If you thought Obama’s reelection meant the end of Runway to Win and Anna Wintour’s political fundraising efforts, you were wrong (man, she’s really still gunning for that ambassadorship isn’t she? Just kidding…).
Anna Wintour’s ‘Runway to Win‘ fundraising efforts for Obama–a fashion line sold online featuring everything from scarves to totes to dog collars designed by fashion’s most well-known designers and celebrities–became an easy target for Obama critics.
During the campaign, the Republican party released a video paroadying the MasterCard “Priceless” campaign: “Watching the Obama campaign host a ritzy NYC fashion show while 12 million Americans remain out of work? Priceless.” Everyone from the usual suspects (ahem, Fox News) to The Atlantic mocked the effort as a sign of Obama’s elitism.
Only it worked. Like gangbusters.
From Michelle Obama’s flawless style and support of young designers to the fashion industry’s fundraising efforts, this has easily been the most fashiony election season of all time.
In fact, the fashion industry is seen as playing a vital role in this election. But, we’re not just talking about designers’ hefty donations and Anna Wintour-hosted dinners. For instance, there was that time Ann Romney wore a $900 Reed Krakoff shirt and who could forget Cathy Horyn attacking Paul Ryan for wearing an ill-fitted jacket?
As ballots continue to be cast and counted, let us take a look back at the biggest fashion stories to come out of the 2012 presidential election, which will soon, finally, come to an end.
Here’s Sarah Jessica Parker on her way to the polls this morning. Guess who she’s voting for?
Last night, Anna Wintour was in Chicago to host the second high-profile event for Runway to Win, the Obama campaign’s official fashion-backed fundraising initiative (her dinner with SJP and the Obamas is tomorrow). She wore Chanel resort with her favorite Thakoon Runway to Win scarf and thanks to Shoot for Change, we have a video Read more →
In the past couple of years, Anna Wintour has become more publicly involved with politics than at any other time in her career, leading many to wonder: Why?
Wintour, who is one of Obama’s top-tier fundraising bundlers, has been particularly politically active over the past few months. She’s attended two state dinners (one of which honored UK prime minister David Cameron and his wife, Samantha) and hosted a fundraising event with Scarlett Johansson for Runway to Win, an official fashion fundraiser for the Obama-Biden campaign. This week, she’ll host another Runway to Win event with Iman in Chicago, as well as a fundraising dinner in New York at Sarah Jessica Parker’s house. While conservatives are criticizing Wintour’s involvement in Obama’s campaign as an indicator of the President’s “out of touch”-ness (the phrase-du-jour), the Brits are suddenly speculating that she may be up for a job with the president, should he be re-elected.
“Don’t be tardy for the party.” –Anna Wintour. Well, not exactly. As you may have heard, Vogue EIC and known Barack Obama supporter Anna Wintour is co-hosting a dinner with the POTUS, first lady Michelle Obama and Sarah Jessica Parker, whose home will serve as the venue (Wintour’s also hosting an event in Chicago). Based Read more →
The fashion industry seems to be leaning to the left, according to a recent analysis of the industry’s financial support of presidential candidates leading up to the 2012 election.
WWD commissioned the Center for Responsive Politics to crunch the numbers, which took into consideration donations from department store, mass retail and apparel brand executives and employees. The result: the industry gave a total of $435,160 to the presidential race, 53.9 percent, or $234,600, to Obama and 45.9 percent to Republicans.
Also interesting: the fashion industry may play a more significant role in getting Obama re-elected than other Democratic-leaning industries like Hollywood, tech and Wall Street, whose donations are said to have declined this time around.
Are you an aspiring designer who also wants to support the Obama reelection campaign? Soon, CFDA designers like Marc Jacobs and Diane Von Furstenberg won’t be the only ones selling their pro-Obama merchandise through Obama 2012 fashion fundraiser Runway to Win. The Vogue-assembled website is now giving amateur designers (like you?) a chance to win Read more →
Yesterday, the Obama campaign released a list of its top fundraising “bundlers,” and the list, not surprisingly, included Vogue EIC Anna Wintour, who raised over $500,000 for Obama’s re-election, WWD reports. Of course, she’s been known to raise as much as $1.5 million at a single dinner, so this comes as no surprise. She was one of 61 people to “bundle” at that level (Hollywood media moguls Harvey Weinstein, with whom Wintour has hosted a fundraiser, and Jeffrey Katzenberg were the other big ones), meaning she’s a pretty influential lady, and not just within the fashion community.
Wintour hasn’t been secretive about her support of Obama:
What if we told you that for $45 you could get a Marc Jacobs shirt and support Obama’s re-election campaign at the same time? Well, you can! Right now.
Runway to Win, if you haven’t heard, is a new initiative that has major American designers, rallied by Vogue, designing exclusive items to be sold on Obama’s website. The proceeds benefit the president’s re-election efforts. While the initiative was only announced this week, most of the products are, as of yesterday, on the site and available for pre-order.
Is Anna Wintour the Oprah of the fashion industry? The Vogue editrix’s support of Barack Obama over the years has been no secret. Her $30,000+ per person fundraisers for the commander-in-chief–one at her home and one at Harvey Weinstein’s–were highly publicized and practically shut down all of downtown Manhattan last year. In addition to raising tons of money for the DNC, the events drew a star-studded crowd of celebrities and designers.
So as Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign gets underway, Anna is using her pull with the fashion crowd to support him. First up, another event, co-hosted by Scarlett Johansson in conjunction with a new initiative assembled by Vogue called Runway to Win.
Runway to Win will showcase exclusive products created by 22 designers to be sold online at runwaytowin.com with proceeds benefiting the Obama Victory Fund, WWD is reporting.
