A year ago, I found myself in bed with Kylie Jenner. OK, technically it was on rather than in – and it wasn’t just us on the pink satin sheets. No, the bed was one of many where guests were invited to take their seat ahead of Acne Studio’s 10th anniversary S/S ’23 show – and I was on Kylie’s. But what was more surprising than being in-or-on a bed with Kylie was to see her at that show at all. The alignment felt, well, strange. Acne, the edgy, art-inclined Swedes; Kylie, the baby billionaire, all pout and contouring. The cool vs the commercial. Fast-forward to today and this odd couple makes perfect sense.
When Kylie’s Acne campaign was released last month – the make-up mogul smeared in grease and grime, in ultra-baggy unisex jeans, topless or with a doppelgänger in tow – she looked every inch the cool Acne girl. She also looked a bit like she was nudging into Kim’s territory. Kim has long been the Kardashians’ resident Serious Fashionista™. Kendall’s up there too, literally, on the runway. They are all powerful product shifters, formidable consumers – and creators. But while nobody was looking, the junior Jenner has snuck up and made a play for the style crown. That Acne campaign might have made Kylie’s tastemaker status official, but it’s been brewing for a while. Those S/S ’23 shows last September – of which Acne was just one she attended – acted as her fashion ‘coming out’.
Another surprising look? The grandad Y-fronts, vest and floor-sweeping coat combo she wore on the FROW at Loewe. January 2023’s couture week sealed her new power position. In that viral Schiaparelli lion head, Kylie became the name of Paris once more. Now with fashion month in full swing she’s at it again; in archival Prada in Milan or fresh-off-the-runway Sportmax. So she has money and access, so what? Whether or not that equates to taste is a different conversation, but she is expressing a degree of autonomy with her choices, not least supporting young and independent designers like Dilara Findikoglu.
‘We love working with Kylie. She’s an icon of her generation and incredibly supportive of up-and-coming brands and designers,’ Coperni’s Sébastien Meyer and Arnaud Vaillant tell me. ‘Her professionalism is outstanding, and she always wants to explore new things and projects, which is something we admire about her.’
She knew before the rest of the world that the brand was major. Brands have long courted Kylie for her commercial clout (400 million followers = unparalleled influence), the difference now is the type of brands that are courting her. But why? I suspect there is a degree of novelty. She is familiar and yet it still feels unexpected to see her transported to a serious fashion sphere (Kim’s transition from against-all-odds infiltrator to genuine insider was completed long ago).
And a new boyfriend doesn’t harm, especially when he’s as well dressed as Timothée Chalamet (with whom Kylie was seen at the US Open tennis last month). Yes, because the giddiness of a new relationship re-energises everything we do (getting dressed as much as getting undressed, people). Also, although Travis Scott knew his way around a great ’fit, Chalamet occupies an alt, cerebral fashion sphere. His fondness for Haider Ackermann – who the couple dined with during NYFW – is already echoing in Kylie. She wore one of Ackermann’s Jean Paul Gaultier couture creations to the Met Gala this year. Simultaneously, in the wake of Kim’s (blameless!) proximity to Kanye and Balenciaga-shaped scandals, she seems to have taken her foot off the gas a bit. It’s not that her influence has shrunk so much as the spotlight has continued to grow and Kylie is ready to step up.
The chameleonic joy with which she dresses (prim for Dolce, pantless for Prada, all in a week’s work) is fun to watch. As she said in the season two finale of The Kardashians, ‘I am a mom but I also am still so young. These are the years that I’m supposed to be naked everywhere in the streets. Titties out. Ass out. F**k, yeah!’ (Another thing about Kylie? She is funny. And smart. Obviously she isn’t ‘self-made’ but she has made something of herself, which is aspirational in the entirely unrelatable Kardashian context.)
As she gets older and more confident, we're seeing more and more of her "f*ck, yeah!" approach to fashion
As she gets older and more confident we’re seeing more and more of her ‘f**k, yeah!’ approach to fashion. The super desirable vintage pieces? She does that (Mugler! Comme! Gaultier! Alaïa! Margiela!). A divining-rod scent for the pieces and brands everyone is going to want? That too; she knew Coperni was a thing before everyone else did. The strange, quirky little touches? Trust me when I tell you that you’ll soon be weighing up white tights, just as Kylie wore earlier this month. She’s been there all along, we’re only just noticing her. F**k, yeah!