By Nadine Kam

Bravo
Rachel Zoe, left, and her assistants Brad and Taylor.

The latest must-see TV for the fashion set, especially anyone with stylist ambitions, is Bravo’s “The Rachel Zoe Project” that airs Tuesday nights.

I know, I know, she’s the stylist so many seem to hate and she’s an easy target with her high-profile Hollywood glam-boho style, and all the celeb dressing, in her own image. I just read where a New York Times reporter reviewing the show said Rachel is “a pox on humanity—exploiting an aesthetic of dissipation, invading our collective consciousness and spraying it with dummy dust.”

Them’s pretty strong words, but my feeling is that the woman deserves a lot of respect because styling is tough work. It’s extremely stressful to have the responsibility to both client and for her, A-list designers. There’s been a lot of political talk lately about putting lipstick on pigs, and the fashion equivalent is putting the wrong designs on the wrong bodies. Major designers are very careful about their image and few people are able to earn the trust of both clients and the designers, which makes me think there’s a lot of sour grapes in the criticism out there.

One legit piece of criticism is the sameness of the red carpet because of stylists’ fear of a misstep. But consider the celebrity client. They’re not out to challenge anyone with their fashion sense. Their only concern is looking pretty, and for the vast majority of the American audience, pretty and extravagant is as good as it gets.

Rachel Zoe inspects some of the water damage on Episode 2. Wonder how the designers reacted on seeing the episode.

What’s funny is her deadpan reaction to the most dire circumstances. On last night’s episode, her studio flooded and thousands of dollars worth of designer gowns were sitting with their hems in water and colors running. A lot of sh** happens in styling and you try to prevent it and cope as much as possible without freaking out, which gets you nowhere.

After watching only two episodes, I could relate to a lot of things happening on the show. Like when FedEx boxes of clothing didn’t arrive from New York. Working on fashion from Hawaii is an even bigger disadvantage than her working from L.A. where there is a lot available within the city. I’ve worked on shoots where dresses have had to be FedEx’d in one day, photographed the next and shipped back immediately after the last photo is taken. When you’re dealing with samples, the companies need to keep the clothes moving from city to city, one publication to the next.

Rachel’s assistants are made to look like they don’t get along and have different work styles, so it amused me that Rachel made the distinction of Brad’s coming from an editorial background, which tends to be more theoretical than a stylist’s hands-on, visual and logistical approach.

A long time ago, I noted how fashion journalists tend to look so schlumpy compared to the people they cover. One stylist reassured, “That’s OK Nadine, we know writers come from a more intellectual perspective.”

Gina Lambert photo
Photographing Dior in the dark by generator-powered light. I’m adjusting our model Kate Schuette’s dress for the October/November issue of HI Luxury. The dress is a sample flown in from New York. Don’t worry, she’s lying on a tarp, which also made it harder to move her once she was positioned.

Hmmm. I guess so. I admit I have a stronger affinity to ideas than visual reality, but having covered fashion for so long, the two halves of my brain are converging. My job requires that I play the part of stylist some of the time, which I find to be much more stressful than writing, as well as back-breaking labor.

Last week I was on vacation but it took the full week to wrangle clothing and jewelry and move it from stores to location and back for our sister publication, HI Luxury. I fashioned a pair of gloves while sitting in my car just before the shoot because face it, you’re not always going to find all the props you need at retail.

Anyway, “The Rachel Zoe Project” does capture many of the real, non-glam aspects of the business, and I can’t wait to see Rachel’s experiences at Fashion Week next week. I also adore her husband Rodger, who seems to be very patient and accommodating in spite of all the drama in the household. Every girl needs a Rodger.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 17th, 2008 at 3:28 pm and is filed under People, media, Entertainment, Random thoughts, Obsessions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.