NY Fashion Week Bigger Than Ever

After spending 17 years under large tents in Manhattan’s Bryant Park, the hub of New York Fashion Week has moved to a new, larger venue: Lincoln Center’s Damrosch Park. The biannual event showcases fashion lines from the biggest designers in the business, and also helps promote Friday’s Fashion’s Night Out—a multicity shop-a-thon that Vogue Editor Anna Wintour spearheaded last year. This year, over 1,000 stores in New York City will stay open Friday until 11 p.m., with many featuring celebrity-attended in-store events and deejays, all to encourage recession-wary customers to whip out their wallets. “There's a new frugality going on,” said David Wolfe, creative director of the Doneger Group, a leading source of global trends in fashion. “Designers are struggling with the price of new materials and giving value—there's going to be sticker shock.” However, many in the fashion industry are excited by the venue upgrade. Designer Tracy Reese believes the bigger venue will “rejuvenate” the industry, adding, “There is such great energy surrounding the change that is encouraging creativity and ingenuity.”