A year on from the fires that devastated Los Angeles, Vogue Business takes stock of fashion’s recovery and rebuilding efforts as part of our series, Refashioning LA, assessing where the city’s fashion and apparel industry is headed in 2026.
For the next few weeks, Hollywood will briefly feel like Hollywood again. Awards season has kicked off and the entertainment industry has descended on Los Angeles for the relentless run of ceremonies, culminating in the Academy Awards in mid-March. Though these days, the influx of actors and executives makes their absence for the rest of the year all the more noticeable.
Many one-time Angelenos now spend much of the year elsewhere — on-set in Atlanta, Vancouver or Australia, for example — and some have left the city altogether. It’s a shift driven less by lifestyle than by economics. Studio budgets are shrinking, and filming has shifted out of Hollywood as other states and countries introduce tax credits and offsets that make moviemaking cheaper. Last year, production in LA reached an all-time low, according to an October report by non-profit FilmLA.
“I think everyone can definitely feel the effects of shifting budgets, including the talent,” says Kent Belden, CEO of The Only Agency, which represents celebrity stylists including Dani Michelle and Sam Woolf.
This is having a knock-on impact on fashion. Traditionally, studios have set out styling budgets for talent doing press tours. But in recent years, those budgets have shrunk. One stylist says she marvels when she sees reports on how much big-budget movies make, and how successful they are, only for her rates per look to sit in the $500 to $700 range.
“These media companies and studios are huge corporations. They’re public companies. They’re always looking to save money,” observes Karla Welch, who styles talent from actors Renate Reinsve to Tessa Thompson.
“The studio budgets are not sustainable,” says stylist Britt Theodora, who works with the likes of director Celine Song and actor Pete Davidson. “I have a studio, I have a full-time employee, I work with multiple freelance assistants, I have tailors. There’s a lot of work that goes into these looks.” Sometimes, she says, you expect a big, 20-look press tour — and it winds up just needing a couple of looks. But you still have to put in the work.
The tide may be turning, at least when it comes to film budgets. In June 2025, California governor Gavin Newsom increased tax credits for film and television production from $330 million to $750 million a year. One stylist, who works in fashion and film rather than with celebrities, says she expects these to bring movie and commercial work back to LA. In December, Newsom announced that 28 film projects have received financial support through the recently expanded tax credit program, which bodes well for 2026.
