What's Special About NYFW? You Never Know What You're Going to Get

From theater productions to book fairs, boats, and going off-runway, New York designers surprise and delight like no one else.

Go through the list of most memorable, talked-about New York Fashion Week happenings from the last decade, and you’ll find they have one thing in common: They weren’t “typical” fashion shows.

Think of Tommy Hilfiger’s carnival on a pier co-hosted by Gigi Hadid, Opening Ceremony’s “Pageant of the People” at the Javits Center, Telfar’s collaboration with Jeremy O. Harris at Irving Plaza, Pyer Moss’ tribute to Sister Rosetta Tharpe at Kings Theater, Tory Burch’s SoHo street market—while they all involved models and clothes, they didn’t follow the traditional format of walking up and down a straight runway to an untz-untz soundtrack. Of course, a fashion show can be successful without the bells and whistles, but the greatest of all time, in New York and elsewhere, weave theatricality into every aspect of the collection, including how it’s presented to audiences.

Jackson Wiederhoeft grew up watching John Galliano and Alexander McQueen shows, which helped fuel a love for fashion—however, that love was born and cemented in drama club. “The first time I ever designed the garment was for production of ‘Great Expectations’ in my high school,” he says.

Initially, he thought he would study to become a costume designer. “When I was looking at colleges, someone told me, ‘Costume designers are martyrs, fashion designers are not.’ In theater, as a costume designer, you're always going to be subject to the director, the performers, the producers. There's a story that's being told that you're not in charge of.  Whereas in fashion design, you’re the director…  I realized the medium could even be more creative for what I wanted to do,” he says. “I'm a very creative person generally, so I like telling my own stories a lot.”

Still, as a student at Parsons, Wiederhoeft’s dream was to intern at the Santa Fe Opera. When he didn’t get the job, he returned to his native Houston to work for the Alley Theater. “I met a designer named Tricia, who was the associate designer on an off-Broadway show called ‘Queen of the Night’—[for] which Thom Browne was designing,” he remembers. “I came back to school as a sophomore and interned for this show and met Thom's team.”

That would lead to an internship, then a full-time job at Thom Browne, which was formative in more ways than one: It showed Wiederhoeft that the type of performance-rich fashion he wanted to make was not only possible, but it was possible to do in New York. “The first show I ever interned on at Thom, when I was 19, was this garden-themed show, and the whole venue was done out like a garden party — almost the whole runaway was grass, and there were these statuary figures in the middle of the room,” he remembers. “Actually, that venue is where I'm showing this season, which is very full-circle.”

Step into a Wiederhoeft show—whether it’s in a garden, an old church, or an experimental theater club—and you can expect to be fully immersed in the story of the collection through the music, the casting, the lighting, the movement, and, of course, the clothes. To Steven Kolb, CEO of the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA), this exemplifies what makes New York Fashion Week so unique.

“The show should be magic. It should be joy. There should be an experience that someone has when they leave the show—yes, moved by the collection and inspired by the creative talent of the designer, but there needs to be something more than that,” he says. “Wiederhoeft doesn't have a Thom Browne budget, but he's got a Thom Browne way of thinking. He really sees this way of entertaining or moving the audience, so when they've spent 10, 15 minutes sitting there, they're feeling something. It's important for a designer to not just slap a logo on the back of a runway and have models walk, but to really give something special and know that it can be done.”

Much like in Sex and the City, New York City is so often a main character in the fashion week story. “The city itself is the venue,” Kolb says. “You can be Tommy Hilfiger on the old Staten Island Ferry that Pete Davidson and Colin Jost bought or Ralph Lauren out in the Hamptons… There's real use of the city. It’s really an extension of the creative thinking of the collection.”

In addition to taking advantage of scenic backdrops, brands will also pull from the many industries, experiences, and people the city has to offer. He adds: “New York is a theater town. New York is a music town. New York is a food town. American designers at New York Fashion Week have integrated this through shows.”

Brandon Maxwell has been known to feed guests Shake Shack at shows. Some of Wiederhoeft’s models this season are coming off the recent Broadway production of Illinoise or taking a night off from Cabaret at the KitKat Club. Both Susan Alexandra and Rachel Antonoff have hosted out-of-the-box NYFW presentations, like bagel parties, bat mitzvahs, and comedy shows (the former); and staged murder mysteries, science fairs, and musicals (the latter) to debut new collections. This season, they’re teaming up for what they’re calling the “Best in Show,” a Spring 2025 runway production featuring adoptable dogs from two New York City shelters, Animal Haven and Waggytail Rescue.

“Picture the Westminster Dog Show, then picture it taking place in heaven, with a dash of the fun parts of hell,” Antonoff says.

Korn adds: “Obviously, the ethos of Westminster is perfection and purebred, and there are so many things about it that are, while delightful, a little antithetical to where we come in. We want all the ruffians that nobody else wants, and we're celebrating that by giving them their catwalk debut.”

The two are working closely with both rescue organizations to “cast” dogs that would be comfortable in a chaotic fashion show environment. “We want everything to look amazing, but we cannot have dogs not feeling comfortable,” Antonoff assures, noting how important it is to her given that her own pet, Lafitte, “does not feel comfortable in many places.” (Lafitte and Korn’s dog, Pigeon, may make an appearance. It’s still TBD.)

As for how this collaboration came about, Antonoff says it was “bizarrely serendipitous, to the point that I'm still truly weirded out.” They were at a party, and the topic of their upcoming New York Fashion Week plans came up: “She said to me, ‘You're not going to believe what I'm doing for fashion week.’ I was like, ‘Oh my god, same.’ She was like, ‘We're doing a dog show with rescue dogs.’ And I was like, ‘...but same.’”

To combine forces seemed like the obvious conclusion—they work in different categories (Susan Alexandra in accessories, Rachel Antonoff in apparel), and people often connect the two brands organically. “We do the same things in our own universes,” Korn says. “Our customers are very similar. We have the same passion. It was really a serendipitous, gives-me-chills situation where it was like, ‘We have to do this together. There's just no other way.’ It's kind of amazing that it didn't happen sooner… like, ‘Oh, of course, that was all leading to the dog show.’”

It ties back to something Antonoff says she and Korn have always connected on, which is “how we both feel weird about our own places in this industry.”

“We are the underdogs,” Korn says, to which Antonoff adds: “We both have one eye, metaphorically speaking.”

In Europe, you might see the fashion week lineups by conglomerate-backed heavyweights. New York City has the big (and big-budget) players, but the little guy stands a fighting chance to make an impact, too.

“What's so great about New York Fashion Week is this kind of mix. We're really proud of the great diversity we have on the calendar, but also of this mix of these big brands—Coach, Michael Kors, Tory Burch, Ralph Lauren—and so many young designers like 5000 or Wiederhoeft,” Kolb says. “There's such a sense of a return to the big iconic drivers of Fashion Week and yet the discovery as well.”

Showing during fashion week is a massive financial undertaking, especially for emerging talent. Korn likens it to a wedding:  “It's so emotional—it's your work, it’s all the people closest to you and the people that you want to impress and the people that would maybe make or break your career. It's just so much money and so much pressure. It's so brief: 30 minutes max, and then it's all over.”

Melke has been doing fashion week for two years now,  and founder Emma Gage says she’s “really grappled with the challenge of it.” Having started the brand in 2020 without “huge connections or even just awareness,” she hosted her first presentation in February 2022 and has since staged proper runway shows, which she argues really helped get on people’s radars.

“It's a touchpoint for our community. It's a time for people to see our stuff in person and be a part of the new collection,” she says. “I would be lying if I didn't say that doing [fashion week] hadn't served me as a business owner in branding and marketing.” (For Spring 2025, she’s putting on her own version of a Scholastic Book Fair, complete with a “school picture” station, books, and novelty pencils.)

Designers often fund their fashion week events through sponsorships, which have, over the years, led to partnerships that range from the surprising (Luis de Javier x PornHub) to downright brilliant (Telfar x White Castle). “There's some beautiful irony to those types of consumer brands that can get engaged and fold into Fashion Week,” Kolb says. He argues it’s somewhat of a distinctively American approach: “We would sell our sister's wallet if somebody asked us to buy it. We’re very entrepreneurial, and we have that sales way about us… We have that mentality where we're good at buying and selling, and we're good at business. That doesn't compromise the craft or the creativity of what American fashion stands for, but we're darn sure going to sell the creativity and not feel bad about it.”

A word that often comes up when talking about what makes New York Fashion Week special is hospitality. Designers want people to feel at home and to have a good time during their allotted slot on the calendar.

“I want for people to come into the whole world while still having their own personalities in the space,” Gage says. “They can see the clothing, they can interact with it, they can interact with the people wearing it, but they can also step into this world of what Melke is.”

It all connects back to why she founded Melke in the first place: “When I started, the core essence was really embracing individualism and authenticity. It ties back to being from the Midwest—I wore a uniform growing up and was the kid that looked to fashion to escape. As I started showing, people would start talking to me about, ‘I felt so safe in your space. I really feel like I could be myself.’”

Antonoff and Korn share an ethos the former describes as “you can sit with us,” which guides their approach to New York Fashion Week.

“We specifically went for a bigger venue because we want to invite not just media people but our neighborhood dog walkers and our top customers. We want it to be something where a lot of different people can engage with it,” Korn says. “That's number one, and then putting on the best show these people have ever seen is number two.”

For Wiederhoeft, there’s just nowhere quite like New York.

“I have a lot of pride in being a New Yorker. I think it’s really cool that I get to engage in New York Fashion Week because it’s historically really interesting and, also, I fucking heart NY,” he says. “For so much of my collection, especially this one, I spend a lot of time walking at night, sometimes three or four hours. New York is not just my home, but it's also a huge part of my brand.”

Lead Image: Maria Drametenos

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