Rachel Zoe Admits 1 Reason She Left Styling Was Because She Was 'Betrayed' by Assistants: 'I Couldn't Trust' Them (Exclusive)
- - Rachel Zoe Admits 1 Reason She Left Styling Was Because She Was 'Betrayed' by Assistants: 'I Couldn't Trust' Them (Exclusive)
Brianne TracyJanuary 2, 2026 at 6:30 AM
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Rachel Zoe -
Rachel Zoe says one major reason why she left the world of celebrity styling 12 years ago was because she'd been burned one too many times by her assistants
"In full disclosure, I just couldn't trust assistants," she says
Zoe has previously been open about her falling out with her ex-assistant Brad Goreski
Rachel Zoe is opening up about why she decided to step away from celebrity styling.
The fashion mogul, 54, tells PEOPLE that in addition to wanting to focus on her family and building her businesses, she left styling 12 years ago because she'd been burned one too many times by her assistants.
“In full disclosure, I just couldn't trust assistants,” Zoe says. “The definition of insanity is when you do the same thing over and over and expect a different outcome. I think after being completely betrayed, for lack of a better term, in various ways, by enough assistants and not being able to trust them with my clients and stuff to represent what I do and how I am with my clients, it just wasn't worth it anymore."
Zoe added that her clients — which included stars like Jennifer Garner, Lindsay Lohan, Kate Hudson, Mischa Barton and Nicole Richie — felt like "extended family" to her so "there was no margin for error."
"I never wanted to let them down, ever," she says. "But if I have five clients going through an award season, I physically cannot be with all five at the same time. You have to be able to entrust that in people that represent your work, and if you can't do that, the system is broken."
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Rachel Zoe
Zoe has previously been open about her falling out with her ex-assistant Brad Goreski, who was featured on her Bravo show The Rachel Zoe Project and left his job at the brand in 2010.
In a 2011 interview with New York magazine's The Cut, Zoe alleged that Goreski, 48, "started to pursue our clients, started going to all these events, and doing all the things he said he had "no interest in" within a week of leaving her company.
"It's not the first time I've been used," she said at the time. "I would say it's going to be the last time, though."
In October 2024, Zoe revealed to PEOPLE that she is still not in contact with Goreski. "I just, honestly, I don’t talk to him," she said.
THOMAS EVANS/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images Rachel Zoe and Brad Goreski
Zoe also tells PEOPLE now that becoming a mom to her sons Skyler, 14, and Kaius, 12 — whom she shares with ex Rodger Berman — made styling difficult.
“It was hard to give styling my undivided attention and to get up and jump on a plane every other day, which is really what that life is,” she says. “It's incessant and unpredictable traveling, with fittings at 2 a.m. You are working for other people, and you are on other people's schedules, and that's very hard to do when you have multiple businesses, and you are the CEO and you have a newborn and a toddler.”
“I've definitely spent my life trying to be all things to all people,” she continues. “But in the end, it's not sustainable in the sense that you can't really be 100% everything to everyone in every area of your life and your business. You just can't.”
In the years since she stepped away from styling, Zoe has grown her business to almost 50 brand extensions and licensing partners. She has also returned to reality TV in season 15 of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.
"I'm very honest about where I am and what I'm dealing with on [RHOBH]," says Zoe, who filed for divorce from Berman in July. "I think my goal is really to share the reality of my life. And everyone's going through stuff, right?”
The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. ET on Bravo, with episodes available to stream the next day on Peacock.
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
