In New York’s fashion circuit, there is no obvious genius in sight

That’s the question that perennially fuels the rave of creativity, stitchery and circus nerves that is the New York Fashion Week now on the catwalk. It’s the tease that attracts designers, buyers, editors, photographers, stylists, models, bookers, trend forecasters, sharp-tongued blogosphere sibyls and strung-out accountants. It’s the dream we all dream.

The United States remains the world’s largest market for fashion, and New York is the centre of the global fashion image machine. The assembly line keeps cranking; the maw must be fed. But who will do it? What’s immediately apparent is that while fashion is healthily supplied with journeymen, there is no obvious genius in sight.

This is not to suggest that New York is suffering from talent shortfall. There’s the team of Proenza Schouler, who make middle-of-the-road design seem indie and cool. There are pop cultural gadflies like Isaac Mizrahi, and chaste classicists like Francisco Costa at Calvin Klein. We have elder statesmen Oscar de la Renta and Ralph Lauren. And we have Miguel Adrover, the man who captured the imagination of the fashion establishment with clothes made from a recycled mattress and Yankees caps.

Still, there is no world-beater, no one to replace Yves Saint Laurent, who died in June and seemingly took with him a genius for draping his designs to suit the mood of his time. Like it or not, fashion has become something larger, a viral cultural force that sometimes seems only incidentally concerned with clothes. Yet, as in film, music and other arts, consumers have wearied of big names and labels. They are bored with diktats, with taste legislated by self-appointed “experts” and with camphor-scented archaisms like “stars”. There’s a do-it-yourself ethos prevalent among young consumers: a 12-year-old with a MySpace page and access to digital “mood boards” or electronic makeover applications (girltech.com) can become an instant authority on fashion. So is there a need for the dictators of the front row?
“I really never understood the next big thing,” said Kim Hastreiter, an editor of Paper magazine. “How can someone be a genius this season and next season they’re not?”

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