The most googled fashion brand of 2018, headquartered in nearby Vernon, can approximate a Kardashian look faster than you can say Chicago West. Fashion Nova, a fast-fashion favorite among celebrities like Cardi B and a slew of beauty and fashion influencers on Instagram, is making headlines this week after advertising a knock-off of a dress Kim Kardashian West wore less than 24 hours before.
On February 17, Kardashian West accompanied hairdresser and friend Chris Appleton to the fifth Annual Hollywood Beauty Awards, donning a vintage gown from Thierry Mugler’s Spring/Summer ’98 collection. The next day, Fashion Nova was already advertising to customers to sign up for a waiting list to get their paws on the latest Kardashian West facsimile. And as expected, the internet went wild.
Diet Prada (@diet_prada), an Instagram account known as the fashion industry’s watchdog, posted a side-by-side of Kardashian West and a Fashion Nova model’s Instagram Story (@the_jodiejoe) featuring the dress in question. The caption on Diet Prada’s post read, “[…]house model Yodit Yemane may or may not have accidentally leaked a story 2.5 hours earlier of photo options from her shoot featuring the Mugler replica.”
According to Diet Prada, the file names on the Fashion Nova shots were even labeled “Kim’s Dress” and while promoting it, the dress was being called “Winning Beauty Cut Out Gown” (read: Hollywood Beauty Awards). They posed the question, “Did Fashion Nova whip up the dress overnight in their L.A. atelier after seeing Kim in it or is she peddling her vintage finds to mass retailers ahead of debuting them for a calculated, timely release?”
Amid the sudden swirl of suspicion, Kardashian West took to Twitter and Instagram to set the record straight (and inadvertently set herself up for even more trolling). But this wasn’t the first time Fashion Nova mimicked a Kardashian sister’s look. In 2018, the fast fashion company recreated a neon pink dress Kim wore to her sister Kylie Jenner’s birthday party (they also recreated the sequin pink jumpsuit Jenner wore to her own party).
“It’s devastating to see these fashion companies rip off designs that have taken the blood, sweat and tears of true designers who have put their all into their own original ideas,” Kim began her thread of tweets. “I’ve watched these companies profit off my husband’s work for years and now that it’s also affecting designers who have been so generous to give me access to their beautiful works, I can no longer sit silent.”
Bottom line, she tweeted: “Don’t believe everything you read and see online. I don’t have any relationships with these sites. I’m not leaking my looks to anyone, and I don’t support what these companies are doing.”
And while Kim may not personally be working with these sites, other members of the Kardashian clan have in the past. Kylie Jenner started working with Fashion Nova back in 2016; a single post from her on Instagram can translate to $50,000 in sales, according to Fashion Nova CEO Richard Saghian. Even the Kardashian matriarch, Kris Jenner, has gotten her slice of the pie, posing back in October 2018 in a Fashion Nova dress.
My relationships with designers are very important to me. It’s taken me over a decade to build them and I have a huge amount of respect for the amount of work that they put into bringing their ideas to life.
— Kim Kardashian West (@KimKardashian) February 19, 2019
I often plan for weeks, sometimes months, and even a year in advance, and I’m grateful for every fashion moment those designers and their dresses have helped me create.
— Kim Kardashian West (@KimKardashian) February 19, 2019
When asked to comment about their process in recreating looks worn by celebrities and about the Kardashian West controversy, Fashion Nova gave Los Angeles this statement: “Fashion Nova is an ultra-fast fashion brand that is capable of executing design within hours and believes in fairness in pricing. We strive to offer our customers affordable leading trends. We respect the fashion community and work with a variety of vendors, designers, influencers and celebrities to keep our style offering fresh and relevant. Kim Kardashian West is one of the top fashion icons in the world that our customers draw inspiration from. However, we have not worked with Kim Kardashian West directly on any of her projects but have been driven by her influential style.”
According to an interview with Fashion Nova CEO Richard Saghian on WWD, the fast-fashion company is able to produce clothing faster than other companies “because they partner with L.A.-based manufacturers, which means they can have samples made within 24 hours of creating the concept.” Then, after 48 hours, the items are ready to be shot on models and the pieces are ready about one or two weeks after that. (It seems like they worked overtime on the mock-Thierry Mugler gown modeled after Kardashian West’s.)
Kardashian West is suing another fast fashion site, Missguided, for “using her name and likeness” and “tricking consumers into thinking she works with Missguided,” according to Hollywood Reporter.
Kardashian West has also taken down photos on her Instagram of her wearing the Thierry Mugler dress, and the knock-off is currently nowhere to be found on Fashion Nova’s website.
RELATED: People Shelled out $1.7k to Take a Selfie With Kim Kardashian West
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The post The Internet Thinks Kim Kardashian Is Leaking Her High-Fashion Looks to Fast-Fashion Brands appeared first on Los Angeles Magazine.