The Truth About Celebrity Styling with Kate Young

You’re an OG in the stylist game—what do you make of the landscape of styling right now?

The thing that’s changed more than anything is the way brands function with VIP [talent] and stylists. It has changed dramatically post COVID, and I think it’s really changing right now too with all the new regimes. Every house with a new designer is getting a new VIP team, which means they’re getting a new strategy. Brands now have these hard and fast lists, but before you used to be able to kind of hustle someone at a brand to trust you based on a personal relationship. It was a personal decision of a VIP PR person with a stylist in that relationship to lend them something for a client or not. That is disappearing, I would say. Now, so much is on contract and predetermined. People are really laser focused on their celebrity placements in a way they didn’t used to be. I mean, there’s also the famous stylist thing that I feel like has been going on forever, and that was Rachel Zoe.

The point you make about brands is interesting, because it carries into editorial—who magazines can photograph wearing what.

Right, it’s always “she has a contract.” I don’t know how politically correct this is to say, but the reality is that brands are who hold the purse strings right now. When I started doing this, movie companies paid. I would make money doing a press tour, and now I am paid less for the same work than I was 15 years ago. And production companies now really rely on movie stars having brand deals to subsidize this. I think that’s even true with magazines. I don’t know whether you all want to admit it. We talk so much in this industry about the decline of luxury, but in fact, who has money? Dior and Louis Vuitton and Chanel. Movie companies aren’t making the money anymore. Magazines aren’t making the money anymore. Even celebrities, to a certain degree, aren’t making the kind of money making movies that they make from brand deals. I think really, you can just follow the money to see where the industry’s changed. Sorry, that’s not a very glamorous take.

It’s not, but it is the take. It’s why this conversation series exists—people have questions and you have answers. As we keep talking about brand ambassadors and deals, what’s it like to work with someone who doesn’t have one? Has it become harder, or is it more fun?

No, it’s so fun. It’s really fun to have freedom. I was doing a lot of editorial up until not that long ago still just because I liked it, I come from that and I love doing photo shoots, but I was doing this editorial with a cover and had the run through and the editor in chief said to me, “okay, so you’re going to shoot this for the cover and this inside and you have to shoot these.” I had a sheet with the jewelry that needed a full page and a sheet with the accessories, and I was like, this is a catalog, so what do you need me for? And if I shoot a catalogue, I don’t do it for $250 a day. I actually walked off the shoot, which is I think one of the only times I ever have. But I knew this actress and we had been friends for years. She wasn’t a regular client, but she was somebody I know who asked for me because she trusted my vision. I also didn’t work at this magazine, so there’s nothing in it for me to shoot X, Y, and Z. I didn’t think it was good for my brand to show up with this rack of advertisers and tell her what she had to wear when it didn’t align with my taste.