Here, I’ve documented my personal experience at the Yeezy Season 4 show. Click through the slideshow to see the photos I took.
As a freelance writer who works for many different publications, I either get fashion week invites randomly, request them myself as a freelancer, or someone at one of my publications requests them for me. In terms of the Yeezy show, which I had never been to, I got a random invite the day of the show at 4 am sent to my email.
The email didn’t specify the location and requested that I arrived an hour and a half before the show began to take a shuttle bus to the *undisclosed location*.
About an hour before pickup time, it was revealed that the show would take place at Roosevelt Island (no one goes there. It’s not really a “remote” location as others wrote about it, it’s just a place where people live and there’s a big hosptial–so lots of old people and paraplegics). Of course, the shuttle bus pickup was located on 12th Avenue and 26th Street, which anyone in New York will tell you is a hassle to get to. No one goes there, unless they work there.
I walked from Broadway and 23rd street to the location. It was 84 degrees outside. Already, I was starting to get annoyed and felt like this is Kanye pulling some kind of power trip. Randomly, Mickey Boardman of Paper walked five blocks to the bus in front of me, carrying furry black purse and wearing jeans.
When I got to 26th Street and 12th Avenue, editors, buyers and guest were loaded into tourist style buses after being checked in on iPads.
A representative who looked like she didn’t fit in with the Yeezy aesthetic stamped printed out tickets with smiley faces to confirm that people would stick to the same bus on the way back.
Some European guys who appeared to be menswear editors sat next to me and didn’t understand the value of personal space. “It’s like going to a Raf show back on the day. Spend an hour going outside Paris,” said one of them, comparing the experience.
Once the bus arrived to Roosevelt Island the representative said “I’m really sorry, we’re being held back. That’s all the information we’ve been given.” The bus drove around in circles for 15 minutes before stopping at the location. The truth is that I was on the first bus, and I think the others got held back in traffic. At this point, I started to really regret coming. I felt like I had been kidnapped. The bus was literally circling around a parking lot.
Finally, the bus pulled out outside the Roosevelt Island Racquet Club. We were told to get out, go left and keep walking. A few of the people in the back with purple hair and blue hair thought they were really cool and tried to push in front of people to get out first–it didn’t work out so well. Everyone seemed very confused when we got out. We were handed small white cards that read “Yeezy Season 4” and the representatives kept saying these are our “credentials.”
We walked down by the water and everyone was taking photos. Some people thought the show would actually take place in the water on a boat. After walking about five minutes we were met with a metal gate and told to stop. We–meaning club kids and fan boys as well as editors from New York Times, Harper’s BAZAAR, InStyle, had to wait about 30 minutes standing in front of the gate. C-list celebs like rappers you haven’t heard of rolled up in black vans and were let through the gates. But everyone else was left to stand in the searing heat. A girl behind me had to use the bathroom and was considering squatting right then and there because there were no bathrooms.
The reps had closed us off into a sort of holding stall and put a gate behind us, which held other guests from getting into our area. One guests beside me mentioned that it was “dehumanizing.” A helicopter kept flying over us, very closely. Some wondered if Kanye was inside laughing.
We were finally let through the gate after the demi-celebs arrived. And guess what? We only ended up waiting in a second section. We walked down by the water, another five minutes and arrived at the old Smallpox Hospital. At this point, it was already 3:40. 40 minutes after the show was supposed to start. And two hours from when we got on the bus to begin our journey to Yeezy Season 4. At this point, everyone was instagramming the Old Small Pox Hospital and hoping the show would happen there. It. was. so. hot. Vannesa Friedman and Guy Trebay of The New York Times sat down on a bench that had some old, disgusting Starbucks cups left by someone. They looked annoyed.
About 15 minutes later, we were let through to the third and final holding pen. No one seemed to know what it was–there were lots of trees, grass and a giant set of concrete stairs that we were forbidden from going up. Everyone was trying to take shelter under the trees. Because once again, it was so hot. T-shirts printed with “Yeezy Season 4” were sold at a little shack in this area for $75. People seemed to think it was a good deal.
Around 4:05, everyone started running up the stairs. Apparently it had been announced that we could all go up to the show. A huge platform hosted about 60 or 70 models just standing blankly–part of the ongoing performances Kanye does with Italian artist Vanessa Beecroft.
I was confused, because my ticket had a seat assignment that seemed like it was front row. The only seats were concrete benches–about 30 of them on either side, labeled with a corresponding letter and number. I know for certain that some people were just sitting down regardless of whether or not they had a seat, but luckily there was one space left open on my assigned bench and I took it.
The models in Vanessa Beecroft’s performance were multiracial women only as the controversial casting suggested. No light skinned women. There were diverse body types, though models who later walked the actual runway were more diverse in skin tones. For an hour, loud, experimental moaning music played. Nothing happened, except for some models who sat down on the ground – was it part of the performance, or were they just told to sit if the couldn’t take it anymore? I don’t know.
One model in Beecroft’s performance appeared to get heat exhaustion. Other models calmed her and rushed her water to drink.Another one appeared to faint from standing and fell down. A few models brought bottles of water to various women who were standing or sitting in the performance piece. It was actually terrifying.
After an hour of just staring at the presentation (we get it Kanye, the jokes on us that you got us to sit and stare at a fashion presentation for an hour), professional models came out and walked the white runway surrounding the standing women. A few minutes before this, the royal Kardashian family arrived and walked though–blonde manes, bodycon dresses and all.
The whole thing was streamed on Tidal, and the massive cameras rolled by in front of everyone. The models who walked the runway really struggled with the shoes. One pair of boots had the model’s feet going completely sideways. Another model took her clear heels off after struggling on the runway and continued to walk barefoot.
After the anti-climatic runway ended, Kanye and the models as well as hair crew walked some near the water embankment and waved to guests. Everyone headed back to the buses–after using the disgusting public toilets without lights–and we didn’t arrive back in midtown until 6:20. That’s right. The Kanye West Yeezy Season Four show took up FIVE HOURS YESTERDAY.
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