Who Won the Oscars of American Fashion

The 2024 Council of Fashion Designers of America awards, otherwise known as the Oscars of American fashion, were held in the Museum of Natural History, in the atrium under the great blue whale, but the coming election was the elephant in the room. How could it not be?

It’s easy for awards shows to get insular and self-congratulatory, and fashion can seem very much like its own echo chamber, but the industry is increasingly wearing its politics on its well-dressed sleeves. The last New York Fashion Week began with a get-out-the-vote march attended by many of the people in the room on Monday, including the positive change award winner Michael Kors, who managed to get the presenter Blake Lively out of floral prints and into a very chic sequined white gown and tuxedo (of his own design, natch).

As if in acknowledgment, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, in a black lace dress, opened the evening with a plea to “please tap into your drive, tap into your inspiration, tap into your ability to bring other people along.”

Thom Browne, the chairman of the CFDA, seconded the idea, reminding the crowd that “fashion, like democracy, is about choices and individual decisions that have the power to create culture and communities and define the future we want, we need and we deserve.”

In a way, that’s what these awards do: define the future of the industry, or its power structure. And by that measure, there is no question that, as may be true in the election itself, a generational shift is occurring. One that elevates the melting pot of America and the allure of diverse points of view, putting them right at the beating center of how we dress.

So while the nominees for the three big awards of the evening included familiar names from past CFDA ceremonies — Marc Jacobs, Proenza Schouler, Tory Burch, Thom Browne — the actual winners represented a change in the system.