The Daily Front Row Fashion Media Awards take over the Rainbow Room

At a Glance

• The Daily Front Row held its 13th annual Fashion Media Awards on September 11, 2026, at the Rainbow Room.
• Matteo Lane hosted an evening honoring Bethann Hardison, Twiggy, Jenna Lyons, Jordan Roth, Kai Schreiber and more.
• More than 300 fashion, entertainment and media insiders attended the New York Fashion Week celebration.
• The night continued with an official after-party at Paradise Club at The Times Square EDITION.

There are New York Fashion Week parties, and then there are the nights when it feels as though the entire fashion ecosystem has somehow landed in one room. The Daily Front Row Fashion Media Awards was decidedly the latter.

On Friday, September 11, 2026, The Daily Front Row returned to the legendary Rainbow Room at Rockefeller Center for its 13th annual Fashion Media Awards, bringing more than 300 designers, models, editors, actors, stylists and cultural tastemakers 65 floors above Manhattan. Comedian and actor Matteo Lane hosted the evening, which went beyond celebrating who is having a moment in fashion to honor many of the people responsible for creating those moments in the first place.

Against the glittering backdrop of New York at night, the FMAs unfolded as one of Fashion Week's rare occasions where generations of influence genuinely collided: Twiggy and Bethann Hardison alongside Jenna Lyons, Jordan Roth, Wisdom Kaye, Jordyn Woods and 17-year-old breakout model Kai Schreiber.

The honoree list read like a snapshot of fashion's past, present and future.

Bethann Hardison received the evening's Lifetime Achievement Award, presented by Iman. Twiggy was named Style Icon, with actress and filmmaker Sadie Frost presenting the honor. Town & Country editor in chief Stellene Volandes received the Media Icon Award from Isaac Mizrahi, while Jenna Lyons was recognized as a Fashion Force, presented by Derek Blasberg.

Jordan Roth received the Fashion Innovator Award from Evan Rachel Wood, while Zac Posen presented Wisdom Kaye with the Fashion Trailblazer Award.

Law Roach presented Stéfère's Corina Larpin with Accessories Designer of the Year, and Jordyn Woods took home Fashion Game Changer, presented by her sister Jodie Woods. Vogue's Chloe Malle accepted Magazine of the Year from Tonne Goodman.

One of the evening's most personal moments belonged to Kai Schreiber, who received Breakthrough Model of the Year from Stephen Gan. Schreiber described becoming the award's first trans recipient as "surreal," while acknowledging the women who paved the way before her.

For all the fashion on display, the evening's emotional center came when Iman took the stage to honor Bethann Hardison.

The two women share decades of fashion history, and Iman's introduction placed Hardison's career within the larger story of representation in the industry. She recalled how Hardison advocated for Black models and creatives long before diversity became an institutional priority in fashion.

Hardison, in turn, reflected on a career defined less by conventional ambition than by purpose. It was a fitting distinction for an awards ceremony devoted to influence: some careers change trends, while others change the industry itself.

The guest list was every bit as eclectic as the awards.

Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiber were there to support Kai, while Lisa Rinna, Karl-Anthony Towns, Veronica Webb, Coco Rocha, Devon Windsor, Cass Bird, Jessica Wang, Ming Lee Simmons, Patrick Ta, Renee Herbert, Rose Bertram, Meredith Mickelson and others added to the fashion-week mix.

Presenters including Iman, Evan Rachel Wood, Zac Posen, Law Roach, Isaac Mizrahi, Stephen Gan, Derek Blasberg and Tonne Goodman made the ceremony feel less like a conventional awards show and more like fashion's most glamorous extended family reunion.

And there was plenty of fashion worth discussing. Kai Schreiber arrived in vivid Valentino green, while the evening ranged from sharp tailoring to statement gowns and the more theatrical looks expected from a room containing Roth, Kaye, Roach and Lyons. The Daily's red-carpet coverage captured the evening's deliberately eclectic approach to personal style.

The awards may have ended, but Fashion Week certainly hadn't.

Following the ceremony, the crowd headed downtown, or, more accurately, several blocks south, to Paradise Club at The Times Square EDITION for the official Redken-sponsored after-party. DJs Gabe and Chloe took over the music as guests moved from awards-show polish into late-night party mode.

It was an appropriately New York ending to an evening that captured what the Fashion Media Awards does particularly well: putting the people who shape the images, conversations and personalities of fashion into the spotlight themselves.

The Daily Front Row has been chronicling fashion's insiders since 2003, from runway front rows to Hamptons weekends and the places in between. More than two decades later, the Fashion Media Awards remain an extension of that world: glamorous, occasionally irreverent and filled with the kind of personalities who make Fashion Week worth watching.

And for one September night, nearly all of them seemed to be at the Rainbow Room.