How this video of a Haider Ackermann show helped me find Fashion’s most mysterious Colombian muse. Part 1
Who is Victoria Fernandez? Why is she at the center of this show’s review? Is she Colombian? I thought to myself: I need to find her. So I did.
In the 2000’s, the closest thing I had experienced to real high fashion was, of course, Style.com, with Tim Blanks as the narrator of an industry that seemed impossible to get to—especially for fashion fans in Colombia like me, who could barely dream of seeing one of those shows in real life—ever! I remember blocking times on my school schedule to sit down on my computer for a couple of hours, first to code the shit out of the aesthetics of my Myspace profile, and second, to watch Tim’s reports of the most important shows during all the fashion weeks.
My obsession with these videos and reviews grew so much that I would google every single person they interviewed. After a few seasons, I felt like I knew all of them. I would look exclusively for the opinions of the ones who seemed cool, smart—or just plain hot! For Fall 2011, a relatively unknown (to me) fashion designer named Haider Ackermann presented a collection in Paris that changed fashion forever and created an impact so big that people left the show crying and thinking about clothes entirely from an emotional point of view. When I saw his face on the interview after that show, I remember thinking, “He seems very warm”—but then I went straight to the clothes, and saved all the photos of my favorite models who walked the show on a flash drive.
After receiving the best reviews from that Fall 2011 show, Haider’s Spring 2012 show was the most anticipated runway on the fashion circuit and all the big journalists and fashion people went. Three or four days later, Tim’s review video was published and as I was watching it, I realized that I wasn’t paying attention to the clothes or the models. I just kept wondering, “How come I don’t know this woman with a Spanish name?” “Why does Tim Blanks know her?” and “IS HAIDER ACKERMAN COLOMBIAN?!” My heart was pounding. Colombians are intensely proud people. We cry whenever Shakira or Karol G say something in English or walk the red carpet of a major event. We play the national anthem on TV when a Colombian soccer player scores on an international game because we know how very few of us are out there. So knowing that someone who was raised with arepas instead of pancakes is making an impact in any industry will always feel like a victory for the entire country! It turns out that Haider was born in Colombia but was adopted and taken out of the country right after he was born. HOWEVER, Victoria was not—her review in that video was intense, she spoke english like a Colombian and her accent is the same we all have when we get sent to the immigration room in every airport in the world. The first thing I did was google her. I found a few pictures, but nothing else. I asked a few friends about her last name, but no one knew who she was. I went on Tumblr and found two articles about her. One was a very poorly scanned interview Vogue US had done about her style. The little article described her as a fashion consultant. Sure. We all are. But I just couldn’t stop thinking that Vogue knew who she was and Tim Blanks knew her too! The very little information I found of her online made me both upset and even more eager to keep digging to try to find her.
I mean, just look at that first answer! She is all of us Latins at every dinner party. Do you need more proof? I have it for you. This is my first response every time someone in New York just simply says Hi:
The second thing I found of her on Tumblr was a 2010 fashion story edited by Carine Roitfeld and photographed by none other than Tom Ford, published in Vogue Paris, in which Victoria, while wearing sunglasses, a hat and drinking a glass of champaign, is featured next to American supermodels like Laurent Hutton, Marisa Berenson and indisputable fashion Icons like Betty Catroux and Daphne Guinness. This was basically a story about the holy grail of “It girls.” There was not much information in these scanned images and I could not find the actual interview, but I understood that this was a MUSE and, like most muses, her presence, her images and the events she was probably part of were big enough to amplify the need to be in the same room with —and possibly to even get the chance to photograph—her. I was officially obsessed, so my search continued and I’m going to tell you what happened.
One year later after that successful 2012 Haider Ackermann show, I learned that Colombian Fashion’s most important event, “Colombiamoda” in Medellín, was going to have Haider as the guest designer for the inaugural show for our local fashion week festivities. Not only that, but one of the people who made this happen was Victoria Fernandez. I thought to myself, THIS IS IT! This is the moment I was waiting for to finally meet Victoria, so I started my quest to do everything I could to get an invitation to the show. Don’t get me wrong. I am aware that today, Ackermann is almost like a fashion god. But my instincts always take me to women—and even more if they are chic, older and Colombian! In that moment, my career was starting to take off, but it was still very local (Bogotá), so not a lot of people knew about me. However, I called the few editors I knew and even called the producers of the show to try to get an invite as a press photographer. None of my efforts were successful. This was the most gate kept and expensive show ever produced in Colombia, so only the VIP fashion personalities of our country were invited. Still, I traveled to Medellin, where I stayed in the only hotel I could afford in the center of the city. I payed 25 dollars a night and had to buy a lock for the room door to protect my camera equipment. The night of the show, I went early to the venue and asked all the press photographers if they needed an assistant. They all said no. The guests started to arrive at 7pm. I stood outside and said hi to some of the VIP guests I knew who kept asking: Will I see you inside? I said: Of course!
I didn’t get in.
The show happened on top of a very modern building, and I sat outside for an hour on a bench where I could see some of the lights and I could hear the music for the show. I felt terrible. It didn’t help that I had no money and that I hated being obese. It all felt like I was confronted by one of my biggest fears at that time: People will eventually realize that I was a nobody and that I didn’t have a rich background that could get me the right connections to get me into this show or into fashion in general.
When the show was over, the guests came downstairs. All of the beautiful people seemed to be ready to go to an after party together, and I decided to wait a little more in case Victoria would come out and join them. She did! I recognized her short hair, her long neck and her all black little outfit. This was probably the first time I saw archival YSL heels in person. The presence was there, the chicness of it all was real, and the best part was that she stood outside by herself, almost as if she was waiting for me (she was waiting for her car, but this is my fantasy, OK?). So I immediately ran towards her and said:
I love you!
I don’t know why I said that, I had never said it to anyone besides my mom or my sister, but I just felt so close to fashion, to a real elite…to a muse! She looked at me with a smile and said: Why? I told her everything I’ve described here, and she just smiled and kept looking at me. Her car arrived, and I asked if she had time on this trip for a portrait. She said: Do you live here or in Bogotá? Bogotá I said, and Do you have a studio there? Yes. (I didn’t). Give me the address and I will be there on Friday from 2:00 to 3pm…
…To be continued
I know, cliff hangers are the worst! But you have things to do, and this platform limits the length of the posts plus, there’s a drag queen sitting across from me on the subway as I write this story and can’t keep my eyes off her:
Chao!
Andrés.
Cliffhanger alright! Aquí quedo colgada esperando por el final! 🥰🥰🥰
Quiero saber toda la historia! Está buenísima! 🖤