At the end of last year, reports that the designer Alexander Wang sexually assaulted and harassed men and trans women circulated on social media. In a post on TikTok, the model Owen Mooney accused Wang of groping him at a club in New York in 2017. Mooney told The Business of Fashion that he decided to name Wang in the post after he learned of similar allegations against the designer. “I was sickened and shocked I was not the only victim of his behavior,” Mooney told the outlet. “So I felt it was necessary to stand with these people and say his name out loud.” Four other men who remain anonymous told BoF that they’d had similar experiences with Wang at clubs or parties.
Wang denied the accusations, saying in a statement on New Year’s Eve that he “never engaged in the atrocious behavior described and would never conduct myself in the manner that’s been alleged.” On Thursday the prominent victims’ rights lawyer Lisa Bloom told The New York Times that she is representing 10 men with allegations against Wang and his company.
One of the men is the stylist and fashion archivist David Casavant, who told the paper that Wang pulled down his pants and underwear at a Brooklyn club in 2017. Casavant was drunk, telling the Times, “I was so apparently in a vulnerable state,” and that he thought Wang’s intention was to “humiliate” him. (Through a lawyer Wang denied pulling down Casavant’s pants and underwear, writing that Casavant had an “irrefutable yearslong personal animus.” In response Bloom said that “Casavant stands by his account. Mr. Wang’s ridiculous personal attacks on him say more about Mr. Wang than they do about him.”)
Casavant told the Times that he decided to come forward about the allegation after Wang released his statement denying the accusations made last year.
As BoF noted in January, anonymous reports about Wang’s alleged behavior appeared on social media a few years ago. Wang, who rose to fashion fame in part through his reputation as a noted nightlife figure, continued to hold New York Fashion Week parties in the years to come. But the focus now seems to have shifted firmly from the glamour and excitement of the parties Wang attended and held to his behavior at them. “I didn’t like the idea that people could be branded as liars who weren’t,” Casavant told the Times. “I didn’t feel a necessary response from the fashion industry about it. Which I can understand—I get it, they were mainly anonymous, so that’s fine. But here I am. I’m sitting in front of you. I’m saying who I am. I’m not anonymous anymore.”
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