The Fate and Fortunes of the Fashion-Adjacent Economy

This was a good thing, too, for photographers who had tired of the circuslike atmosphere outside shows, where some people show up uninvited, in their most attention-grabbing outfits, just for the chance to be snapped by someone with a big Instagram following.

In Paris in October, Mr. Hunter said, “a couple of us would just walk the streets and capture people who weren’t part of fashion week, instead of capturing people outside the show who have just been dressed head to toe by the brand.”

Acielle Tanbetova of Style du Monde said the smaller crowds and fewer photographers “reminded me of my early days as a street-style photographer, in 2008.”

Still, some publications were wary of highlighting this kind of work in 2020. “Magazines didn’t want to cover street style, to promote traveling in a pandemic, which is obviously understandable,” said Asia Typek, a photographer in Warsaw who has shot for Porter and Dior. Some outlets wanted only photos of people wearing masks; others wanted only people without masks.

With social distancing rules in place, competition was also tighter for jobs inside the show sites. Ms. Tanbetova mostly shoots backstage at shows now, but this fall, only three or four photographers were given this kind of access, compared to the dozens normally hired to shoot backstage. (Ms. Tanbetova said she was the only backstage photographer at Chanel this season.)

Getting through the summer and fall without a full fashion calendar — or the ability to freely travel internationally — hurt many photographers financially. Some were able to find a steady source of income in licensing old photos to international magazines, for example, but others had to focus on booking more traditional jobs, like editorial work or advertisements, to supplement lost fashion week revenue. But the pandemic slashed budgets for those projects, too.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/21/style/the-fate-and-fortunes-of-the-fashion-adjacent-economy.html