Eyes sting. Heart heavy. Finger hovering over “send.” Maybe they won’t like my wording. Maybe they won’t even read it. I have nothing left but to wait. Wait. Wait longer. Carrying this deep convincing feeling that It’ll probably be another unopened email.
After days if not weeks, it appears. We regret to inform you.
But what exactly do they regret? Not having taken the time to notice the effort? One thing is certain — this phrase will remain unchanged. Polite. Cold. Detached. For decades, fashion has thrived on rejection. The industry is designed to be gatekept. Those at the bottom are told their late nights of studying, unpaid internships, and overworked passion are “the price of entry.”
The Politics of Rejection
Times have shifted but our structure remains the same. Nepotism is the main fuel of the industry. The well-known and well connected are so privileged, you just have to have 10million followers and a netflix deal. And yes.. all doors swing open. The celebrity-as-creative-director phenomenon is being today’s PR virus. Take Pharrell at Louis Vuitton or Jaden for Louboutin. Chasing celebrity partnerships as if art direction were a marketing department, not a discipline. Craftsmanship will slowly become a myth. Truth is: if your last name doesn’t whisper in the right rooms, your talent will die in someone’s inbox. Brutally but honest.
Demna’s Rejection
Consider Demna Gvasalia. In 2007, the now-icon of Balenciaga was just another graduate from Antwerp Academy, desperately looking for an internship. He applied for a role at Balenciaga’s menswear team. The reply? Cold, with the same impersonal melody
And yet, through Vetements and later Balenciaga, he redefined modern fashion. One rejection didn’t stop him, but what about the thousands of unnamed designers whose paths ended there? Not everyone has a brother, resources, or sheer stubborn luck. For every Demna, there are countless silent talents swallowed by rejection.
A Thought to Sit With:
Once you get in, it’s not over..Fashion is one of the only billion-dollar industries that runs on free labor disguised as privilege.
Every season, countless young photographers, stylists, writers, and interns pour unpaid hours into the system, all under the ‘silent’ agreement that exposure is enough compensation. In the process, fashion creates a distorted psychology of value where worth is measured not by skill or creativity, but by endurance.
Sociologists call this “hope labor” the willingness to work for free today for the hope of being paid tomorrow. But that “tomorrow” often never arrives. What’s more insidious is how the system moralizes this imbalance. The narrative becomes: if you really loved it, you wouldn’t care about the money. Passion becomes a weapon. And exhaustion becomes proof of commitment.
Why Do We Still Want In?
So.. why do we still chase it? Why do rejection letters still sting so deeply?
Because fashion promises something primal: status, identity, visibility. To be seen in fashion is to exist in a glamourized reality. And so we endure the cruelty, the closed doors, the endless we regret to inform you, not because the industry is worth it, but because we’ve convinced with the desire to belong. The key is noticing where you stand and choosing to lean into the side that gives you energy rather than drains it. Seek out the spaces and people that make you feel connected, not consumed. Fashion feels better when you treat it as a tool for self-expression and community, instead of a measure of your worth.
by @imane.bfth, Editor at HCN Insider