If I were to have a Wikipedia page, a scavenger might pick out little facts that make me seem like a credentialed candidate to report on something like the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week. I was raised in Los Angeles and I’ve spent the past 3+ years living in the East Village and Williamsburg sections of New York City. In October I’ll be marrying a graduate of the Fashion Institute of Technology who has worked as a clothing designer in the garment district for the past 6 years. One of my close friends from my college days has been one of the most talked about designers this year.

But truth be told, it wasn’t until a year or two ago that I learned how to actually match my clothing (and my fiancée is only marginally convinced of this). Yet, somehow I’ve found myself waist-deep in Fashion Week work for the second season in a row – learning the pronunciation of names like Diane Von Furstenberg, regurgitating everything that I learned from Season 3 of Project Runway to make my voice seem that much more credible and scrounging the internet to find the rare pockets of the blogosphere that have yet to cover the Fashion world’s biggest event.

But in a world of housing foreclosures, credit crunches, Bernie Madoffs, and publicly funded bank bailouts turned directly into billion dollar bonuses and vacations, the initial question I had was “Do people really care about $5,000 vanity projects, celebrity sightings, corporate sponsorships and the lifestyles of the rich and famous?” It turns out that they do. Michael Kors elaborates:

And I do too. From a personal standpoint it’s a form of escapism. It’s imaginative enough to be inspiring but shallow enough to not rattle my brain all that much. From an economic standpoint, we can stand back and judge but the week does wonders for the local economy. But most of all its interesting from an artistic standpoint. Fashion is functional art. Art that takes and changes shape and must move and work alongside a moving body. That’s impressive; and after an entire week of it I’ve learned enough to transform my appreciation into words. So what did I learn?

I learned that Donna Karan is not only responsible for the DKNY line, but for the Donna Karan line as well! I also learned that the “NY” in DKNY is something that Karan used as inspiration for her woman’s line “The Power of New York.”

I learned that Diane Von Furstenberg based her line “Nomad” on nomadic tribes using animal prints and cozy sweaters meant for hibernating.

And finally I learned that Michael Kors thinks that the recession is a ludicrous reason to tone down design…that if anything its even more of a reason to do something fun and new.