Strap line: #HowDoesSheDare — calling out fashion’s sacred cows, from Donatella’s throne to Victoria’s carefully curated confessionals.
Donatella Versace makes a pointed comment about Victoria Beckham “redesigning” a leather dress years ago. Victoria, after all this time, addresses the slight on a Netflix camera with a perfectly timed mix of poise and pique. And I’m meant to pretend this is just gossip? No. This is a case study in power, legacy, and who gets to write fashion history—and who gets written out of it.
Let’s name the elephant in the room: Donatella sold the Versace house for billions. She is both the guardian of a legend and the beneficiary of luxury capitalism at its most ruthless. How does she dare gatekeep the very idea of originality, while participating in a machine that endlessly “remixes” itself and calls it reverence? Because she can. Because the club lets her.
Because, in Europe’s grand capitals, heritage houses behave like cults—closed ranks, sacred codes, and a hierarchy sharper than any cut on the bias.
Victoria Beckham: How Does She Dare
And yet Victoria Beckham—so often dismissed as the pop-star-turned-pretender—did what hundreds of talented designers never get the runway to do. She built a brand that survived public ridicule, press sneers, and financial haemorrhage, buoyed by relentless networking and the cultural gravitational pull of her iconic husband. How does she dare? With teams, with money, with time, with polish—and with protected corridors that stay shut to most others. This is the brutal calculus the industry won’t admit: fashion applauds resilience, but only after it has selected whose resilience it will reward.
The Cult Of Legacy Vs the Myth Of Merit
Italian and Parisian houses protect legacy like a lion defends her cub. They will deny it, but the gate is real. Talent helps you knock. Access opens the door. This is why Donatella’s side-eye lands with such force: it’s not just about a dress, it’s a signal about who is allowed to reference whom, who is permitted to iterate on house codes, who can claim the aura of “authentic” design lineage. When a heritage matriarch says that silhouette is ours, it’s not a dialogue—it’s a verdict.
Victoria’s brand, on the other hand, has lived in the liminal space between aspiration and acceptance. She has poured years and—let’s be honest—hundreds of millions of investment into chasing solvency and status. The press called it vanity; the runway called it minimalist polish; accountants called it a long, expensive road. Yet she did not fold. That, in itself, is rare in this business. But it’s also a story about privilege: access to capital, PR, and platforms.
How many brilliant graduates have the runway, the showroom calendar, the celebrity halo, and the patience of investors to keep “finding the brand” for a decade?
Inclusivity theatre in 2025
Let’s talk about inclusivity. Fashion weeks issue press releases brimming with self-congratulation: diverse casting! body positivity! mental-health awareness! Meanwhile, in the front row and on the catwalk, 2025 still looks and feels like 2010—skinny, stressed, and surgically selective. If you’re plus-size, you’re a headline. If you’re older, you’re a stunt. If you’re disabled, you’re a moment. The industry remains exquisitely curated thinness, with the odd “inclusive” flourish tacked on like a ribbon at the end of the show.
Yes, Victoria has spoken publicly about control, food, and image. That matters. Visibility matters. But let’s not cosplay progress while building a brand on silhouettes and sample sizes that perpetuate the same old worship of scarcity: fewer calories, fewer curves, fewer people admitted into the aesthetic temple. When the collection cuts out the bodies it claims to embrace, the message is louder than any interview: We are not ready to meet you where you live. You must meet us where we sell.
Bullying isn’t a bug. It’s a feature.
I’ve felt the industry’s teeth. The whisper networks that blacklist you for asking questions. The PR handlers who ghost you if your platform won’t play nice. The velvet-rope cruelty of show access, where “capacity” is code for we don’t need you. Bullying in this arena is not rogue behaviour—it is the operating system. It keeps the myth of scarcity alive. It keeps editors obedient, freelancers grateful, and independent critics on the outside looking in. You can build a career inside the castle, or you can keep your integrity outside its walls; few get to do both.
So when Donatella throws shade from a gilded balcony, I don’t hear a personal gripe; I hear a dispatch from the gatekeeping ministry. And when Victoria responds from a sleek documentary frame, I don’t see raw catharsis; I see image management in 4K. Both women are formidable. Both are strategic. And both are operating within a system that rewards control and punishes dissent—especially the unfashionable kind.
I built MenStyleFashion.com from the heart, soul, judgment, and bullying. The fashion week organisers hated me and still do! I have never returned since 2015.
Who owns a dress?
Design is a conversation that spans decades. Everyone “redesigns” everyone else, openly or covertly. The question is not who borrowed, but who is allowed to borrow and be praised for it. Heritage houses pull from their archives and call it timeless. Newer labels pull from the same lineage and get accused of derivation. Streetwear drops a sly quote and is accused of theft—until the museum retrospective anoints it as meta commentary. The problem isn’t borrowing. The problem is power.
Which brings us back to that leather dress. If Victoria referenced Versace, she was joining a tradition as old as couture itself: saying, I see the line you drew—I’ll draw through it. Donatella’s complaint only lands because the industry pretends lineage is proprietary. Yet the runway’s most worshipped innovations are precisely those that challenged ownership—Galliano’s piratical plunder, McQueen’s savage romance, Margiela’s deconstructions.
We celebrate rebellion, then punish it when it comes from the “wrong” person.
Money, narratives, and who gets forgiven
Fashion forgives almost anything if the numbers work: plagiarism scandals, abusive temperaments, creative droughts. What it rarely forgives is irrelevance. Victoria outlasted the smirks because she kept refining a clear, wearable proposition—and because her narrative (discipline, restraint, English chic) photographs beautifully. Donatella survived tragedies and market storms because she understands spectacle, celebrity, and how to sell glamour without apology. Both crafted identities that the market devours. That is talent. But it’s also the dividend of staying close to power.
The rest of us? We are told to bootstrap. To “build community.” To be grateful for backstage standing room. To internalise that a seat at the table is charity rather than merit, and that constructive criticism is ingratitude. How does she dare becomes a question aimed downward—at anyone who tries to enter without paying the unspoken toll.
So, what should daring look like now?
Not performative apologies and one-season “inclusive” casting. Not documentaries that confess just enough to trend. Daring, in 2025, would look like this:
- Change the sample block. If the base size shifts, the rack shifts. Suddenly more bodies are possible—on runways, in showrooms, on shelves.
- Open the pipeline. Sponsor public, juried slots at fashion week for independent designers without pedigree or patron. Put real money behind it. No strings.
- Audit the PR ecosystem. If access is currency, distribute it with criteria beyond follower counts and favour. Publish your allocations. Expect pushback—welcome it.
- Own the archives honestly. If you call something “house codes,” publish the lineage of that code. Attribute the seamstresses and studio teams who built it. Make homage a feature, not a scandal.
- Protect the people. Independent ombuds for casting, backstage conditions, and model health—funded by the houses, governed at arm’s length. If a show can afford a hundred metres of Swarovski, it can afford safeguarding.
#HowDoesSheDare
So how does Donatella dare? Because legacy is power—and power rarely whispers. How does Victoria dare? Because persistence with resources is still a power few can match. And how do we dare—those of us shut out, shushed, or shoved to the margins? By refusing the script that says your worth is a seat, your value a tag, your body a problem to tailor away.
I am a product of that machinery and a critic of it. I’ve felt the door slam and learned to build my own entrance.
I will not mistake proximity to power for progress. And I won’t let a leather dress—however fabulous—become a proxy war that distracts from the real one: who gets to belong, who gets to be seen, and who gets to decide.
#HowDoesSheDare is not a taunt; it’s an audit. Of houses that preach inclusivity while policing who may reference their codes. Of brands that speak wellness while selling narrowness. Of the media that loves a rebrand more than reform. Of every velvet rope disguised as culture. You want daring? Stop defending the gate. Start dismantling it.
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