Is This The Most Bizarre Last-Minute Fashion Show Request Ever?

When said out loud, "Fashion Week" has a double meaning — and for anyone who's ever been a part of all the action, feeling weak is not only par for the course, it's often the reason we love fashion to begin with. So, in honor of the moments of chaos, beauty, and excitement that made us feel weak, we present My Fashion Week-ness: a compilation of accounts from some of the industry's biggest players. They're spilling their most memorable stories from Fashion Weeks gone by, and the ones that keep them coming back for more. If you've never heard of mega-editor Anne Slowey before, let us make your acquaintance: She's been the fashion news director of Elle longer than R29 has been alive; she hosted her own reality show called Stylista (produced by none other than Tyra Banks, of course); and, interesting enough, she's saved the day at some of the most elaborate fashion shows to date. Slowey remembers one, in particular, like it was yesterday. It was the '90s, and she was working behind the scenes at the annual AIDS Project Los Angeles fashion show at the Hollywood Bowl. And, compared with how fashion shows are normally carried out, the agenda didn't go exactly as planned (not once, but twice). We'll let her tell the rest: "For AIDS Project Los Angeles’ 1993 fashion show at the Hollywood Bowl, I not only rejected Cameron Diaz out of hand as too wan to be one of the show’s 212 models, but just before showtime, 'Marky' Mark Wahlberg — in his Calvin briefs — rapped at me about how he wasn’t quite ready for the show to begin. I had to radio for help. "At the same event the following year, after honoree Isaac Mizrahi decided at the last minute that he wanted a dozen male models in white tights and angel wings to fly in on high-wire attachments for the finale, I found myself hurtling 100 miles per hour in a van stuffed with wings from the Universal Studios costume shop (I’d found them stored behind the monkey costumes from The Wizard of Oz), Hole’s 'Doll Parts' blaring on the radio, leaving a trail of feathers fluttering down the 101 [freeway]. I knew in that moment that I was the only person on the planet ever to have lived through this specific adventure. From that point on, I rarely doubted my decision to work in this business. Simply put, I just didn’t think I could ever have as much fun doing anything else."

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