#AICANTDOTHIS: Fashion Has A Pulse

Article + Creative Direction by Vanessa Coppes

Photography by Miguel Pichardo

Makeup by Chris Lanston

Hair by Lily Pisano, The Secret Garden Eco-Chic Boutique

Stylists Mindy Shapiro + Paula Orlan

Styling Assistance by Daniela Morales + Alexis Lombardo

Behind the Scenes Photography and Videography by Michelle Behre + Miguel Pichardo

Shoot Assistance by Daniela Morales, Alexis Lombardo + Alessandra Agostino

Location, Vivian Pisano Photography Studio

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Style Credits: Boots, UGG | Sweater, Grey/Ven

What happens when fashion starts moving faster than its soul can catch up?

We’re living in a time where trends are born and buried in the same scroll. Where models don’t breathe, and makeup looks don’t smudge. Where creativity can be prompted, rendered, and posted — without a single human touch.

We’ve chosen fast over real, flawless over honest, and data over instinct. In doing so, we’re watching an industry — one built on imagination, vulnerability, and people — being quietly erased.

The AI revolution didn’t knock on fashion’s door. It broke it down.

It’s already replacing copywriters, retouchers, illustrators, editors, stylists, and models.

And the most dangerous part? We’ve welcomed it. We’ve normalized it. We’ve filtered the human out of the frame, and we’ve called it progress.

This issue of BELLA is our line in the sand.

Covers That Speak

This season, we broke our own rules.

I put myself on the cover — not because I am famous, but because I have been real. I am a Latina immigrant who has been told “no” more times than I can count, who was excluded from rooms and who once dreamed of writing for a magazine like BELLA — and now I own it.

I almost didn’t do it. I questioned whether I belonged on the cover and then I remembered: if I don’t take up space, how can I ask anyone else to?

I also wanted to present an alternate cover, Annabelle Hedges, a model, dancer, and content creator who represents the next generation of fashion. Photographed by the legendary Nigel Barker, Annabelle’s shoot is an ode to unfiltered beauty — undone hair, natural light, emotion in motion. Just real.

Together, these two covers say what we’ve all been thinking: AI might be fast. But it will never be us.

“The AI revolution didn’t knock on fashion’s door. It broke it down. It’s already replacing copywriters, retouchers, illustrators, editors, stylists, and models. And the most dangerous part? We’ve welcomed it. We’ve normalized it. We’ve filtered the human out of the frame, and we’ve called it progress. This issue of BELLA is our line in the sand.”

Vanessa Coppes

What AI Still Can’t Do

As I began working on this issue, I found myself deep in research about how artificial intelligence is shaping — and in many ways threatening — the future of fashion. The findings were alarming, not just because of what AI can do, but because of everything it still can’t.

AI can replicate a runway show. It can style a virtual model, generate a garment, even mimic the cadence of a fashion caption. But it can’t feel.

AI doesn’t know the weight of silk in your hands or the adrenaline that hits backstage when a zipper gets stuck 30 seconds before showtime. It can’t smell fabric fresh off the steamer or sense the hesitation in a model’s breath before stepping into the light.

AI can’t understand the cultural history sewn into a hand-stitched hem, or the nuance of foundation undertones on deep skin. AI also didn’t grow up flipping through fashion magazines as an escape. It wasn’t bullied for being different, or told it didn’t “look the part.”

AI never had to scrape together enough money to attend fashion week, or stay up until 3AM sewing a dream together by hand.

Those experiences matter

They shape the art, the work, the energy that pulses through this industry.

And if we replace them with code and convenience, we will lose the very heartbeat of fashion.

AI isn’t just about replacing tasks — it’s about erasing context. When we outsource creativity to algorithms, we risk creating an industry that is technically perfect… but emotionally empty. We create a fashion landscape that looks good on our screens — but feels soulless in real life.

What We’re Really Fighting For

Let me be very clear: I am not against technology. I use it. I embrace it. We all do.

This isn’t an anti-AI conversation. This is an anti-erasure moment.

I believe in innovation — but not if it means flattening identity.

I believe in tools — but not if they become replacements for lived experience.

I believe in fashion — the kind that is messy, brave, unpredictable, raw, beautiful.

I believe in fashion that’s made with hands, not prompts. The kind that’s shaped by stories.

Style Credits: Top, Old Navy | Jeans, Generation Love

Fashion Has a Pulse

And it beats in the hands of the seamstress,

In the flash of a photographer’s eye,

In the spine of a woman stepping on set for the first time.

It beats in the pages of this magazine.

We won’t let fashion lose its heartbeat.

Not while we’re still here.

Not while you’re still here.