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Tavi, a 13-Year-Old Blogger, Is the Fashion World's Latest Obsession. Something Wrong With This Picture?

by Katie Hintz-Zambrano (Subscribe to Katie Hintz-Zambrano's posts)
Posted Feb 8th 2010 at 10:41AM  
209 Comments
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tavi fron row givenchy fashion show paris haure couture

Tavi perched front row at Givenchy during the haute couture shows in Paris. Photo: Eric Ryan, Getty Images

With New York Fashion Week just a few days away, we thought we'd catch any stragglers up to speed on who will likely be one of the most photographed "ladies" (perhaps an overstatement) at the shows: 13-year-old blogger Tavi Gevinson.

While the sartorial savvy have known about this pint-sized Chicago-residing fashion follower since she launched her "Style Rookie" blog in March 2008, Tavi mania has recently reached fever pitch, with 29,000 daily visitors (according to The Chicago Tribune) flocking to her site to read her fawning over high end designers and their collections.

This frenzy is in no small part due to Harper's Bazaar appointing Tavi its youngest columnist to date, edgy British magazines Pop and Love over-dressing her to appear on their respective covers and Target tapping the (just old enough to qualify as a teen) flavor of the month to host a video guide of the Rodarte for Target collaboration alongside her "friends," designers Kate and Laura Mulleavy.

Although, we're pretty sure junior high is back in session, Tavi could even be found sitting front row (with her father) at the recent haute couture shows in Paris, blogging for Pop and ticking off fellow attendees -- whose views were obstructed by her giant bow-adorned hat (a gift from famed milliner Stephen Jones, naturally) -- at Armani Privé.

Perhaps it's because the now grayish-blue haired girl has fashion heavyweights singing her praises, was "guest of honor" at a Comme des Garçons party in Tokyo and receives high end fashion freebies left and right that her critics have grown in number.

"It sums up the Haters thing altogether," Tavi writes on her blog of the bow hat incident.

"It is impossible for EVERYONE to be pleased with EVERYTHING. If I wore leather and studs no one would complain, and I'm not sorry for bringing a bit of color into the room. Haters gonna hate..."

Tavi also doesn't sound very sorry about her headpiece blocking others from seeing the Armani show, as she recently told The Fashion Informer that one of her favorite fashion week memories was "... meeting Stephen Jones and him giving me a hat and saying its knocking-people-in-the-face abilities were like old Dior dresses that would knock everyone's ashtrays over when the girls in them would spin." (Well, consider ashtrays knocked.)

tavi karl lagerfeld john galliano hair bow haute couture shows

Tavi under the fashion wing of top designers Karl Lagerfeld (left) and John Galliano (right). Photos: Eric Ryan, Getty Images

While Tavi herself is rather harmless (though, let's face it, her overdone avant garde getups often warrant serious eye rolls), we've just become anti the whole Tavi phenomenon.

Our irritation mostly stems from the absurdity of fashion's biggest players anointing a 13-year-old blogger the next big thing and inserting her into an adult world that she has little business being a part of.

And maybe, at the core, having a 13-year-old seated in the front row and treated as a fashion expert, when she doesn't even have a fraction of the experience the seasoned journalists around -- or now behind -- her possess, is what really gets us.

We think this is the point Elle's Fashion News Director Anne Slowey was trying to get at when she recently told New York Magazine: "People in fashion are constantly looking for the next unique boundary-pushing extreme thing to get excited about, but, you know, it's like outsider art. What am I getting out of a 13-year-old's opinion about fashion? How does that help me distill the collections? What am I supposed to be buying? That's what an editor's job at a magazine is."

Although Slowey soon after tried to take back her statements (apparently nobody likes to look like they're picking on a 13-year-old), we think she hit the nail on the head.

"Unfortunately we live in a culture that sees children as novelties," Susan Stiffelman, a family therapist and author in Malibu, Calif., tells StyleList. "We do it with actors and kids that are singers. But people dismiss the long-term impact on the children."

"It's inevitable that she'll have a crash," Stiffelman says of Tavi. "But it's very unlikely that she has the internal emotional equipment to cope with the negatives and the absence of all of that praise and attention."

Based on her observations of fashion and sometimes witty prose, it's clear that Tavi is wise beyond her years. But we just hope she's mature enough to recognize the fickle world she's playing in. Because, as Heidi Klum says, one season you're in and the next you're out.

In other words, it's sort of like high school.

Note: Despite Tavi recently writing on her blog, "I want to be a part of a discussion that has pinpointed me specifically," within a longer diatribe about "bloggers vs. editors" and a warning that she'll be wearing more big hats during New York Fashion Week (read it all here), the young blogger did not respond to our requests for an interview.

What do you think of Tavi's icon status in the high stakes world of fashion: Is it harmless or potentially damaging? Let us know in a comment below.

And for another celebrity child who may be growing up a bit too fast, check out Suri Cruise's footwear of choice.
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Filed under: Fashion, News
Tags: anne slowey, Bloggers, child stars, Fashion World, Hair Bows, Harpers Bazaar, Haute Couture Shows, love magazine, New York Fashion Week, pop magazine, Tavi
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READER COMMENTS

(209)Add A Comment

Buhlebonga, 2-09-2010, 2:15AM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
Buhlebonga

Tavi... I follow that girl's blog and she ALWAYS surprises me. Excellent stuff, really good stuff and I hope that she will not be taken advantage of...

Reply »

erica, 2-11-2010, 8:14PM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
erica

is it just me, or does she look like a small-framed 60 year old?

Reply »

andrew, 2-11-2010, 8:50PM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
andrew

small old woman is what she looks like to me, i think we have a curious case of benjamin buttons sister here(:

»

Karinka, 2-11-2010, 11:58PM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
Karinka

Yes, she looks very old. I thought the same thing.

»

hatesgames, 2-11-2010, 8:16PM

Half a star vote downvote upReport
hatesgames

Like I always say: if you're white, cute and female, you can do anything.

Reply »

jenn, 2-11-2010, 9:50PM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
jenn

Realist ...

thank you ... its obscene, not to mention pathetic, to use the race card these days. just another bitter person making excuses for their failure.

»

Mary, 2-12-2010, 2:55PM

1 star vote downvote upReport
Mary

One more racist. When will you people ever learn to stop. I have never had a slave and never would. It is time for people like you to wake up and get a job and stop blaming the white people for your mistakes.

»

hatesgames, 2-12-2010, 3:02PM

1 star vote downvote upReport
hatesgames

Inabilities? Failures? Mistakes? Boy, you internet rednecks sure get off on your little fantasies. I made a generalization based on my own observations, and you idiots made it personal. Which is a zero-sum game because neither one of you know me at all, or my capabilities.
After the examples set by Paris Hilton, Winona Ryder, Anna Kourinkova and Sarah Palin, (I could go on) I can say what I like about that subject because it's true.
You dont have to like it, and frankly I dont care one way or the other.

»

xbeachgirly86x, 2-11-2010, 8:17PM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
xbeachgirly86x

she should change her hair color she looks like an old lady but other than that she has a cute style for a 13 year old

Reply »

cannotbelievethis, 2-11-2010, 8:58PM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
cannotbelievethis

She looks Estelle Getty from "Golden Girls", when she wasn't playing on "Golden Girls" - who or what is she, anyway? I'm glad she's able to pick out haute couture, but yunno, so what?

»

VimalaNowlis, 2-11-2010, 11:39PM

2.5 stars vote downvote upReport
VimalaNowlis

Agree. Look at her hands and the lines on her face, she looks like a short, dried up, very badly dressed, 48 years old.

»

talsbaby, 2-12-2010, 12:43AM

2 stars vote downvote upReport
talsbaby

go eagles! I'm hungry for pizza.

»

hatesgames, 2-11-2010, 8:17PM

Half a star vote downvote upReport
hatesgames

Or I should say, get away with anything...

Reply »

Cyndi, 2-11-2010, 10:32PM

1 star vote downvote upReport
Cyndi

Your racism is showing again. Don't blame whites for your inabilities. Blame yourself. If you think you can get a better deal in another country, by all means, don't let whitey stop you.

»

Dito, 2-11-2010, 8:21PM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
Dito

My my is Hintz-Zambrano unable to sublimate her envy? Leave the child alone. What you have been unable to notice- obviously whilst honing and cultivating your editor's eye for fashion... is the fact, not the notion, but the fact that the opinions of 13 year old girls are more important to the success of the fashion industry than anyone would like to admit.

Little Girls may follow their mother's look, or rebel against it- those that rebel propel designers in directions to reinvent their wheels year after year.

She may be a chiché, but no more than you. She may think she's a lost character from Sex and the City, but that's the point. She's not following trends as much as she's creating them.

What would Anna Wintour be doing today, at 13, had she internet access? Blogging? I think so.

Chew on that while you're peering over her hat, not to see the collection, but to copy her notes.

Reply »

ploobi, 2-12-2010, 1:26AM

2 stars vote downvote upReport
ploobi

Well said!

»

miche, 2-12-2010, 3:07AM

2.5 stars vote downvote upReport
miche

That type of hat at any type of show is just plain rude. People attending the show want to see the fashions, not the back of an oversized hat! I can understand that she was very proud & flattered at receiving that hat as a gift from someone she looks up to, but she would have won more respect from her peers & potential fans if she had proudly worn the gifted hat into the show and removed it during the show. Her hair doesnt look like it would be messed by hat removal! And her statements to continnue this thoughtlessness are the actions of a rebelious 13 year old out to alienate adults, not a fashion lover wise beyond her years.

»

Madeleine, 3-10-2010, 11:16AM

2 stars vote downvote upReport
Madeleine

Very well said.

And to miche: Tavi wrote personally on her blog if anyone was sitting behind her and it was blocking their view they should feel free to ask her to take it off. If you had not noticed she is about half the size of most adults and if an adult had sat in her place, I guarantee you the person behind would have even less of a view. And really.. she's 13. She's not out to alienate anyone haha.

»

ngluvspat, 2-11-2010, 8:19PM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
ngluvspat

wow! shes 13 yrs old?????? she looks so old n ugly!!

Reply »

ED, 2-11-2010, 8:24PM

3 stars vote downvote upReport
ED

This little girl needs to become a little girl. The hair has to go. My daughter is 12 and has highlights but blonde and pink ~ come on the gray looks horrible on her. Why do adults let their children act grown?

Reply »

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