WME-IMG is the 800-pound gorilla of New York Fashion Week, but Style Fashion Week, an outfit headed up by 33-year-old Veronica Kerzner, has big ambitions.
The upstart runway-show producer expects to fill up The Theater at Madison Square Garden with some 15 designers showing their spring and summer collections while hip-hop artists perform and guests shop and sip cocktails in the lobby.
“We are in talks with some large designers, world-renowned names, who are right now with IMG,” Kerzner told The Post. Most of the designers who show with Style Fashion Week are emerging and lesser known with a few exceptions, including Taiwanese born Malan Breton, a Project Runway alum who has been in IMG-produced shows.
“Our focus is attracting the next generation of designers who will be the next big name,” Kerzner said, boasting that “many of the designers we work with are dressing a ton of celebrities on the red carpet.”
She also wants to keep them once they get big.
“We are taking ownership in certain brands that we represent, between a 20- and 40-percent stake in their companies,” Kerzner said, declining to identify the four companies she has so far invested in.
Kerzner, who charges between $15,000 and $30,000 to produce shows, says her price tag is cheaper than IMG-produced shows. IMG can produce smaller shows for as little as $10,000 to $20,000 say industry sources, but the bulk of the shows cost significantly more.
“Maybe this is a new way to launch a brand and to enter an otherwise difficult club to penetrate,” one prominent designer said. “It becomes very expensive to put on a show and to be part of the group.”
Style Fashion Week is now the main fashion show in Los Angeles, where IMG pulled out some years ago. It also produces shows in Palm Springs, Calif., and Miami.
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