Apparently an appearance fee or the token fee dress is no longer enough for a celebrity to make the rounds at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week at Bryant Park. At Badgley Mischka’s show Tuesday, Shenae Grimes was on the clock tracking trends for Nylon magazine. “In L.A., it’s all about looking like you are someone and here it’s all about proving you are someone. Most of these designers don’t give a crap about dressing celebrities. They want to dress real women,” the 19-year-old said. “The line between fashion and celebrities has really blurred in the past few years but it’s getting back to being about women who actually buy the clothes. And that’s what fashion is all about.”

Another show guest, Kim Kardashian, said she has been busy trying out her upcoming fragrance on her boyfriend, Reggie Bush, and her whole reality TV family. Having been in the studio recording her third album until 3 a.m., Kelly Rowland was at a loss to identify her show attire. As for the Kanye West-Taylor Swift dust-up, Rowland said it was “really disappointing, but it came from a good place. Kanye really likes B [Beyoncé] as an artist.”

Bethenny Frankel of “The Real Housewives of New York City” took the tents for her new gig as an “Access Hollywood” guest commentator. “The ironic thing is I bought all my clothes on eBay and at sample sales so I did everything wrong — except for wearing this Badgley Mischka dress they sent me,” she said.

But that wasn’t the only faux pas — Frankel said she was also scolded for leafing through the runway looks backstage, stealing a celebrity’s seat and standing up on the
chairs. “It was all kind of comical,” she said after the show. Her second book, “The Skinny Girl Dish,” is due out in November and next year she will debut “affordable” Skinny Girl activewear that can be worn to the health club and then out to lunch “but not to lunch at Le Cirque,” she said.

When her on-screen frenemy Kelly Bensimon suggested pulling up a seat, Frankel obliged. Frankel said, “I guess my little lithium and Prozac cereal worked today. I mean, how many times can I beat a dead horse? I can’t be a hater — 2010 is all about nice.”

Bensimon looked like she is also on board with that frame of mind, greeting camera-snapping fans warmly. When one complimented her Swarovski crystal bracelets, she piped up that they were from her new jewelry collection called Kelly. A former Elle magazine accessories editor and model, Bensimon said she was inspired in part by the
Native American designs worn by the late Standard Oil heiress Millicent Rogers. But the reality star sounded less enthusiastic about the reconciliation with Frankel. “She
wasn’t very nice to me and I didn’t want to be part of that. I don’t really care. She’s a girl,” Bensimon said. “I teach my kids, ‘If someone does something you don’t like, you speak up and move on.