Last month it was announced that a female fashion designer had topped *Management Today'*s list of the 100 most powerful entrepreneur's in the UK. No, it wasn't Stella McCartney - she who had Kate Moss walk in her graduate show almost 20 years ago and has designed hit-after-hit every season since. Nor Phoebe Philo, who has made stuffy old brand Celine into the best reason to ever drop a grand on a jumper. It was Victoria Beckham, former Spice Girl, one-time leader of the rhinestone encrusted WAGs, and now designer of the luxury fashion label that is wiping the floor with the competition to the tune of £30 million.
The fact that a celebrity, and a not even particularly credible celebrity at that, is able to command such an incredible turnover is the subject of Hijacking the Runway: How Celebrities Are Stealing The Spotlight From Fashion Designers, a new book by long-time Wall Street Journal style contributor, Teri Agins. 'When the red carpet really took off in the 90's, designers like Giorgio Armani and Valentino were bagging all the stars to wear their clothes, so they became huge celebrity names in their own right,' Agins tells The Debrief from her home in New York. Propelled further by the likes of fashion show-ponies Tom Ford and Karl Lagerfeld, the notion of a designer as celebrity grew even stronger. As a result, it's not super surprising that the idea could eventually be flipped to create the celebrity as designer.
So should we be taking Victoria Beckham and the Olsen twins seriously then? Yes, according to Agins. 'They're not just phoning it in, this is not just some hobby, this is their job,' she explains. 'Victoria Beckham is a mother of four children and a fashion designer and that's just what she does. The Olsens ended their acting career when they became adults, so they launched their own fashion label. The bottom line: they get up every day and they go to work.'
Even more fascinating though, is Agins' examination of the number of hugely profitable stars who are trumping even those two luxury conquerers without actually doing that much. One-time professional denim shorts-wearer and the only girl to ever be truly confused by a can of tuna, Jessica Simpson, has a fashion empire that is reportedly worth over $1billion. And she hasn't even been on television for almost a decade.
'Jessica Simpson became known as the woman who had a couple of kids, gained a lot of weight and got dumped by that football quarterback, so her plight is just the same as of an ordinary woman. People are rooting for her,' Agins explains of her success selling fashion to a mass audience. 'She's a cute blonde, she was pretty clean, and all that made her very accessible to people.' In Simpson's case, the familiarity reeled people in and the fact that people liked the product, even as the novelty of her name may have worn off, kept people coming back. 'I own a couple of pairs of her shoes, and they're good!' laughs Agins.
READ MORE: Is This Paris Hilton In The Noughties Or Now? Turns Out It's Surprisingly Hard To Tell
The other huge celebrity fashion success story is Paris Hilton. Few style commentators would even dream of holding her up as an icon, even if pink was popular that season, but there's no doubt she's bankable. 'She's got 660 stores in the middle east and Asia where she sells handbags,' explains Akins. 'Who would remember the look or the shape of a Paris Hilton handbag? I've never even seen one, but women in 40 countries are buying them and Paris Hilton has a huge fashion footprint outside the US.'
Who would remember the look or the shape of a Paris Hilton handbag? I've never even seen one, but women in 40 countries are buying them
While The Olsens and Victoria Beckham are very much the driving forces of their brands' DNAs, researching her book Agins found that nobody believes or even cares if celebrities like Paris Hilton or Jessica Simpson design clothes. Talking to girls queueing to get into a New York Macy's store where some Kardashians were appearing to hawk their latest line of dresses, she discovered that 'people were totally seduced, and they couldn't pinpoint what by, but they were fully convinced that they were getting some kind of added value because of the Kardashian name.'
Not that sale-by-association is anything new when it comes to fashion. 'That's basically the same as what traditional designers have always wanted people to think about their clothes,' Agins says. 'They want you to say, I relate to this item of clothing because this designer is cool or good or whatever. It shows the impact of marketing.'
This power of association also explains why the celebrity collaboration is a big deal, from Madonna's hook-up with H&M back in 2007 to the big-ticket sales-winner Topshop pulled out of the bag recently with the announcement that they will play host to Beyonce's line of sportswear next year. That particular mega-star might not have had as much fashion success as you'd expect in the past, Knowles-led House of Dereon being something of a flop, because, Agins suggests, 'she's other-worldly and I think people are intimidated by her. They love her as an entertainer, but they don't look to her as someone they can relate to'. Match Beyonce up with Topshop, the high-street's gate-way drug into the upper echelons of style, though and it looks likely to be quite a different story.
READ MORE: In Which We Predict What Beyonce And Topshop's New Sportswear Brand Will Look Like
As far as retailers are concerned, a collaboration is win, win, no matter how big the name. 'It gets a lot of young people into the store, who will ideally buy something else while they're there, and then the next season, there's a new celebrity with a collection,' Agins says.
In a climate where celebrities cannot expect 'those $20,000,000 pay days that Cameron Diaz and Jennifer Lopez used to get', Agins notes that 'these people are having to diversify and find other ways to monetise being famous'. Halle Berry is about to launch a lingerie line, Gwyneth Paltrow's GOOP is branching beyond whole grains and into apparel, and it's only time before the latest to the woman-as-brand gang starts flaking off her own skin and selling the translucent silvery fragments as Etsy-style necklace pendants.
Chanel better be on the look-out, because Victoria Beckham, it seems, will not be the last of the red carpet crowd to come knocking on its door.
Picture: Getty
Like this? You might also be interested in...
A Few Autumn Style Tricks That Don't Involve Buying Anything
How You And Your Best Mate Can Totally Get Away With Wearing The Same Thing
Follow Laura on Twitter @laurafleur
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.