lima with Alex Consani, Paloma Elsesser and Anok Yai. There is a YouTube docuseries about casting, Angels Among Us, featuring creative director Adam Selman. This year’s performers were Tate McRae, Megan Thee Stallion, Katseye and Megan Moroney.

Yet Vanity Fair observed that the internet seemed more interested in which 2010s models were missing than in who was there, and that Strijd’s posts “ignited interest in the show that did not appear nearly as fervent over the past few weeks.” Its kicker: “Maybe all press is good press, or maybe it is 2012 again after all.”

When the show finally aired from Los Angeles on Oct. 18, with Bella Hadid opening the runway, some viewers called looks “cheap” and wings “extremely tacky,” Fashion Times UK reported, even as others praised Tate McRae’s wings, the gold-wing segment and Elsa Hosk’s look. A conversation that began with a missing Angel ended with a referendum on whether the brand still knows what it is.

Our take: the end of the polite no

Strip away the wings and the diamonds and this is a story about a workplace. Fashion runs on options, holds, “maybes” and silence, and for decades the people at the bottom of that chain absorbed the cost of the ambiguity privately. Models cleared calendars, turned down other jobs, trained for months, and found out from a call sheet or a group chat that they were not in the show.

What Strijd did was not a tantrum. It was documentation. She gave dates. She named the agency. She said she accepted the brand’s right to choose, and she asked for one thing: clarity. And the brand, to its credit, answered with a date of its own. For the first time in a long time, a casting dispute played out in public with both sides on the record.

That is the change. In an age when every model has an audience of her own, the polite no is over. The old silence only worked because nobody outside the room could hear it. Now the room has a comment section.

If there is still uncertainty, say that honestly… That has always been my point.

Romee Strijd, via Vanity Fair

What Los Angeles can learn from it

We see the other side of this every week. At The Bureau Fashion Week in Los Angeles this month, the models we interviewed described exactly the kind of work that rarely gets credit. Kevin Fernandez told us that “some of us also have full time jobs outside of this.” Sofhia Flores said the job “takes confidence, patience, rejection, and the courage to keep showing up even when things don’t go as planned.” Sophie Rann said it takes “the ability to keep showing up as yourself in an industry that constantly challenges you.” (Their full answers are in our What You Missed chapter.)

None of them said the industry owed them a yes. Neither did Strijd. What they describe, and what she asked for, is a basic professional courtesy: if the answer is no, say no, and say it in time to matter.

Here is a simple standard that every brand, agency and casting director in this city could adopt tomorrow, and that we would happily report on:
- Release in writing. When talent is released from consideration, the talent hears it the same week, not just the agency.
- Date every option. An option without an end date is not an option. It is a waiting room.
- Say “undecided” out loud. If the answer is still uncertain, say so honestly. That is Strijd’s point, and it is a good one.
The verdict

Victoria’s Secret was within its rights. Strijd was within hers. But only one of them understood that the audience is now in the room for the whole process, not just the final walk. The brand gave Vanity Fair a date. The model gave the public a story. In 2026, the story wins.

The next time a casting office goes quiet, someone will post about it. The smart brands will already have answered.

Know something about how casting really works in Los Angeles? We protect our sources. Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app.

Sources
1. Vanity Fair, José Criales-Unzueta, “The Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show Casting Drama, Explained,” Fit Check, Oct. 16, 2026: vanityfair.com
2. Vanity Fair, Fit Check follow-up, Oct. 21, 2026: vanityfair.com
3. The Daily Beast, Roosa Rahkonen, “Victoria’s Secret Hit With Wild Nepo-Baby Casting Controversy,” Oct. 13 (updated Oct. 14), 2026: thedailybeast.com
4. Fashion Times UK, Jastine Beatrice Yap, “Victoria’s Secret 2026 Fashion Show Faces Backlash Over ‘Cheap’ Looks and ‘Tacky’ Wings,” Oct. 19, 2026: fashiontimes.co.uk
5. USA Today, Fantasy Bra, Oct. 19, 2026: usatoday.com
6. Interviewee answers: Nightlife Report questionnaire, submitted Oct. 19–21, 2026, under signed release
Join the inner circle.

Nightlife Report is a nonprofit news desk funded by readers. Back the reporting at patreon.com/aperlas.

Seen something we should know? Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app

Request Coverage: editor@nightlifereport.app
nightlifereport.app | Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app | 1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046
October 23, 2026
The $50 Million Bra Went to Kylie. The Angels’ Fans Want a Recount.
Chapter 1 cover. Sofhia Flores, photographed by @adamlupix. Design: Nightlife Report.

See the carousel on Instagram: The $50 Million Bra Went to Kylie: What You Missed, Chapter 1

What You Missed · Chapter 1

A $50 million bra, a war over one word, luxury’s worst week in a decade, and a Halloween that already sold out of witches. Then we asked the people who actually walk the runway who deserves it.

By Anthony Perlas · Nightlife Report. Fri Oct 23, 2026 · 8 min read. Chapter 1 of a story that builds to February 14. Every figure below links to its source.

LOS ANGELES — Every fashion week ends with a single image that the internet decides to fight about. This week it was 1,373 carats of diamonds, one famous face, and a comment section that refused to move on. The Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show came to Los Angeles on Oct. 18, the Fantasy Bra came back for the first time since 2018, and it went to Kylie Jenner. Within hours, the fans of the women who built the brand’s mythology had filed their objection.

That is the headline. The story underneath it is bigger, and it runs through a diamond trade at war with itself, a luxury market that just had its worst day in memory, a Paris that spent the week behind plywood, and a Los Angeles that is quietly preparing for its own runway: Halloween. Here is what you missed, and why it matters to anyone who goes out at night in this city.

The bra

Start with the object, because the object is absurd in the way only fashion objects are allowed to be. Jacob & Co.’s Fantasy Bra holds more than 4,410 natural diamonds centred on a 75.54-carat Fancy Vivid Yellow, and fifteen artisans spent more than 1,000 hours making it, according to JCK. USA Today puts the total at 1,373.39 carats and the value at $50 million, and confirms it is the first Fantasy Bra since 2018.

The numbers, per JCK and USA Today.

Then came the recount. On Reddit, the refrain was “The OGs deserved it,” and commenters nominated Adriana Lima, Alessandra Ambrosio and Barbara Palvin, career Angels who in their view had earned the piece long before a reality-television dynasty did, IBTimes UK reported. On X, “Fantasy Bra” drew 22,630 posts in the week to Oct. 23, and 17,835 of them landed on Oct. 19 alone (X post-count search, pulled by Nightlife Report on Oct. 23). That is not a news cycle. That is a referendum.

It was not the only casting fight of the week. The Dutch model Romee Strijd, a 2010s Angel, told her followers she had prepared all summer and was left waiting for an answer that never came. We unpack that one, and what it says about how fashion says no, in a separate report.

The internet couldn’t stop saying it. X post counts pulled Oct. 23.

The word war

Here is the twist the comment sections missed. The most consequential diamond fight of the week was not about who wore the stones. It was about what you are allowed to call them. CIBJO, the world jewellery confederation, now recommends the word “synthetic” for man-made stones. The Diamond Producers Council calls that mandate “biased and deceptive,” and cites a 2016 survey in which 56% of consumers read “synthetic diamond” as imitation or fake, JCK reported. The miners’ marketing group, meanwhile, has renamed itself The Diamond Collective.

Read that twice and you understand modern luxury. The product is chemistry. The price is vocabulary.

The word war, per JCK.

Follow the money

The money, for now, is following the laboratory. IGI’s lab-grown jewellery certification revenue rose 47% in the third quarter, against 3% for natural stones, on 4.35 million grading reports, up 26%, according to Something About Rocks. Zales launched The 26.2 Edit, a lab-grown line priced from $149 to $7,999 (same source). And the miners are not exactly starving: De Beers’ third-quarter rough volume rose 71% to 9.8 million carats, Rapaport reported.

So the $50 million bra is, among other things, an argument. It is natural stones making their case on the most-watched runway of the season, in the same week that the cheaper stones are winning the Christmas shopping list.

IGI and De Beers figures, via Something About Rocks and Rapaport.

Luxury’s bad week

While Los Angeles argued about carats, Europe’s luxury houses were counting losses. Gucci’s third-quarter revenue came in at €1.3 billion ($1.46 billion), a figure that has halved in four years and is the brand’s lowest third quarter since 2016, worse even than 2020, The Business of Fashion reported. Kering scrapped its guidance for a return to growth in 2026 and lifted its target for net store closures this year from 100 to 125 (same source). Kering shares fell as much as 16% on Friday, on course for their worst day ever, Reuters reported via Investing.com.

The timing was exquisite. Demna’s “GucciCore” campaign went live on Wednesday, the same week the numbers landed, per BoF. Gucci accounts for more than half of Kering’s profit, and “as Gucci goes, so goes Kering,” as BoF put it. Chief executive Luca de Meo called the transformation “a multi-season undertaking.”

Per The Business of Fashion and Reuters.

Paris, behind plywood

Our Fashion City of the Month spent the week with its shutters down. Art Basel Paris closed two days early over fears that France’s civil unrest would return over the weekend, a week after nationwide protests over affordability and public services devolved into rioting and looting, according to BoF. Jacquemus, On, Audemars Piguet and Amex cancelled events, and luxury stores were boarding up their windows (same source). The fair had shown a $100 million Modigliani. Attendees described the mood as dancing on the Titanic.

That phrase is worth sitting with. The same industry that can sell a $50 million bra in Los Angeles cannot keep a gallery weekend open in Paris. Luxury is not one market anymore. It is a set of rooms, and some of them are locked.

The Tuscan Mom

On the street, the mood is the opposite of austerity. Quiet luxury is out. The Tuscan Mom is in: flared jeans, silky tops, animal print, chunky gold and oversized sunglasses before noon. “After years of dressing down as a kind of virtue, there’s something quietly rebellious about putting on earrings to go on a coffee run,” Anushka Gupta, founder of 31 Labels, told Harper’s Bazaar India.

Per Harper’s Bazaar India.

Halloween 2026: the dossier

Which brings us home, because in Los Angeles the most democratic runway of the year is eight days away. The numbers say America is dressing up in record style.
- The money: The National Retail Federation forecasts $13.5 billion in U.S. Halloween spending, with $4.4 billion of it on costumes and 74% of people celebrating. The top adult costumes are Witch (4.8 million people), Vampire (4.2 million), Batman (2.0 million), Spider-Man (1.5 million) and Ghost (1.4 million).
- What Google says: Frightgeist’s top five are Buddy the Unicorn, NeeDoh, Nikki from Obsession, Agamemnon from The Odyssey and Lily Love Braids from Poppy Playtime. Dolly Parton is No. 12, and Thriller-era Michael Jackson is No. 18, at a 10-year high. The Google blog adds that “witches brew punch” is the top trending Halloween drink.
- What the store says: Spirit Halloween is betting on KPop Demon Hunters, god-tier mythology, the Certified “It Girl” and Toy Story.
- How to still get one: Spirit’s online shipping chart puts Overnight at about two business days, Second Day at about three, Standard at four to six and Economy at seven to nine, processing included. Spirit also delivers in about an hour via Instacart in eligible ZIP codes and lists 1,550+ seasonal stores. Target says Order Pickup and Drive Up are usually ready within two hours, and it carries an exclusive KPop Demon Hunters Rumi costume. These are estimates, not guarantees.
- Where to be seen: Adventure360’s party-city scores rank New York first (91.1), then Chicago (80.1), Edinburgh (79.2), Dublin (73.0) and Tokyo (72.3), out of 113 cities, per Euronews. Closer to home: West Hollywood’s Halloween Carnaval, Sat. Oct. 31, 6 to 11 p.m., on Santa Monica Boulevard from Doheny to La Cienega. Free. Clear bags only.
Per the National Retail Federation.

Party-city scores via Euronews; WeHo Carnaval details via the City of West Hollywood.

Who really earns the runway? We asked.

The bra went to the famous face. So we asked the people who keep showing up, the ones who walked The Bureau Fashion Week in Los Angeles this month. They answered a written Nightlife Report questionnaire, and their answers read like one team talking.

Photo courtesy of Kevin Fernandez.

Kevin Fernandez (@kevhfernandez) describes himself as a reality TV personality and runway model “proving that you don’t have to limit yourself to just one dream.” His route ran from The Circle on Netflix to Miami Swim Week and back to television. He treats the walk like a game day.

Coming from a Division I athletic background, I’ve learned that walking a runway takes discipline, confidence, preparation, and the ability to perform under pressure.

— Kevin Fernandez, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

And the part nobody sees: “A lot of people don’t know that some of us also have full time jobs outside of this.” At the close of the show, he did what no stylist can script: “I motioned to the crowd to make noise, interacted with individuals and it created the ultimate closing experience.” Off the runway, his moment was sharing it with his parents.

Photo courtesy of Nicole Anne Williams.

Nicole Anne Williams (@nicolewilliams919) walked The Bureau for the second time and is working toward a bachelor’s degree while she does it. “They see the glitz, the glam, and the runway walk—but not the discipline, hard work, and diet behind the scenes,” she wrote. “Beauty may catch the eye, but dedication keeps us in the game!” Her goal is to go “from walking the runway to producing the show.” Her reasoning is the best line of the week: “Why just be part of the vision when I can create it?”

Photo of Sofhia Flores by @adamlupix.

Sofhia Flores (@sofhiafloress) is a Filipino model and content creator from San Isidro, Nueva Ecija, who has walked in New York, Milan and Paris, and now Los Angeles. Her career began when a designer discovered her and gave her a chance to walk, which taught her “that sometimes all it takes is one person believing in you to change your life.”

It takes confidence, patience, rejection, and the courage to keep showing up even when things don’t go as planned.

— Sofhia Flores, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

She hopes to “inspire other girls, especially Filipinas, to believe in themselves.”

Photo courtesy of Sophie Rann.

Sophie Rann (@sophie.rann) has walked from New York Fashion Week to Paris Fashion Week, and walked for Krissy King in Los Angeles. “It takes confidence, discipline, resilience, and the ability to keep showing up as yourself in an industry that constantly challenges you,” she wrote. What she loves most: how “people from different backgrounds come together through a shared love for fashion.”

Mirka Howard, Mrs Universe 2025, representing San Marino, named the cast that never gets a credit line.

Every polished moment on the runway is supported by designers, stylists, makeup artists, photographers, producers, models, and countless others working behind the scenes.

— Mirka Howard, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

Eternalbeen look, photo courtesy of Eternalbeen.

And Eternalbeen (@eternalbeen), the Los Angeles designer who took our Hot Seat this week, said the quiet part out loud: “Talent shouldn’t need a famous name or industry connections to be seen.” Then, three words that should hang in every casting office: “Let the creativity speak.”

The verdict

Nobody we interviewed asked for a $50 million bra. They asked for something cheaper and harder to give: to be seen for the work. That is the real recount the fans are demanding, and it is not about Kylie Jenner. It is about whether fashion still has a door that opens from the outside.

The bra went to the famous face. The runway belongs to whoever keeps showing up.

The Nightlife Report verdict

This is Chapter 1 of a story that builds to February 14. Chapter 2, Nightlife Unites Us All, follows the same voices from the runway into the night.

Photos: Sofhia Flores by @adamlupix; Kevin Fernandez, Nicole Anne Williams and Sophie Rann, courtesy of the subjects; the Eternalbeen look, courtesy of Eternalbeen. Interviewee quotes were submitted to Nightlife Report for publication under signed release. Eternalbeen’s quotes come from the published Hot Seat.

Sources
1. JCK, “Jacob & Co. Fantasy Bra,” Oct. 19, 2026: jckonline.com
2. USA Today, Kylie Jenner Fantasy Bra backlash, Oct. 19 (updated Oct. 20), 2026: usatoday.com
3. IBTimes UK, Fantasy Bra debate, Oct. 19, 2026: ibtimes.co.uk
4. JCK, Diamond Producers Council on CIBJO terminology, Oct. 22, 2026: jckonline.com
5. Something About Rocks, IGI grading figures and Zales 26.2 Edit, Oct. 22, 2026: somethingaboutrocks.com
6. Rapaport Market Comment, Oct. 22, 2026: rapaport.com
7. The Business of Fashion, “Gucci Gloom,” Oct. 23, 2026: businessoffashion.com
8. Reuters via Investing.com, “Gucci owner Kering drops 16% as luxury braces for tough winter,” Oct. 23, 2026: investing.com
9. Harper’s Bazaar India, the Tuscan Mom, Oct. 22, 2026: harpersbazaar.in
10. National Retail Federation, Halloween survey, Sept. 22, 2026: nrf.com
11. Google Frightgeist costumes: frightgeist.withgoogle.com; Google Blog, Oct. 14, 2026: blog.google
12. Spirit Halloween trend report via PR Newswire, Oct. 1, 2026: prnewswire.com; shipping chart: spirithalloween.com; Instacart: instacart.spirithalloween.com
13. Target Help, Drive Up and Order Pickup: target.com; Target Corporate, Aug. 12, 2026: corporate.target.com
14. Euronews, Halloween party-city ranking, Oct. 16, 2026: euronews.com
15. City of West Hollywood, Halloween Carnaval: weho.org
16. X post-count search for “Fantasy Bra,” pulled by Nightlife Report, Oct. 23, 2026
17. Nightlife Report Hot Seat: Eternalbeen, Oct. 22, 2026: blog.nightlifereport.app
18. Interviewee answers: Nightlife Report questionnaire, submitted Oct. 19–21, 2026, under signed release
Join the inner circle.

Nightlife Report is a nonprofit news desk funded by readers. Back the reporting at patreon.com/aperlas.

Seen something we should know? Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app

Request Coverage: editor@nightlifereport.app
nightlifereport.app | Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app | 1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046
October 23, 2026
The Golden Apple Has Been Passed: Four Seats Are Waiting
THE HOT SEAT · GOLDEN APPLE

Congratulations, you’ve been selected.

Four golden apples are in play in Los Angeles. You can’t buy one, and you can’t apply for one. Each was passed by someone who has already taken the Nightlife Report Hot Seat, and each holder now has seven days to answer or to pass it on.

Think of it the way the great houses do it. A Ferrari special series goes to selected clients. A steel Rolex goes to whoever the dealer chooses. The Hot Seat works the same way: it’s an allocation, not an application. The only people who can choose the next four are the people already in the seat.

Where the apples came from

Independent LA designer @eternalbeen took the seat first and didn’t hold back: “Talent shouldn’t need a famous name or industry connections to be seen.” Eternalbeen passed three apples, with one reason: “They was apart of LAFW.” Read Eternalbeen’s full Hot Seat.

LA creator @zackbernz followed with “I still miss the Supreme hypebeast days of 2016,” a fix for Fashion Week (“Bigger after parties”), and one apple of his own. Read Zack’s Hot Seat.

And the weekend’s runway crown is already on record: Model of the Year Ava Kortman and first runner-up Emily Sophie Christine.

The open bounties

Apple 01 of 04 · 7 days

Brian A. Metcalf

@bametcalf1

Passed by @eternalbeen
Status: 🟡 Awaiting answer

Take the seat →

Apple 02 of 04 · 7 days

Julia Kolesnikova

@julia_kolesnikova_psy

Passed by @eternalbeen
Status: 🟡 Awaiting answer

Take the seat →

Apple 03 of 04 · 7 days

Whitney J.

@_whitneyj_

Passed by @eternalbeen
Status: 🟡 Awaiting answer

Take the seat →

Apple 04 of 04 · 7 days

Liam Gallagher

@liamdelvingallagher

Passed by @zackbernz
Status: 🟡 Awaiting answer

Take the seat →

The rules of the apple
- Selected, not applied. Only a holder can pass an apple, and each seat can pass up to four.
- Seven days. Answer the Hot Seat, or pass the apple to someone whose voice should be heard. On day eight it returns to the one who chose you.
- Your words, as written. Five short questions, about three minutes. We print your takes under your name.
- To the fairest. In the Greek myth, Eris tossed a golden apple marked “to the fairest” and started the most famous judgment in history. We don’t judge. We print who it lands on.
Why a golden apple

Virgil wrote that Rumor, Fama, “gathers strength as she goes”: a winged giant with an eye under every feather and a tongue for every eye. Medieval churches had their own version, Titivillus, a demon who wrote down every idle word spoken during Mass. Nightlife Report keeps a different kind of ledger: on the record, in your own words, with your name on it.

Not holding an apple? The waitlist is how the next four are chosen. Email editor@nightlifereport.app or DM @lillithmagic, and follow the apples on Instagram.

Holding an apple? Take the seat →

Quotes are printed as submitted to the Nightlife Report Hot Seat questionnaire, with the respondents’ permission. Illustration: Nightlife Report.

nightlifereport.app | Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app | 1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046
October 23, 2026
While Victoria’s Secret Fought Over Who Deserves the Runway, LA Already Had Its Answer: Model of the Year Ava Kortman and First Runner-Up Emily Sophie Christine
Model of the Year

The same week a $50M Fantasy Bra and a casting snub set the internet on fire, LA’s independent runway crowned its own. Emily Sophie Christine is first runner-up and Kyla Dodds is second runner-up, behind Nightlife Report’s Model of the Year, Ava Kortman. Emily tells us, in her own words, why she was “never meant to fit into a frame someone else had created.”

By Anthony Perlas · Nightlife Report · Thu Oct 22, 2026

Emily Sophie Christine walks for Sewreffic during “The Opening,” Bureau Los Angeles Fashion Week, The Lot Studios, West Hollywood, Fri Oct 16, 2026. Photo: Anthony Perlas / Nightlife Report

The internet spent the weekend arguing about who deserves a runway. On Sunday, Oct 18, the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show filmed at Sony Pictures Studios in Culver City. More than 3 million people watched live (The Publish Press). Within hours the conversation turned into a fight. Kylie Jenner wore the $50M Jacob & Co. Fantasy Bra, the first non-Angel to do so, and fans called it “UNACCEPTABLE” (Daily Mail). Former VS walker Romee Strijd posted her casting rejection, and boycott calls followed (Fashion Times). Then came a nepo-baby casting row (Daily Beast).

A few miles north, two nights earlier, LA’s independent runway had already made its picks. Nothing here ties these models to Victoria’s Secret, and we’re not claiming anything does. But the question everyone is suddenly asking, who gets to be seen, is the one this list answers.

The board:
- Model of the Year 2026 (Nightlife Report pick, published Oct 17): Ava Kortman (@avakortman)
- First runner-up: Emily Sophie Christine (@emilysophiechristine)
- Second runner-up: Kyla Dodds (@kyla.doddsss)
- Runner-up placements per Anthony Perlas on Instagram (@lillithmagic).
Rankings are our editorial view, not official Bureau results.

Emily Sophie Christine, in her own words

Emily Sophie Christine, from the photos she submitted with her interview. Photo courtesy of Emily Sophie Christine

Emily walked twice at Bureau Los Angeles Fashion Week: for Sewreffic during “The Opening” on Friday, Oct 16, and for Hey Sis! I Got You! on Saturday. Her public book includes a walk for Runway 7 Fashion (Barbizon Insider, Feb 2026, via Nightlife Report). She answered Nightlife Report’s questionnaire in writing on Oct 21. Everything below is exactly as she wrote it.

On who she is:

“I see myself as an ancient Egyptian pyramid: something people are drawn to admire from the outside, yet few ever truly understand what lies within. Like these monuments that have stood for thousands of years through the harshest elements of time, I carry a depth of history, resilience, and untold stories beneath my surface and somehow, I continue to stand as though the storms never came.”

On why she chose this path:

“I don’t think there was ever one particular moment that made me choose this path; I think it was a lifetime of feeling like the outsider in every room I entered. I spent so much of my life searching for a place where I belonged that eventually, I began creating one through the very thing that made me feel different. Modeling and acting became more than a career to me; they became a language for everything I never knew how to say, a way to give a face to the parts of myself the world had never taken the time to understand. Perhaps I was never meant to fit into a frame someone else had created for me. Perhaps I was meant to stand in front of the camera and tell stories that remind other people what it feels like to be misunderstood, to be different, and still to be worthy of being seen.”

“Perhaps I was never meant to fit into a frame someone else had created for me.”

Emily Sophie Christine

On her favorite moment, which didn’t happen on the runway:

“Some of my favorite moments happened away from the runway, particularly the unexpected connection made over dinner in Los Angeles at Laurel Hardware. I think there is something beautiful about meeting someone as a stranger and discovering, over a conversation, that there is an entire world behind the person sitting across from you. In an industry where so much is carefully curated, I find the unplanned moments the most revealing.”

On what people get wrong about modeling. This is the line that lands hardest in a week of VS casting fights:

“I think people often mistake an industry built around appearance for one built around vanity. Whenever I tell people I model and act, they assume it must be an emotionally draining environment filled with self-centered people, when my experience has often been the opposite. I’ve found that when you surround yourself with people who are comfortable in their own individuality, there is less of a need to diminish anyone else’s. My most genuine friendships have come from modeling, because there is something uniquely beautiful about being surrounded by people who each have the courage to be seen, yet can still appreciate that same light in someone else. I think people underestimate how much confidence can create community rather than competition.”

On what’s next: law school, film, and faith:

“I don’t know exactly what I’m building next, and I think there is something liberating about that. I know I am pursuing law, continue working in film and modeling, and creating a life that reflects the full depth of who I am. Beyond that, I’m leaving room for the unexpected—for the places I’ll go, the people I’ll meet, and the kind of love that might find me when I’m busy becoming myself. I don’t need to know how the entire story ends because I know the director; He has it written, and I have to act it out.”

Emily Sophie Christine walks for Hey Sis! I Got You!, Bureau Los Angeles Fashion Week, Sat Oct 17, 2026. Hair @stylezzby_risss, makeup @soleabydarlyn, shots @adamlupix. Photo courtesy of Emily Sophie Christine

Ava Kortman: still Model of the Year

Model of the Year Ava Kortman walks Look 01 for Krown Kink, The Opening, Bureau Los Angeles Fashion Week, Fri Oct 16, 2026. Photo: Anthony Perlas / Nightlife Report

Ava Kortman (@avakortman) walked for Krown Kink, the label from designer Casey Lee Parker. Nightlife Report named her Model of the Event and our Model of the Year 2026 (Nightlife Report). Off our runway, Miami Living Magazine credited her as a model for Star Mother Swimwear. Her agency is unconfirmed, so we’re not naming one.

Kyla Dodds: second runner-up

Second runner-up Kyla Dodds. Photo via @kyla.doddsss Instagram

Kyla Dodds (@kyla.doddsss) walked for Krissy King. Her public book includes a New York Fashion Week runway in 2023, per Tabloid Nation (via Nightlife Report).

Why this matters this week

Victoria’s Secret is winning on numbers. Its YouTube stream is near 31 million views (ViralShooter), and #vsfs2026 searches jumped 2,633% (Nightlife Report). But the loudest replies are about fairness. Who gets cast? Who gets the bra? Who gets turned away? Viewers even called some looks “cheap” and the wings “tacky” (Fashion Times).

Emily put it in one sentence before any of this blew up: “I think people underestimate how much confidence can create community rather than competition.”

“I don’t need to know how the entire story ends because I know the director; He has it written, and I have to act it out.”

Emily Sophie Christine

More from the Hot Seat
- “Everyone Will Be Wearing My Brand”: Eternalbeen Takes the Hot Seat and Calls Out Fashion’s Connections Game
- “I Still Miss the Supreme Hypebeast Days of 2016”: Zack Bernz Takes the Hot Seat
Request Coverage: editor@nightlifereport.app

nightlifereport.app | Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app | 1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046
October 22, 2026
“I Still Miss the Supreme Hypebeast Days of 2016”: Zack Bernz Takes the Hot Seat

NR Hot Seat

LA creator Zack Bernz doesn’t hold back. He calls the goofy sunglasses overrated, puts a tank top and muscles above any brand name, and says Fashion Week needs bigger after parties. Plus: who he’s passing the golden apple to.

By Anthony Perlas · Nightlife Report · Thu Oct 22, 2026

Zack Bernz in the gym, gloves up and grinning. Photo courtesy of Zack Bernz

Zack Bernz (@zackbernz) makes music, vlogs, boxes and, in his own channel bio, likes “to party” (YouTube). He took Nightlife Report’s Hot Seat this week. His answers are below, exactly as submitted.

Most overrated right now?

“The goofy looking sun glasses”

Unpopular opinion?

“I still miss the Supreme hypebeast days of 2016.”

“I still miss the Supreme hypebeast days of 2016.”

Zack Bernz

One rule worth breaking?

“Ugg boots with long shorts.”

Guitar in hand, under the red lights. Photo courtesy of Zack Bernz

What does LA get wrong?

“Brand name clothes are not cooler than a wife beater tank top and muscles”

Confession?

“You always have to pre game it a bit”

What will everyone be wearing?

“Leather”

Top billing on The Viper Room marquee, Sunset Strip. Photo courtesy of Zack Bernz

If you ran Fashion Week for one night, what would you change?

“Bigger after parties”

The golden apple

Zack is passing the golden apple to @liamdelvingallagher.

“Bigger after parties”

Zack Bernz, on what he’d change at Fashion Week

Request Coverage: editor@nightlifereport.app

nightlifereport.app | Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app | 1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046

October 22, 2026
“Everyone Will Be Wearing My Brand”: Eternalbeen Takes the Hot Seat and Calls Out Fashion’s Connections Game

NR Hot Seat

The LA designer behind Eternalbeen, fresh off a Bureau LAFW runway, says fashion now runs on “connections, money and influence,” wants independent designers to get the same spotlight as the luxury houses, and is passing the golden apple to three LAFW names.

By Anthony Perlas · Nightlife Report · Thu Oct 22, 2026

Head-to-toe yellow under the Eternal Been sign at Bureau Los Angeles Fashion Week, October 2026. Photo courtesy of Eternalbeen

The week the fashion internet argued about who gets cast at Victoria’s Secret (Fashion Times), an LA independent designer sent in an answer.

Eternalbeen (@eternalbeen) showed at Bureau Los Angeles Fashion Week. The segment we covered had open-net tops, cargo trousers, orange sets with black harness straps and corset belts, knit balaclavas and patchwork denim (Nightlife Report). Eternalbeen took Nightlife Report’s Hot Seat this week. The answers are below, exactly as submitted.

Most overrated right now?

Copy and paste streetwear

Unpopular opinion?

Fashion lacks creativity, now it’s about who has connections, money and influence to convince people about what’s fashionable

A pink balaclava and a pale blue jacket: the Eternalbeen look that refuses to blend in. Photo courtesy of Eternalbeen

One rule worth breaking?

All of them, I don’t follow trends! I’m a trend setter

What does LA get wrong?

They think looking expensive is considered fashion and having style

Confession?

I’m not here to fit in ,I’m here to make everyone question what I do,I like to be the odd designer

Tie-dye from hood to hem, Bureau Los Angeles Fashion Week. Photo courtesy of Eternalbeen

What will everyone be wearing?

Everyone will be wearing my brand Eternalbeen

If you ran Fashion Week for one night, what would you change?

Model sizes” “If I ran Fashion Week for one night, the first thing I would change is giving independent designers the same spotlight as the big luxury houses. Talent shouldn’t need a famous name or industry connections to be seen. Let the creativity speak. The future of fashion deserves new faces, new visions, and new voices. — ETERNAL BEEN 🖤🔥”

“Talent shouldn’t need a famous name or industry connections to be seen.”

Eternal Been

An oversized mint open-net top over tan wide cargo trousers, Eternal Been at The Finale, Bureau Los Angeles Fashion Week. Photo: Anthony Perlas / Nightlife Report

The golden apple

Eternalbeen is passing the golden apple to @bametcalf1, @julia_kolesnikova_psy and @_whitneyj_. The reason given: “They was apart of LAFW”

Request Coverage: editor@nightlifereport.app

nightlifereport.app | Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app | 1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046

October 22, 2026
Venus Games First Runner-Up Emily Sophie Christine Was Never Meant to Fit Someone Else’s Frame
Exclusive Interview · Venus Games First Runner-Up

Model and actor Emily Sophie Christine walked The Bureau’s LA Fashion Week for Sewreffic and Hey Sis! I Got You!, and finished first runner-up at the Venus Games. She tells Nightlife Report about growing up as the outsider, why modeling gave her her truest friendships, and a next chapter that includes law.

By Anthony Perlas. Wed Oct 21, 2026. Interview by written questionnaire; her answers are quoted as submitted. Photos of Christine courtesy of Emily Sophie Christine.

The Bureau Fashion Week LA · Oct. 16–17, 2026

Venus Games Results

Nightlife Report Venus Games scoring; The Bureau announced no official winners.

Winner

Ava Kortman

@avakortman

16 pts

Photo via @avakortman Instagram; Li Shen S/S27, NYFW

First Runner-Up

Emily Sophie Christine

@emilysophiechristine

12 pts

Photo courtesy of Emily Sophie Christine

Second Runner-Up

Kyla Dodds

@kyla.doddsss

10 pts

Photo via @kyla.doddsss Instagram

Points are placement points from our published board: Final Results: Bureau LAFW Oct 2026. Ava Kortman walked for Krown Kink by Casey Lee Parker, Christine for Sewreffic, and Kyla Dodds for Krissy King (her Finale story). How the scoring works: the Venus Games rules.

Same city, same weekend. Sunday night, Oct. 18, the fashion internet turned toward Culver City, where Victoria’s Secret staged its show (Vogue). Two nights earlier and a few miles north, the lights at The Lot Studios had come up on The Bureau Fashion Week’s Opening, and Christine walked Look 11 for Sewreffic. By the time our board locked on Saturday night, she was first runner-up. One runway got the headlines. This is the story of the other one, in her words.

Also from the Bureau: Sophie Rann, who walked for Krissy King, in her own words →

LOS ANGELES — In the frame she sent us, fashion week is a blur behind her. A photographer is mid-shot, a crew member is crossing with a bag, and a yellow handrail cuts through the background. Emily Sophie Christine is the only still thing in the picture. She stands in a pink stripe robe tied at the waist, both hands set on her hips, platinum waves over one shoulder, her eyes fixed on something just past the lens. She isn’t asking the camera for anything. She’s letting it catch up.

That stillness is the first thing you notice about her work, and the questionnaire she returned to Nightlife Report explains where it comes from. Christine (@emilysophiechristine), a model and actor, walked The Bureau Fashion Week’s October season of Los Angeles Fashion Week. Asked to describe herself in two sentences she’d want quoted, she skipped the résumé and reached for a monument:

“I see myself as an ancient Egyptian pyramid: something people are drawn to admire from the outside, yet few ever truly understand what lies within. Like these monuments that have stood for thousands of years through the harshest elements of time, I carry a depth of history, resilience, and untold stories beneath my surface and somehow, I continue to stand as though the storms never came.”

— Emily Sophie Christine, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

The outsider’s language

The best model interviews find the feeling under the career. For Christine, there was no single moment when she was discovered. She describes something slower and harder:

“I don’t think there was ever one particular moment that made me choose this path; I think it was a lifetime of feeling like the outsider in every room I entered. I spent so much of my life searching for a place where I belonged that eventually, I began creating one through the very thing that made me feel different. Modeling and acting became more than a career to me; they became a language for everything I never knew how to say, a way to give a face to the parts of myself the world had never taken the time to understand. Perhaps I was never meant to fit into a frame someone else had created for me. Perhaps I was meant to stand in front of the camera and tell stories that remind other people what it feels like to be misunderstood, to be different, and still to be worthy of being seen.”

— Emily Sophie Christine

Read that again with the photographs in mind. “A language for everything I never knew how to say” is as good a description of runway craft as you’ll find. The walk, the set of the jaw and the held gaze are the vocabulary. The story is hers.

Three moments, one weekend

The Bureau Fashion Week produces Los Angeles Fashion Week twice a year, in March and October. This October it ran five runway shows across Friday and Saturday, Oct. 16–17, in West Hollywood, with designers from around the world on the bill (official schedule). Christine’s weekend touched three corners of it:
- Friday, The Opening: she walked for Sewreffic, as covered in our Sewreffic looks and credits.
- Saturday evening: she walked Hey Sis! I Got You!, part of the 5:30 PM show on the Bureau schedule. On her Instagram, her HSIGY carousel tags @officialheysisigotyou, @thebureaufashionweek and @lafw. It credits hair to @stylezzby_risss, makeup to @soleabydarlyn and shots to @adamlupix.
- Backstage: on her Instagram, a video she titled “Backstage Shenanigans at LAFW” tags @thebureaufashionweek and @krissykingthelabel, with makeup again by @soleabydarlyn and video by @hellogorgeous.yh.
Photo courtesy of Emily Sophie Christine

The Hey Sis! I Got You! frame is the one to study. It’s shot in black and white with the brand’s rose glowing on the LED wall behind her. Christine comes down the runway in a liquid metallic slip and a sheer duster that trails behind her. Her chin is level, her eyes are locked down the runway, and her hands are loose. The front row lines both sides of the runway, and she doesn’t look at any of it.

On camera: the gaze

Put her backstage frames side by side and you see the range. In one, she’s squared to the lens with her hands on her hips and her gaze cool and off-axis: the face she brings to the runway. In another, in the same robe against the same concrete wall, she’s caught mid-laugh, eyes creased, the composure gone for a second. In a third, behind the scenes, she stands dead center in a pair of pink and yellow feathered wings almost as wide as the frame. The room is moving around her, and she doesn’t move at all.

Photo courtesy of Emily Sophie Christine

That is the craft she’s describing: giving a face to something inside. The great runway models have long talked about the walk as a kind of acting. Christine does both for real, and it shows. The look is a performance, but the person behind it is never hidden for long.

Away from the runway

Asked for her Bureau Fashion Week moment, on or off the runway, Christine picked the part no camera caught:

“Some of my favorite moments happened away from the runway, particularly the unexpected connection made over dinner in Los Angeles … I think there is something beautiful about meeting someone as a stranger and discovering, over a conversation, that there is an entire world behind the person sitting across from you. In an industry where so much is carefully curated, I find the unplanned moments the most revealing.”

— Emily Sophie Christine

What people get wrong

This is the answer that should travel. Asked what people misunderstand about her or her industry, Christine took on the oldest stereotype in fashion:

“I think people often mistake an industry built around appearance for one built around vanity. Whenever I tell people I model and act, they assume it must be an emotionally draining environment filled with self-centered people, when my experience has often been the opposite. I’ve found that when you surround yourself with people who are comfortable in their own individuality, there is less of a need to diminish anyone else’s. My most genuine friendships have come from modeling, because there is something uniquely beautiful about being surrounded by people who each have the courage to be seen, yet can still appreciate that same light in someone else. I think people underestimate how much confidence can create community rather than competition.”

— Emily Sophie Christine

“I think people underestimate how much confidence can create community rather than competition.”

Emily Sophie Christine

What’s next: law, film and the unexpected

Christine isn’t pretending to have a five-year plan, and she doesn’t want one:

“I don’t know exactly what I’m building next, and I think there is something liberating about that. I know I am pursuing law, continue working in film and modeling, and creating a life that reflects the full depth of who I am. Beyond that, I’m leaving room for the unexpected—for the places I’ll go, the people I’ll meet, and the kind of love that might find me when I’m busy becoming myself. I don’t need to know how the entire story ends because I know the director; He has it written, and I have to act it out.”

— Emily Sophie Christine

Law, film and modeling, all at once, and room left over for what she can’t predict. Hers is a bigger story than most fashion week profiles get to tell.

In her own words / coming next

Everything Christine says in this story comes from her written questionnaire, quoted as submitted. The dinner answer was trimmed only where marked (…). Details about her shows come from our own Sewreffic coverage, the Bureau’s published schedule and, where stated, her Instagram. We’d like to continue the conversation: about her walk and how she prepares, about where the film work is heading, and about what pursuing law looks like alongside the runway. Follow her at @emilysophiechristine.

Gallery

Photos courtesy of Emily Sophie Christine. Instagram post details are attributed to her Instagram, @emilysophiechristine.

nightlifereport.app | Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app | 1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046
October 22, 2026
Sophie Rann Walked for Krissy King at The Bureau. She Wants You to Know Modeling Was Never Just About Looks.
Exclusive Interview · The Bureau Fashion Week

From New York Fashion Week to Paris, by her own account, and down The Bureau’s runway for Krissy King: model Sophie Rann tells Nightlife Report why nothing matches the moment you step out, what people get wrong about the job, and the side of modeling she wants to show next.

By Anthony Perlas. Wed Oct 21, 2026. Interview by written questionnaire; her answers are quoted exactly as submitted. Instagram images via @sophie.rann.

LOS ANGELES — Ask Sophie Rann about the runway and she doesn’t start with the clothes. She starts with the room: the music, the crowd, the lights, and the second the floor opens up in front of her. She has chased that second a long way. By her own account, her runway path runs from New York Fashion Week to Paris Fashion Week, and at The Bureau Fashion Week it brought her down the runway for Krissy King.

Rann (@sophie.rann on Instagram, @sophkate00 on TikTok) answered Nightlife Report’s questionnaire this week. Asked to introduce herself in two sentences she’d want quoted, she called herself a model who loves everything about the fashion world, especially the feeling of being on the runway, and then gave the rest of the answer to the work:

“From New York Fashion Week to Paris Fashion Week, every experience has made me fall more in love with modeling, meet incredible people, and realize how much I want to keep pushing myself in this industry.”

— Sophie Rann, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

The Bureau, and Krissy King

Every model has a show she replays. For Rann, it’s The Bureau Fashion Week, and the energy she describes is the thing the audience only sees from the outside:

“There’s honestly no energy that compares to walking the runway at Bureau Fashion Week. The music, the crowd, the lights, and the feeling you get when you step onto the runway are unmatched.”

Sophie Rann

Krissy King is the swim label that closed The Bureau’s sold-out Finale in Los Angeles this October, and King is also a co-founder of The Bureau Fashion Week. Rann singled the show out:

“Walking for Krissy King was especially memorable, and it’s an experience that reminds me why I love modeling.”

— Sophie Rann, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

Sophie Rann on the runway, from her Instagram, February 2026. Instagram image via @sophie.rann

What stays with her once the lights go down is the people. Backstage at a fashion week is crowded and fast, and Rann talks about it the way working models do, as the part of the job that makes the rest of it worth it:

“Beyond the runway, one of my favorite parts is the community backstage. I’ve met so many amazing models, and I love how people from different backgrounds come together through a shared love for fashion.”

— Sophie Rann, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

Sophie Rann on The Bureau’s red carpet, October 2026. Photos: @idancco and @amtrtoo

More than standing in front of a camera

There was no single discovery moment in her answer. What changed was how she understood the job:

“I realized fashion was my path when I saw how much more modeling could be than just standing in front of a camera or walking a runway. It became a way for me to express myself, challenge myself, and be part of something creative that constantly pushes me outside my comfort zone.”

— Sophie Rann, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

What people get wrong

Asked what outsiders misunderstand about her industry, she went straight at the oldest assumption in fashion:

“People sometimes assume modeling is all about looks, but there’s so much more that goes into it. It takes confidence, discipline, resilience, and the ability to keep showing up as yourself in an industry that constantly challenges you.”

— Sophie Rann, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

“It takes confidence, discipline, resilience, and the ability to keep showing up as yourself in an industry that constantly challenges you.”

Sophie Rann

What’s next: the real side of modeling

Asked what readers should follow or buy, she pointed to the work itself, and to a window into the job she wants to open:

“I’m focused on continuing to grow as a model, taking on new opportunities, and seeing how far I can take my career in fashion. I want to share more of the real side of modeling, from castings and runway experiences to the behind-the-scenes moments people don’t always get to see.”

— Sophie Rann, in a Nightlife Report questionnaire

Follow her on Instagram at @sophie.rann and on TikTok at @sophkate00.

Venus Games results: Rann’s fellow Bureau model Emily Sophie Christine finished first runner-up on Nightlife Report’s Venus Games board for The Bureau Fashion Week LA, behind winner Ava Kortman, with Kyla Dodds second runner-up. Nightlife Report scoring; The Bureau announced no official winners. Read Emily Sophie Christine’s interview and the podium →

The record
- Every quote in this story comes from Sophie Rann’s written questionnaire and is reproduced exactly as submitted. She signed our release.
- Her runway history beyond The Bureau (New York and Paris) is as she describes it.
- The Bureau Fashion Week LA: Oct. 16–17, 2026, The Lot Studios, West Hollywood (official schedule).
- Disclosure: Krissy King (@krissykingthelabel) is also a co-founder of The Bureau Fashion Week.
- Instagram images via @sophie.rann. Red carpet photo: @idancco and @amtrtoo.
Corrections and tips: editor@nightlifereport.app.

nightlifereport.app | Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app | 1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046
October 22, 2026

The History of Fashion: From Bone Needles to Superintelligence Runways

Top image: a Justin Zachary gown on the runway at The Bureau Fashion Week LA, West Hollywood, October 2026. Photo: Anthony Perlas, Nightlife Report.

Who gets to wear what. Who decides. Who pays. Who gets paid. Fashion has asked those four questions for two thousand years. The answers keep changing. The questions never do. This is the short, sourced history of how we got from a needle to a runway with a camera at the end of it, and to a 2026 law that treats a model’s digital copy as something she has to sign for.

How this article was built: every fact below links to a numbered source at the bottom. Where a quote reached us second-hand, we say “as quoted by.” Company figures are labeled as company figures. Anything we could not verify was left out.

The timeline at a glance

Year	What happened
1st century BC	Julius Caesar restricts who may wear certain robes and pearls, and on which days ^[1]
1858	Charles Frederick Worth and Otto Bobergh open a couture house at 7 rue de la Paix, Paris ^[2]
1910	Gabrielle Chanel opens Chanel Modes at 21 rue Cambon ^[3]
1921	Chanel No. 5 ^[3]
1946	Eileen and Jerry Ford found Ford Models in their New York home ^[4]
Feb 12, 1947	Christian Dior shows his first collection; the “New Look” ^{[5, 6]}
1967	Wilhelmina Cooper founds Wilhelmina Models ^[7]
1972	Elite opens in Paris (New York, 1977) ^[8]
Aug 1, 1995	The first Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show, at the Plaza Hotel ^[9]
Jun 19, 2025	New York’s Fashion Workers Act takes effect ^[10]
Oct 18, 2026	The Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show goes live from Los Angeles ^[11]

Chapter 1. In the beginning, the needle

Our runway-construction piece, From Bone Needle to LED Wall, starts where the long documentaries start: with a needle carved from bone. The point it makes still holds. Sewing, not decoration, was the first fashion technology. Every look on a 2026 runway is still a flat material cut and sewn into a shape a body can wear.

What changed over the next few thousand years was not the needle. It was who controlled the clothes, and the money around them.

Chapter 2. Dressed for power: Rome

At his aunt Julia’s funeral, Julius Caesar told the crowd that his family, the Julii, descended from Venus ^[1]. Later, as dictator, he decided who could wear what. His biographer Suetonius writes: “He denied the use of litters and the wearing of scarlet robes or pearls to all except those of a designated position and age, and on set days.” ^[1]

Caesar also dressed to be noticed. Suetonius calls him “remarkable in his dress”: a senator’s tunic with fringed sleeves to the wrist and a loose belt. The dictator Sulla is said to have warned the nobles “to keep an eye on the ill-girt boy.” ^[1] Two thousand years before street-style photography, a young man’s sleeves were read as a political signal.

The lesson: clothing tells a crowd who holds power. Rules about clothing tell you who wants to keep it.

Chapter 3. Worth and the first live model

Charles Frederick Worth was born on October 13, 1825, in Bourne, Lincolnshire, and apprenticed at Swan & Edgar, a London draper. In 1846 he moved to Paris, by the usual account with about five pounds, and went to work at Gagelin, a silk firm. There he met Marie Vernet. They married in 1851. ^[2]

In 1858, with partner Otto Bobergh, he opened his own house at 7 rue de la Paix ^[2]. Four things made him different:

The client came to him. He designed collections in advance and clients chose from them ^[2].
He signed the clothes. Worth sewed labels into his work. The Museum of the City of New York has said that before Worth, the idea of a dress being recognizably the work of its creator did not exist (as quoted by Wikipedia) ^[2].
He used a live woman, not a doll. His early model was Marie. Lucy Bannerman of The Times later called her the world’s first professional model (as quoted by Wikipedia) ^[2].
He ran it like a business. By the late 1880s the house showed seasonal collections; at its height it employed about 1,200 people, and a single bodice could use 17 pieces of fabric ^[2].

His break came in 1860, with a gown for Princess Pauline de Metternich that the Empress Eugénie admired. The princess later wrote: “And so… Worth was made and I was lost, for from that moment there were no more dresses at 300 francs each” (as quoted by Wikipedia, citing The Times) ^[2]. For the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, the empress reportedly ordered 250 Worth dresses ^[2]. Worth also narrowed the crinoline toward the “princess line” and made an ankle-length walking skirt ^[2]. He died in Paris on March 10, 1895 ^[2].

For what happened to the model after Worth, from Lucile’s stage shows to the camera, read The History of Modeling: From Worth’s House Mannequins to Superintelligence Twins.

Chapter 4. Chanel: comfort as a business model

Gabrielle Chanel was born on August 19, 1883, in Saumur. She started with hats: Chanel Modes opened at 21 rue Cambon in 1910, under a lease that barred her from dressmaking. She modeled her own designs from the start and was photographed for Le Théâtre that fall. ^[3]

1913: a shop in Deauville ^[3].
1916: she bought surplus jersey from Rodier, an everyday knit, and showed her first couture collection that fall ^[3].
1921: Chanel No. 5, described as the first perfume to bear a designer’s name ^[3].
1926: American Vogue captioned her black day dress “The Chanel ‘Ford’—the frock that all the world will wear” (as quoted by Encyclopedia.com) ^[3].
Feb 5, 1954: her postwar comeback. American Vogue quoted her: “A dress isn’t right if it is uncomfortable” (as quoted by Encyclopedia.com) ^[3].

She died on January 10, 1971 ^[3]. Worth built silhouettes out of boning. Chanel built them out of fabric that moved.

Chapter 5. Dior’s New Look, and the women who fought it

At 10:30 a.m. on February 12, 1947, Christian Dior showed his first collection at 30 Avenue Montaigne ^{[5, 6]}. He called the lines Corolle and En 8 ^[5]. In the house’s own telling, Carmel Snow of Harper’s Bazaar said: “My dear Christian, your dresses have such a New Look!” ^[5]

It came straight after wartime fabric controls, and Dior could use 25 yards of fabric for a skirt ^[6]. The backlash was loud. As The Independent tells it:

Britain’s Sir Stafford Cripps declared, “There should be a law” ^[6].
Women in Chicago carried banners reading “Mr Dior, we abhor dresses to the floor” ^[6].
Pickets in the United States held signs reading “Burn Mr Dior” ^[6].
In autumn 1948, on the rue Lepic in Paris, photographer Walter Carone captured older women tearing at a young woman’s New Look skirt ^[6].

Dior’s answer was his second collection, in July 1947, which used even more fabric ^[6]. Rome argued about dyed robes. Paris argued about yardage. It was the same fight: what clothing is allowed to cost, and who decides.

Chapter 6. The agency: who the model works for

Every one of those revolutions needed a woman walking in the clothes. Before the 1940s, agencies found work, but models were expected to set their own rates and collect their own wages ^[12].

Eileen Ford, born Eileen Cecile Otte in Manhattan on March 25, 1922, changed that. She graduated from Barnard in 1943 and modeled for the Harry Conover agency ^[13]. With her husband Jerry she started Ford Models in their New York home; the agency dates its founding to 1946 ^[4], while The New York Times and The Guardian say 1947 ^{[13, 14]}. They sold their car to pay the rent on a Second Avenue office ^[13], next to a funeral parlour ^[14].

What the Fords built still shapes modeling today:

Getting paid. Jerry Ford’s voucher system paid models in advance; before it, models often waited a year or more ^[13]. The Guardian says they were paid in cash every Friday ^[14].
The commission. The Times describes a 10% cut ^[15]; Encyclopedia.com describes a 20% standard, 10% from the model and 10% from the client ^[12].
Terms. Fees for cancellations, fittings and bad weather ^[12], and a five-day workweek ^[13].
The funnel. About 60,000 hopefuls a year; about 100 tested; about 30 established a foothold, by Ford’s estimate ^[16].
Protection. She told Forbes in 1984: “I don’t ever want to tell a mother I don’t know where her daughter is at 2 a.m.” (as quoted by The New York Times and The Guardian) ^{[13, 14]}

The record has another side. The AP reported that she told hopefuls under 5 feet 7 to give up ^[16], and models remembered being told to lose weight ^[13]. In 2012 she dismissed the idea of a models’ union: “Models don’t need that kind of protection anyway.” ^[15] Her test for talent was simpler: “I always said it was an X factor. They just had it.” ^[15] The Fords’ full story is in Eileen Ford Built the Business of Beauty.

Then came the competition.

Wilhelmina, founded in 1967 by Dutch model Wilhelmina Cooper ^[7].
Elite, Paris 1972 and New York 1977. Elite’s own history describes the “great model wars” among the big three ^[8].
IMG Models, founded by sports agent Mark McCormack, which manages models as talent, like athletes, and is now part of WME ^[17].

In the 1970s, New York agencies reorganized as “management companies,” which, The New Republic reports, took them outside the 10% fee cap on employment agencies. A later class action by models settled at $22 million in 2005, the magazine reports, citing sociologist Ashley Mears ^[18].

Chapter 7. The supermodels and the Victoria’s Secret show, 1995–2026

By 1990 the models were more famous than many designers. That October, Vogue printed Linda Evangelista’s line: “We have this expression, Christy and I. We don’t wake up for less than $10,000 a day” (as quoted by Wikipedia, citing Vogue) ^[19]. Read it as a negotiating position: the model sets the floor. Elite says it “revolutionized the modeling industry by giving birth to The Supermodel”; that is the company’s claim ^[8]. The look later turned thinner, and the AP reported Eileen Ford disliked the “waif” look of the early 1990s ^[16].

The show that turned the runway into television:

Year	Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show
1995	First show, Aug 1, at the Plaza Hotel in New York, introduced by Stephanie Seymour ^[9]
1998	The wings arrive ^[9]
1999	A Super Bowl ad drives a webcast; reports put viewers above 2 million ^[9]
2001	Network debut on ABC: 12.4 million viewers ^[9]
2002–2017	Aired on CBS; no show in 2004 ^[9]
2006–2007	The show comes to Los Angeles, at the Kodak Theatre ^[9]
2014–2018	Viewers fall from 9.2 million to 3.2 million ^[9]
2019	Show cancelled, citing falling viewership ^[9]
2024	Returns Oct 15 in Brooklyn, hosted by Tyra Banks; Valentina Sampaio and Alex Consani walk ^[9]
2026	“LIVE from LA” on Sunday, Oct 18, streaming free on YouTube at 4:30 p.m. PT, with screenings in select AMC theaters, a Fantasy Bra with Jacob & Co., and an open casting call at select Simon malls ^[11]

Our desk’s roundup of the reaction is in WeHo Whispers: The Fashion Internet’s Verdict on the 2026 Victoria’s Secret Show.

Chapter 8. Who pays whom: how a fashion week works

There are two business models. Once you see them, you will watch a runway differently.

Model one: the designer pays for the show. In 2019, Vogue Business broke down Christian Siriano’s New York budget. The total ran from about $125,000 to more than $312,000, plus samples. On the return, Siriano said: “it’s really hard for them to see actual return.” ^[20]

Model two: the platform week. A producer runs the venue and production and sells designers a package. The Bureau, which says it has operated since 2016 ^[21], is one. Its own published figures (company figures, not audited):

Designers pay the producer: runway shows $5,000 to $35,000; booths from $2,000 ^[22]. A package includes runway production, hair and makeup, models and staffing; a typical collection is 8 to 20 looks ^[23].
The public pays the producer: for LA in October 2026, $72.95 general admission, from $102.95 reserved and $202.95 front-row VIP, fees included ^[24].
Runway time: about 15 to 20 minutes per designer, and one to two hours for a multi-designer session ^[25].

The Bureau does not publish model pay ^[25], and we won’t guess. What is public is the pattern at “fashion week”-branded shows: BuzzFeed reported pay ranging from nothing, or clothes, up to a few hundred dollars, and one model paid $120 who spent about $200 getting there ^[26]. The New Republic calls payment in trade “practically endemic to the industry, especially for girls just starting out.” ^[18] Event staff are employees: in West Hollywood the 2026 minimum wage is $20.25 an hour for non-hotel workers ^[27].

Chapter 9. Superintelligence runways: the law catches up

For a century, the fight was about commissions and pay dates. Now it is also about copies. New York’s Fashion Workers Act took effect on June 19, 2025 ^[10]. According to the state Department of Labor ^{[10, 28]}:

Model management companies owe models a fiduciary duty.
Commission is capped at 20%, with no signing fees or deposits.
The model gets a deal memo with total pay before the work.
Contracts are capped at three years, with no automatic renewal.
Hours beyond eight in a day are paid at least 1.5 times the rate.
Any digital replica of a model needs her separate, written consent, covering scope, purpose, pay and duration, and an agency’s power of attorney cannot be used to sign that away.

Eileen Ford wanted Friday pay, set fees and a code of conduct. Nearly eighty years later, New York wrote a version of that into law and added a rule she could not have imagined: the model has to say yes to her own digital twin. For how brands are already using Superintelligence models, see the last section of The History of Modeling.

Chapter 10. The view from the pit, October 2026

The Bureau’s LA Fashion Week ran October 16 to 18, 2026 ^[25]. Our photographer shot it from the media pit. The full record of designers, models and photos is in The Bureau Fashion Week LA 2026: The Full Nightlife Report Archive, with the night-by-night story in Late start, packed pit: our photographer’s Day 1 and Who Walked: Every Designer at the Bureau Fashion Week LA Finale Weekend.

From Caesar’s dyed robes to a deal memo for a digital twin, the clothes changed. The questions did not. Who wears what. Who decides. Who pays. Who gets paid.

Keep reading: the Battle of the Gods series

Sources

Suetonius, Life of the Deified Julius, trans. J. C. Rolfe (Loeb, 1914), LacusCurtius. https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Julius*.html
“Charles Frederick Worth,” Wikipedia (tertiary; cites The Times, 1958 and 2008, and the Museum of the City of New York). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Frederick_Worth
“Chanel, Gabrielle (Coco),” Encyclopedia.com. https://www.encyclopedia.com/fashion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/chanel-gabrielle-coco-0
“FORD Models Celebrates 75th Anniversary,” PR Newswire, May 5, 2021. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ford-models-celebrates-75th-anniversary-and-announces-the-return-of-ford-miami-301284336.html
Dior, “The New Look”. https://www.dior.com/en_int/one/the-new-look
Annalisa Barbieri, “When skirts were full and women were furious,” The Independent, Mar 3, 1996. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/when-skirts-were-full-and-women-were-furious-1340021.html
Wilhelmina, “Our Legacy”. https://www.wilhelmina.com/our-legacy
Elite Model Management, “About” (company history). https://www.elitemodels.com/about
“Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show,” Wikipedia (tertiary). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria%27s_Secret_Fashion_Show
New York State Department of Labor, Fashion Workers Act. https://dol.ny.gov/fashion
Victoria’s Secret, “Fashion Show ’26” (VS Insider), fetched Oct 18, 2026. https://www.victoriassecret.com/us/vs/vsinsider/fashionshow
“Eileen Ford,” Encyclopedia.com. https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/eileen-ford
Eric Wilson, Eileen Ford obituary, The New York Times, Jul 2014 (read via CNBC syndication). https://www.cnbc.com/2014/07/11/eileen-ford-doyenne-and-disciplinarian-of-modeling-industry-dies-at-92.html
Veronica Horwell, “Eileen Ford obituary,” The Guardian, Jul 11, 2014. https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2014/jul/11/eileen-ford
Tim Teeman, “Eileen Ford: The woman who created the supermodel,” The Times, Mar 17, 2012. https://www.timteeman.com/2012/03/17/eileen-ford-the-woman-who-created-the-supermodel/
Beth J. Harpaz, Associated Press obituary of Eileen Ford, Jul 10, 2014, via Legacy.com. https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/nytimes/name/eileen-ford-obituary?id=60246116
IMG Models, “About Us”. https://imgmodels.com/about-us/
“Fashion Week’s Labor Problem Is Our Labor Problem,” The New Republic, Sep 11, 2019. https://newrepublic.com/article/155020/fashion-weeks-labor-problem-labor-problem
“Linda Evangelista,” Wikipedia (tertiary; cites Jonathan Van Meter, “Pretty Women,” Vogue, Oct 1990). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_Evangelista
Fawnia Soo Hoo, “What a runway show really costs,” Vogue Business, Feb 5, 2019. https://www.vogue.com/article/cost-of-runway-show-christian-siriano-discount-universe
The Bureau, Paris Fashion Week application page (company page). https://thebureaufashionweek.com/paris-fashion-week/apply/
The Bureau, “Fashion Designer Application” (company figures). https://thebureaufashionweek.com/fashion-designer-inquiry/
The Bureau, “Designer Frequently Asked Questions” (company figures). https://support.thebureaufashionweek.com/hc/en-us/articles/46766532828691-Designer-Frequently-Asked-Questions-FAQ
The Bureau, “How Much Do LA Fashion Week Tickets Cost? (October 2026)” (company figures). https://support.thebureaufashionweek.com/hc/en-us/articles/56384214778771-How-Much-Do-LA-Fashion-Week-Tickets-Cost-October-2026
The Bureau, “Los Angeles Fashion Week” (company page). https://thebureaufashionweek.com/los-angeles-fashion-week/
Hannah Marder, “Are Fashion Week Models Paid?,” BuzzFeed, Oct 31, 2022. https://www.buzzfeed.com/hannahmarder/are-fashion-week-models-paid
City of West Hollywood, “Minimum Wage”. https://www.weho.org/business/operate-your-business/minimum-wage/
New York State Department of Labor, Fashion Workers Act FAQs. https://dol.ny.gov/new-york-state-fashion-workers-act-faqs

Nightlife Report
nightlifereport.app
Tips: editor@nightlifereport.app
1049 Havenhurst Dr, Unit 67, West Hollywood, CA 90046

October 21, 2026

Category: Fashion Week

How the Hot Seat works

Answer one: “Overrated” is the wrong word for it

Answer two: The rule she would break, now with hearts

Answer three: What LA gets wrong is the sidewalk

Answer four: The “unpopular” opinion that millions agree with

Answer five: Champagne, coffee and the wait between shows

The Golden Apple: who Julia passes it to

What her five answers add up to

Take the Hot Seat

Sources

What the brand says

Then she kept talking

The internet’s jury

The show that needed the drama

Our take: the end of the polite no

What Los Angeles can learn from it

The verdict

Sources

The bra

The word war

Follow the money

Luxury’s bad week

Paris, behind plywood

The Tuscan Mom

Halloween 2026: the dossier

Who really earns the runway? We asked.

The verdict

Sources

Congratulations, you’ve been selected.

Where the apples came from

The open bounties

The rules of the apple

Why a golden apple

Emily Sophie Christine, in her own words

Ava Kortman: still Model of the Year

Kyla Dodds: second runner-up

Why this matters this week

More from the Hot Seat

The golden apple

The golden apple

Venus Games Results

The outsider’s language

Three moments, one weekend

On camera: the gaze

Away from the runway

What people get wrong

What’s next: law, film and the unexpected

In her own words / coming next

Gallery

The Bureau, and Krissy King

More than standing in front of a camera

What people get wrong

What’s next: the real side of modeling

The record

The timeline at a glance

Chapter 1. In the beginning, the needle

Chapter 2. Dressed for power: Rome

Chapter 3. Worth and the first live model

Chapter 4. Chanel: comfort as a business model

Chapter 5. Dior’s New Look, and the women who fought it

Chapter 6. The agency: who the model works for

Chapter 7. The supermodels and the Victoria’s Secret show, 1995–2026

Chapter 8. Who pays whom: how a fashion week works

Chapter 9. Superintelligence runways: the law catches up

Chapter 10. The view from the pit, October 2026

Keep reading: the Battle of the Gods series

Sources