“Stop Being Rich”: Vetements Makes a Paris Hilton Meme a Twisted Reality

If you’ve been an internet user at any point since the mid-aughts, you might think you’re familiar with the photo of Paris Hilton wearing a slogan tee that read “Stop Being Poor” at the launch of her sister Nicky’s clothing line in 2005. By the time Hilton revealed that it was Photoshopped in an Instagram captioned “debunking the #STOPBEINGPOOR myth” last year, it was already too late: The public will forever remember (and continue) to circulate the image that was fake. In fact, 17 years later, it appears to still be fresh on the mind of Vetements’s Guram Gvasalia. On Thursday, he brought a version of it back at the presentation of the label’s spring 2023 collection which happened to be held during Paris Haute Couture Week.

Per usual, the latest Vetements collection was full of slogan tees—this time, mostly featuring the words “I’m not doing shit today” and “Mother Earth.” But there was one that immediately stood apart: A white shirt that read “STOP BEING RICH.” The reference was unmistakable: It would have been identical to Hilton’s if Gvasalia hadn’t swapped out the last word.

Ironically enough, getting your hands on the shirt pretty much necessitates being rich. Gvasalia has embraced high price points when it comes to Vetements’s slogan tees for years now: A $570 one that went on sale in 2019, for example, read “It's My Birthday And All I got Was This Overpriced T-Shirt From Vetements.”