How do I ignore a directory in mod_rewrite?

Try putting this before any other rules.

RewriteRule ^vip - [L,NC] 

It will match any URI beginning vip.

• The - means do nothing.
• The L means this should be last rule; ignore everything following.
• The NC means no-case (so “VIP” is also matched).

Note that it matches anything beginning vip. The expression ^vip$ would match vip but not vip/ or vip/index.html. The $ may have been your downfall. If you really want to do it right, you might want to go with ^vip(/|$) so you don’t match vip-page.html