CFDA member and co-founder of fashion label Proenza Schouler, Jack McCollough is in the eye (and broken nose) of an unfortunate press storm following an incident with actor Kiefer Sutherland at a Costume Gala afterparty in NYC last week. The 24 star headbutted the designer after, according to Sutherland, McCollough allegedly pushed Brooke Shields (also in attendance) and failed to apologize. McCollough, on the other hand, maintains that the attack was entirely unprovoked and has filed as assault charge against Sutherland. Meanwhile, Shields has failed to comment other than to say that she is a friend of both and that she “regrets this unfortunate situation.” Sutherland is on probation for a drunk-driving conviction in Los Angeles; whether or not the actor will face jail time as a result of the incident remains to be seen.
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A fight that likewise sprouted last week in conjunction with the Costume Gala is the clash between French designer Azzedine Alaia and Vogue editrix Anna Wintour. This head-to-head, however, has roots that stretch as far back as 15 years ago. Alaia, a sartorial legend who refuses to advertise, has long made reference to his annoyance over being consistently neglected when it comes to Wintour’s influential fashion magazine. But, last week was the icing on Alaia’s anti-Anna cake: He boycotted the Met Gala as a result of his exclusion from the Model as Muse exhibition (for which he blames Wintour), despite Alaia’s longtime relationships with supermodels like Naomi Campbell (who also sat out the Gala in protest, along with fellow supermodel Stephanie Seymour). “[Wintour] behaves like a dictator and everyone is terrified of her… but I’m not scared of her or anyone,” Alaia told Women’s Wear Daily. Wintour, not surprisingly, has remained relatively mum regarding the situation. Whatever follows, don’t expect Alaia’s clothes to appear in Vogue’s pages any time soon.
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One of the most notorious rivalries in fashion history took place between icons Yves Saint Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld. The conflict, which perhaps first sparked in 1954, when Saint Laurent beat Lagerfeld for the title of the next great couturier from the International Wool Secretariat, spanned decades. The feud, which was fully ignited during the glamour-fueled 1970s, even inspired its own tome, a book released in 2006 called The Beautiful Fall, which rumor has it Lagerfeld attempted to keep from being published. The competition between the two was so fierce that, as a Radar headline proclaimed in response to Saint Laurent’s death in 2008, only Saint Laurent’s mortality could mark the end of this feud.
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Naomi Campbell’s anger-management issues are well-known beyond the walls of the fashion world; the English supermodel has been arrested on more than one occasion. Back in 2000, Campbell pleaded guilty to assaulting her then-assistant Georgina Galanis with a telephone and threatening to throw her out of a moving car. Five years later, she was accused of slapping her assistant at the time, Amanda Brack, and assaulting her with a BlackBerry. And, in her third assault incident involving a phone, in 2006 Campbell was arrested for allegedly hitting her housekeeper with a jewel-covered cellphone. Campbell’s most recent brush with the law took place at Heathrow Airport when she allegedly assaulted a constable; the supermodel has subsequently been banned worldwide from British Airways. As for industry feuds, Campbell’s had those, too. Model-turned-TV host Tyra Banks famously called Campbell out on bad behavior on her namesake talk show, citing Campbell’s attempts to ruin Banks’ modeling career.
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Giorgio Armani and Dolce & Gabbana’s inter-designer warfare, which broke out in January of this year, was set off by one of the oldest causes in fashion history: plagiarism. Two days after D&G’s menswear show in Milan this past January, Armani sent a pair of quilted silk pants down the runway that mimicked a design seen on the aforementioned Italian designers’ catwalk. But, according to Armani, it was D&G who stole his design, not the other way around. Following some pretty severe comments from both camps (Armani said, “Now they copy, later they will learn,” accusing D&G of copying the trousers from his last collection, to which D&G responded, “we stopped seeing his fashion shows years ago.”), the sartorial storm has since quieted. But, in true fashion form, don’t expect either side to let go of the grudge any time soon.
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Like all trends, fashion feuds tend to recycle rows from the past. As the hostility mounts between Azzedine Alaia and Anna Wintour today, a similar feud took place between designer Oleg Cassini and Vogue’s European-editor-at-large Hamish Bowles nearly a decade ago. Cassini, who dressed fashion icon and former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy publicly accused Bowles of having snubbed him when it came to the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s 2001 exhibition, “Jackie’s White House Years.” Bowles, a protégé of both legend Diana Vreeland and Wintour, was acting as guest curator for the event. But, unlike Alaia and Wintour, the bad blood between Cassini and Bowles was complicated by the fact that Cassini has repeatedly been accused of having copied French couturiers.
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In her lifetime, Coco Chanel didn’t exactly garner a reputation for kindness. In fact, at times the legendary French designer could be downright conniving and cruel. And she was especially so toward Elsa Schiaparelli, the Italian artist and fashion designer (whose friends included Jean Cocteau and Salvador Dali) for whom Chanel harbored a special spite. “Chanel… once ‘accidentally’ set Schiaparelli on fire, pushing her into a candle arrangement and setting her dress alight,” The New York Times wrote in 2003. In the same vein as Yves Saint Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld’s rivalry, much of acrimony that existed between the two designers was the result of their simultaneous preeminence within the industry.
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John Fairchild, the powerful publisher of Women’s Wear Daily from 1960 to 1996, was so harsh with his treatment of certain designers that he earned the nickname: John “Un”Fairchild. While Fairchild famously ignited verbal sparring fests with designers from Hubert de Givenchy and Cristobal Balenciaga, to Perry Ellis and Bill Blass, few of the feuds became as infamous as that with Geoffrey Beene. Fairchild famously told W that he refused to cover the designer because he was “ extremely difficult.” And, it seems that this war is one that has continued even after Beene’s death. WWD continued to overlook Beene’s new designer following the designer’s death—a decision one writer chalked up to Fairchild’s elephant-like “ long, long memory.”
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Though not as public as Naomi Campbell and Tyra’s feud, Elle Macpherson and Heidi Klum have spouted some supermodel slights against one another in the past. And the catwalk catfight came about all because of a nickname. Back in 2006, Klum launched a lingerie collection under the Victoria Secret umbrella called The Body, claiming “they call me ‘The Body,’ and now I have a bra named after me,” in the ad-campaign video. However, according to Macpherson, nine years Klum’s senior, she’s been the bearer of the nickname "The Body" for two decades. Considering both supermodels have launched successful side careers and are faring just fine, perhaps they can share?
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One of the few instances of actual physical violence in recent fashion history (save for Sutherland and McCollough’s scuffle) was a scuffle between designer Tommy Hilfiger and Guns ‘n’ Roses’ front man Axl Rose at nightclub Plumm in NYC back in 2006. Hilfiger allegedly socked Rose in an effort to defend the honor of his adopted brother Michael H. (who has his own eponymous denim line), whose ex-wife had recently taken up with Rose. And, believe it or not, Hilfiger may have not known who Rose was when he attacked him. While some press items reporting the outburst temporarily disappeared shortly after the occurrence, the designer vs. rocker brawl isn’t one the fashion industry will soon forget.
Stuart Ramson / AP Photo; Alfredo Rocha, WireImage / Getty Images
