Prince Charles to meet Australian fashion royalty - and some sheep

via the clitheroe advertiser

Now that Andrej Pejic has met the Queen, it’s only fitting that some other members of the Australian fashion flock get to mingle with the Royals. If you didn’t already know by now, Their Royal Highnesses Prince Charles and Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall are en route to Australia with a whirlwind itinerary that will take in Tuesday’s Melbourne Cup – in fact the duo is due to present the trophy to the winner. Far less well-advertised on their Aussie to-do list is a Woolmark event on Friday 9th November at the Museum of Contemporary Art.

White Sands headed to the Miami runway - but Zimmermann bypasses IMG for New York

white sands

It’s July, it must be time for the world’s biggest bikini show. Yep, the Swimwear Association of Florida’s SwimShow runs from July 18-21 at the Miami Beach Convention Center and as usual, a swarm of local swimwear brands is heading to it. At least 13 Antipodian brands are listed in the lineup, from Anna & Boy to Camilla, Tigerlily, Jets, Seafolly and Zimmermann. With 350 exhibitors, 2000 swimwear lines, 2000 US buyers - and buyers from 50 other markets - Miami is the place to be for anyone in the swimwear biz. Separate to this event - which takes a traditional trade show booth format - IMG runs a smaller, glitzier runway showcase called Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Swim at Miami’s Raleigh Hotel. This year it runs from July 15-19 and on July 18 at 8pm, Leah Madden’s White Sands will become the second Australian brand after Zimmermann to appear on IMG’s runway. Interestingly, after two consecutive years showing at both the SwimShow and IMG's event, this year Zimmermann is ditching IMG's schedule and heading straight from the Miami Beach Convention Centre to New York for an independent presentation at the Empire Hotel on July 22. Then again, Zimmermann has already invested in two IMG FASHION Asia Pacific events this year: February's inaugural Swim Fashion Week and May's RAFW.

Backstage with Camilla and Marc Freeman

Camilla and Marc cooler than Irina, Lovefoxx and Lou Doillon?

Camilla and Marc Freeman/vogue.com.au

According to today’s Observer newspaper in the UK they are.

The Sydney fashion siblings are ranked 3rd and 4th in the paper’s Top 50 “Summer 08 Cool List”, beaten only by Brit tv host Alexa Chung – who is described as “the Kate Moss of teen tv” - and author/filmmaker Miranda July.

The Freemans’ five year-old fashion label may be sold by such influential retailers as net-a-porter.com, but it’s nevertheless a pretty big rap given some of the other, far more heavily-hyped hipsters who appear much lower down the list:

• Facehunter blogger Yvan Rodic (7)
• Model Irina Lazareanu (21)
• Photographer Matt Irwin (28)
• MisShapes frontwoman Leigh Lezark (29)
• Dazed & Confused creative director Nicola Formichetti (31)
• BoomBox and Ponystep founder Richard Mortimer (34)
• Model Jourdan Dunn (37)
• British knitwear designer Claire Tough (38)
• French actress/sisters Lou Doillon, Charlotte Gainsbourg (42/43)
• British designer JJ Hudson aka Noki (44)
• Brazil's Cansei de Ser Sexy frontwoman Lovefoxx (46)
• Hintmag founder Lee Carter (48)

Other Australasian hipsters may be disappointed to have been overlooked. The list does include two additional antipodians, however they’re not in fashion.

Summer Heights funnyman Chris Lilley ranks #30 – while London-based Kiwi songstress Pip Brown, aka Ladyhawke, ranks #41.

Paul Keating and the Veronicas - Fashion Week kicks off

I'm en route to the first show of Fashion Week: camilla and marc down at the Sydney Theatre Company. It's a beautiful day, with still not much sign of winter - except save no doubt for the winter clothes in which I am expecting most will be clad today. Wear current season's winter, watch next season's summer.... yes the crazy fashion locomotive charges forward.

This time last year I was new to blogging - and indeed blogging was relatively new to the event. This is my fourth blog in twelve months and I've noticed that the blogging ranks have started to swell, not just in Sydney but overseas as well. By February we saw The New York Times add a fashion blog to the runway review duties of its chief critic (Cathy Horyn), the latest in a long list of mainstream newspaper and also indie blogs to enter the tents. As with every other sphere that the blogging phenomenon touches, blogging provides a unique viewpoint at fashion shows.

Bloggers have no space limits, usually no sub editors and few rules. We also provide a backbone for dialogue with our readers and this is one aspect of the medium that I am finding fascinating at the moment - the reactions by some designers to the (relatively) unfettered commentaries of the public.

Some, like Alex Perry, say they are "thick-skinned" - and the frequent flack is like water off a duck's back. Others, I can tell you, aren't quite so bolshie. All I can say to them is, deal with it. The public are the end users of what you are showing on these runways, they have a right to their point of view.

Now sitting down inside the venue - one very long, snaking front row that runs from the front to the back of the STC. Too bad Cate Blanchett isn't on deck yet here. It's little consolation I suppose, but I've just brushed past a couple of Oz popettes.

"We could sit you over there next to them - you could be the third Veronica" quipped Lorraine Lock, the wife of Fashion Week supremo Simon Lock.

[Former Australian prime minister] Paul Keating is supposed to be somewhere in the distance. He could be the fourth Veronica.

The show itself is a pretty, and very short ode to the major influences of the northern hemisphere's current spring/summer season, with a soupcon of the new winter's tough chic thrown in for good measure: a suite of A-line, waistless shift dresses with exposed silver and brass zippers, some of them boasting sportif racerbacks.

I liked the cropped, hooded boleros in barely-there flesh tones, the vermillion micro knit dress and the series of cobalt shift dresses, which should provide plenty of party dresses for the Pretty Young Thing customers of this up-and-coming brand.

But while everyone has a trench coat on offer these days, camilla and marc's baggy-sleeved versions looked far too Stella McCartney-esque for my money and the lab coat dresses with grommets, like (very) poor man's Lanvin. Please leave the complete ripoffs to the high street.

Walking out, I spot Keating and manage to grab a few comments:

What did you think about the collection?
Paul Keating: Oh I liked the collection. I liked #1, #3 and #5 for a start. And a number of other single items in there.

What did you particularly like about them?
Well, their chic casualness.

Does it compare to Zegna?
Well that's formal. We don't get around in suits all day, do we?

No that's very true. What do you think about fashion in Australia in general?
Well I think fashion is one of the great arts, one of the great creative arts. One of the places where the endless combinations and permutations of fantasy all mix.

Do you think it gets enough support from the Australian government?
Oh well, I don't know what support it gets, to be honest.

On Saturday night at another show I spoke to Ian Thorpe, who volunteered that he had seen some Dior shows. Have you done Dior - or any other international fashion shows?
I haven't been to any.

Really?
I'm interested in the international fashion shows of the 30s and 40s and 50s when clothing was at its peak.

But that was a bit before your time wasn't it?
Well no style is before one's time.

I meant you couldn't possibly have been at those shows.
Oh I couldn't have been at the shows. But the gear is still around - the great A-line of the 50s, Balenciaga and all those people.

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Sibling revelry: Fashion Week openers Camilla and Marc crack page one

Sydney's brother-and-sister fashion act Camilla and Marc Freeman are on a roll. First they scored the highly-coveted opening spot at Australian Fashion Week: 9am on Monday April 30th. And now they've made the cover of one of the world's most influential fashion publications: US fashion trade 'bible' Women's Wear Daily.

The Freemans are part of a double-page story inside Tuesday's edition about up-and-coming labels in the US market, from which their image was selected for page one - with their names, a brief backgrounder and stockist CV splashed all over same.

And while they are not the first antipodians to make WWD's cover - Collette Dinnigan was the first back in 1996, followed more recently by a handful of other names notably Josh Goot, Dinosaur Designs and Lover and Kiwis Trelise Cooper and Karen Walker - it's a pretty significant coup, not to mention a great leadin to their Fashion Week show.

"Marc and I are really excited that camilla and marc has made the cover of WWD, hopefully this is a positive sign of things to come for the label in the USA" Camilla Freeman told Fashion Season.

"We have also just confirmed [high profile UK- and now also US-based online retailer] net-a-porter.com as a stockist, which is great news as they are such a respected online store. All this good news has made the hard work involved in our RAFW show that much easier!"

I'm not going to pretend that was a first-hand quote.

You may get to hear from Alber Elbaz, Miuccia Prada, Marc Jacobs et al while Fashion Season is on the road but back in Sydney we have to make do with statements from twentysomething designers' publicists. Such is life. Australian designers are clearly busy bees these days. So much of the world to conquer, so little time.

But look, the Freemans have a charming, feminine signature, a great story and I wish them well. I mean come on, how many brother-and-sister fashion acts are there? Well OK, maybe Gianni and Donatella Versace and Christopher and Tammy Kane and then of course Rebecca Davies and her brother and Belinda Seper and her Joburg-based bro..... but that said, it's fairly unusual you have to admit. Camilla, 25, is a graduate of the Whitehouse Institute of Design and Marc, 27, has, I kid you not, an engineering degree from the University of NSW.

What else can I tell you? They will open Fashion Week down at the Sydney Theatre Company - using one long front row stretched along the STC boards between the Hickson Road entrance and the restaurant. The collection, in a muted palette, is described as "a strong collection of modern directional silhouettes paired back with feminine timeless fabrics".

Bring it on.

Patty Huntington is a contributor to Women's Wear Daily.

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