As the Ye-ssification of Julia Fox gains momentum, we rank the duo’s best Paris Fashion Week looks so far
Kanye West and Julia Fox have only been dating for 25 days and yet it feels so, so much longer. From Miami, to Carbone, to Paris Fashion Week, the duo have seemingly modelled themselves on a pop cultural vision of power coupledom, thinking themselves the next Pamela and Tommy, Britney and Justin, or... Kim and Kanye? Things change so fast, and the eye so quickly adapts to what’s new, that it’s easy to forget just how little time they are alleged to have spent together, despite saturating the timeline with palpably awkward photoshoots and bizarre BTS videos.
The most cringe aspect of any celeb romance is that each party is encouraged to act as though the world is enthralled by their every move, like Megan Fox and Machine Gun Kelly. And these two are no different. Many of their appearances have resulted in some kind of commercial payoff and as a result, what started out as entertaining, with Fox giddily diarising their second date to a fashion magazine, began to feel a little strung out. Yet to label the whole thing as some kind of PR or financial stunt sounds too callous. As Fox told her podcast listeners, “Honey, I've dated billionaires my entire adult life, let's keep it real.” Yes, the public are certainly more astute than celebrities like West and Fox give them credit for but we are nonetheless enraptured by the perfomance of it all. Particularly the costuming.
Lest we feed the pseudo-intellectualisation of Kanye West, it is interesting to see the rapper mould Fox into a completely unrecognisable version of who she was just 25 days ago. If she was once a little pedestrian, a little ‘jeans a nice top’, she’s now full crack-baring leather chaps and Black Swan eyeliner. Of course, West knows the power that fashion has to legitimise celebrity. He did the same with Kim, dragging her out of Hervé Leger bodycons red soles flailing, not to mention that their subsequent divorce had seemingly been art directed by Demna Gvasalia himself. Whether Julia Fox is another prop to West, an extension of his paparazzi-charming latex masks, has yet to be seen, but her Schiaparelli, Rick Owens, and Balenciaga jaunts have proved some of the most eye-popping of Paris Fashion Week. Long live, erm, JuliYe.
Below, we run through the best of Kanye and Julia’s fashion week looks so far.
DOUBLE DENIM
The couple made their “red carpet debut” as they gathered outside of Nigo’s first presentation for Kenzo, wearing matching double denim and aligning themselves with the most canonical of celebrity relationships in the process – Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake. Now, Fox has been making joots, that’s jean boots, her sartorial calling card for the last couple of weeks but she doubled down on the style this week by pinching Daniel Roseberry’s Carhartt jeans and wearing them over her trusty Diesel boots. On top, she wore a cone-shaped, cropped denim jacket courtesy of Schiaparelli – just to remind people of that harrowing video the couple took with Madonna last week. It was Fox’s coal-faced eyeliner, though, that ultimately cinched the headlines.
DATE NIGHT WITH THE OWENS
West formally introduced Fox to the upper echelons of fashion this week, as the duo visited Rick Owens and Michèle Lamy for dinner. The actor wore a graphic, one-shouldered red leather dress by Owens with thigh-high metallic Balenciaga boots while the rapper wore icy blue contacts, a leather jacket, also by Owens, and his now-signature Red Wings. It was a strong, devilish look to meet the dark lord and high priestess of fashion, but one which seemed deliberately modelled in the image of Kim Kardashian.
DOUBLE LEATHER
As the days went by, Fox’s eyeliner, painted by Kanye himself, got increasingly extreme. This reached its zenith at the Schiaparelli show when the duo were dressed in double leather looks, with Fox opting for another of Roseberry’s cone-shaped jackets and five-toe-grooved, thigh-high boots. West wore the same outfit as the previous evening, though this time he shoved a slit-eyed balaclava over his face, which felt a little friendlier than his pin-hole-eyed latex heads or full face-obscuring Margiela masks.