LITTLE ROCK — Rodarte’s collection for Target launched recently, which for die-hard fashion lovers is shopping nirvana. Now anyone can own a piece of the label’s sunshine-meetsgoth aesthetic, with spidery lace sweaters and stockings, tulle blouses and slip dresses priced at $9.99 to $79.99, instead of the four figures that Rodarte’s clothes typically command.
To get the word out, designers Kate and Laura Mulleavy didn’t tap red-carpet fans Reese Witherspoon or Kirsten Dunst, or vintage guru Cameron Silver, who helped put them on the fashion map. They didn’t go to Vogue, or any other glossy magazine that has championed their collections, which have been inspired by thingsas disparate as horror movies and California condors.
Instead, they turned to Tavi Gevinson, a 13-year-old blogger from the suburbs of Chicago, to star in a behindthe-scenes video about the line on the Target Web site.
A self-described “dork that sits inside all day wearing awkward jackets and pretty hats, scatters black petals on [Comme des Garcons founder] Rei Kawakubo’s doorsteps and serenades her in rap,” Tavi launched her Style Rookie blog in March 2008. In her early posts, it was refreshing to read about someone who thought of the world as her costume box, who wore guitar straps as belts, used “thrifting” as a verb and “Rodarte-slashed” her secondhand sweaters because she couldn’t have the real thing.
Her runway critiques were so thoughtful that people assumed she was a fake. Then, she took time off from school to attend New York Fashion Week in September, chaperoned by her father, getting her picture snapped as she sat front row at shows. The same month, she landed on the cover of Pop magazine and was featured in the pages ofLove magazine, interviewed by Pixie Geldof. In November, she sat with the Mulleavys, designer Hedi Slimane and Pop editor Dasha Zhukova atthe Museum of Contemporary Art’s 25th anniversary gala in Los Angeles. The blogger wore a borrowed Rodarte dress and sweater so expensive they are out of reach for most designer customers.
By year’s end, Tavi had penned a column about the spring 2010 runway shows for the January issue of Harper’s Bazaar, on newsstands now. She has met Marc Jacobs and Yohji Yamamoto, traveled to Japan to visit Kawakubo’s studio, and been gifted with designer clothes months before the collections land in stores.
For the Rodarte for Target video, the pint-size prodigy was filmed backstage at the Rodarte runway show, interviewing bold-facers such as Elijah Wood and Cecilia Dean.
In just one year, Tavi (and a host of other bloggers) went from obscurity to celebrity, and Rodarte went from winner of the Council of Fashion Designers of America’s Emerging Womenswear Designer of the Year Award to winner of the Womenswear Designer of the Year Award.
Northwest Profile, Pages 41 on 12/27/2009