Wouldn’t surprise me, their pettiness knows no limits.
LOS ANGELES – “Honored to see First Lady Michelle Obama wearing our Spring 2013 dress at the final presidential debate,” boasted the Twitter account of fashion label Thom Browne soon after Monday night’s debate. Yet over at the Twitter account of OscarPRGirl, the official publicist for Oscar de la Renta, not a word was uttered about the fact that Ann Romney had donned a dark teal dress from the designer’s collection.
But that’s nothing new.
Designers, stylists and fashion industry publicists routinely clamor to outfit First Lady Michelle Obama, with press releases flying out the door any time she sports a certain brand. Fashion publications praise her designer selections and several books have been published that are solely devoted to analyzing her style and taste.
However, the fashion world has remained particularly quiet on the Ann Romney fashion front, with many questioning whether or not outspoken Obama supporter Anna Wintour is keeping stylists and designers away, silently threatening their standing should they endeavor to promote their outfitting of the wife of a Republican presidential hopeful.
Over the past year, the Vogue matriarch – who many say has enough power to make or break fashion careers – has become one of President Obama’s leading financiers. Wintour has raised over half a million dollars for the incumbent, hosted numerous lavish dinners in his name and even enlisted designer pals like Marc Jacobs and Thakoon Panichgul to design pro-Obama products.
“Wintour’s connections and influence in Hollywood, fashion, and society aren’t merely pretty, shiny things to have around; they have become vital to the financial success of the campaign,” wrote Noreen Malone in the November edition of The New Republic. “She is in search of something more than a victory in November; she wants politics to take fashion seriously.”
And according to fashion industry pros we talked to, no one wants to risk annoying Wintour.