I think consumers now days don’t care whether a designer is gay, straight, men, women, black, white. They buy brands that they like. But the media has the power to influence their choices as they make particular brands more popular than others and if they are selecting designers based on their gender or even sexual orientation, then that turns into an unfair playing fields for our sister designers such as yourself.

I think it is not a question of if the gap exists as much as it is a question of why, and this article did a wonderful job of discussing that.

It gets me in a hot rage when I hear gay men saying that they are better at designing and knowing what women want better than women themselves. I find it deeply,deeply degrading that this is said with so much flippancy, because it is a complete slap in the face to women. Let’s imagine for a moment that we are talking about an imaginary booming market of exclusively African American clothing( clothing made for and marketed towards African Americans ) and let’s say that there are more Caucasians designing for this market and making money at it and let’s also imagine that there are some incredibly talented African American desigers trying to become recognized and appreciated in this market. Can you imagine the outrage in the African American community and all across the media if Caucasian designers started arrogantly proclaiming that they knew better than black people what black people want!? And rightly so would they be outraged. I admire black people for the way they stick together and stand up for themselves and I firmly believe that women should follow this example and be far less tolerant of such blatant disrespect, maybe if we did it wouldn’t happen so much.

As for gay men not being trapped by thier perception of themselves in designing, who says? After all, they are only human, and who would be more trapped by a limiting perception of women? Gay MEN, or Women themselves who know what it is like to walk through this world as a woman. Gay men will never know what that is like. Secondly,it reflects a deep predjudiced view on the part of gay men who say this, about what it is to BE a woman. I LOVE being a woman thank you very much, and I don’t need some gay man with ridiculous fantasies about what he imagines my life to be like, dictating to me that I should wear S+M bondage gear( for example ) Being a woman is not a bad thing and I don’t need or want a man telling me what I should look like, gay or straight. That is a dangerous path and in a world as morally bankrupt as the one we are living in, women are fools if they accept without reservation the view of someone who may or may not have their best interest at heart, as to what they should wear.

I know for a fact that other women feel exactly as I do because we talk about it. I do not hate gay designers, one of my favorites is Marc Jacobs, but that is because I pick and choose what fits my personal flights of fancy and imagination based on my desires as a woman( and how enjoyable these flight are )

This whole issue of the gender gap in fashion really is summed up by one old phrase we have all heard, “Ask the fox to watch the henhouse”.