Birthday girl - David Jones Autumn/Winter 2013

Australia’s David Jones celebrates its 175^th birthday this year, making it the oldest department in the world to be operating under its original name. Last night in Sydney, DJs staged its Autumn/Winter 2013 fashion showcase. Thanks to a dramatic expansion of the backstage area - 250sqm of it in fact, over double the space allocated for the previous two seasons - there was so much more room for the media in attendance, from DJs’ outside broadcast camera crew, who were shooting for the live stream, to all the photographers and social media chroniclers on deck (see our backstage portfolio, below). The latter included many of the models themselves, who were happy-snapping and Instagramming in the lineup in their first looks.

The producers: Lara Karamian - MBFWA SS 12/13

backstage at miss couture SS1112, sydney, may 2011/lara karamian

Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia starts next Monday in Sydney and today, the event began to bump in to the Overseas Passenger Terminal site. Production teams are scrambling to put the finishing touches to show concepts. Yesterday, as part of frockwriter's pre-MBFWA series, we posted a chat with producer Mark Vassallo. And now here is a Q+A with Lara Karamian, arguably the busiest producer of the week. Karamian has been with Australian Fashion Week for 12 years. After graduating from the University of Technology of Sydney in 2000 with a Bachelor of Management – and a major in event management – she worked as an event producer for Spin Communications, the sister company of Fashion Week founder Australian Fashion Innovators, eventually moving onto Fashion Week proper as an in-house producer. In 2005, Karamian founded her own independent events company called LARA INC and today counts Alex Perry, Lisa Ho, Toni Maticevski, David Jones, Marie Claire, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Burberry and Australia's Next Top Model among her clients. 

Coles steals the show

coles 'aisle avant-garde' show via lifestyled

Back in March, in reviewing a fashion show staged by Kiwi hipster collective Stolen Girlfriends Club at the New World supermarket in Auckland's Victoria Park, Pedestrian noted "We can only hope that next time we're at Coles it's this eventful". They didn't have to wait long. Last week, Coles ripped off the idea for its 'Aisle Avant-Garde' presentation in Sydney in collaboration with Sunsilk, showcasing the work of 12 UTS students who were each asked to create a gown that incorporated Sunsilk's logo and colours. Above and below are a few shots from last week and, bottom, a video of the SGC original at New World, a New Zealand supermarket chain owned by Foodstuffs. Needless to say, Coles doesn't take quite such a laissez-faire attitude when it comes to anyone shoplifting its goods. Although given that Coles apparently rebranded its Australian supermarkets as Coles New World in 1962 - the year before New Zealand's New World chain was founded - perhaps there's 50 years of trans Tasman tit for tat at play here. 

Josh Goot's Richter scale

It's three years since Josh Goot last showed in Sydney – and just six years since he launched his brand here, with an unforgettable collection of what he dubbed ‘tailored comfort’, realised in a space age track-and-field silhouette that included jersey trench coats and blazers. After showing for multiple seasons at New York and London Fashion Weeks, Goot has firmly established himself at the vanguard of Australia’s new designer generation. And what international polish he brought to Australian Fashion Week last night. The production, co-signed by The Artist Group and Mr and Mrs Fish, dragged arguably the week’s biggest crowd up six flights of stairs to an abandoned inner-city carpark, transformed for the evening to a futuristic sporting venue. Partially inspired by the German expressionist artist Gerhard Richter, the collection, which was delivered in modern techno silks, sporty neoprene and an eye-popping palette of fluoro pink, cobalt blue, Kelly green, black, silver and white, focussed on a voluminous silhouette. More to come. 

Kate Sylvester's mothwoman prophecies

Inspired by moths and motocross, Kate Sylvester’s Spring/Summer 2011/2012 collection is called ‘Into the light’. Due to the awkward lighting of her show at the Newmarket saleyard in Randwick last night, however, ironically many have complained that didn’t get to see it. In an uncharacteristically abrasive spray, even Vogue Australia’s Damien Woolnough complained today, “If I want to sit in a dark room filled with smoke I'll visit the share house of my university friends”. Frockwriter stayed backstage for the duration and had a much better view. It was a fantastic, if macabre, collection, with two motifs at its centrifuge: moth markings, which included a full death’s head moth motif used on T-shirts; and then a flame graphic, which doubled up on the revhead theme, as seen on coats, dresses and several fantastic sheer jumpsuits, shown with the tops worn both up and down – on the latter occasion, teamed with a lacy brassiere. 

Lover comes back

It’s been a long time in between Lover shows at RAFW. Five years to be precise. The Black Rose Army collection, shown in May 2006, was staged in a grungy, inner-city dive. Last night’s presentation of The White Serpent SS1112 collection demonstrates that this Sydney brand with a global cult following, which celebrates its 10 year anniversary this year, has most certainly come of age. A slick, ultra-sophisticated affair staged inside the Sydney Opera House, the collection was dazzling in its simplicity. Rendered in a three note palette of ivory, black and scarlet red, the collection flirted with masculine/feminine stereotypes: ivory tuxedos and jumpsuits with ultra wide-legs and mannish, oversized jackets were layered over sheer white blouses with pie-crust collars and lace inserts, then segued into a suite of killer lace dresses. Although the lace dress is a Lover signature, these sophisticated versions said not so much Woodstock free spirit as red carpet siren and they could give Collette Dinnigan a run for her money. 

Carla Zampatti's fair ladies

Frockwriter hears that Carla Zampatti had to have her arm twisted to use the basement of her Kent Street headquarters as a show venue on Thursday. Originally used in the late 1800s as a carriageway for horse-drawn vehicles, but now serving as Zampatti's garage, presumably the Australian fashion industry veteran figured the crumbling industrial interior was not sufficiently chi-chi for her classic, uptown designs. Celebrating her 46th year of business this year, good to see Zampatti take advice from a younger creative generation. The space was not unlike many edgy show venues that you would see at London Fashion Week. And stylist Michelle Jank made full use of the 19th century brickwork, using it as the backdrop for a model tableau that was choreographed at the end of the show. Wearing the strikingly elegant eveningwear from Zampatti’s 'Strength of Simplicity' Spring/Summer 2011/2012 collection, which included columns with sporty necklines in tangerine, cobalt, black and ivory and a pretty short shell pink taffeta puffball dress - all teamed with beautiful, Beaton-esque picture hat-like silk georgette headpieces from Jonathan Howard ‘Hatmaker’ - the models draped themselves over chairs and ladders at the end of the runway. The image evoked the iconic Cecil Beaton photograph of models in Christian Dior’s 1957 collection, which has been copied a number of times by fashion magazines - one example of which we spotted backstage as reference. 

The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show 2010

manik mercian for victoria's secret/getty via daylife

The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show 2010 screened in the US on Tuesday night. Predictably, it did not take long to wind up on YouTube. Here is the entire show, below, which frockwriter noted last month did not include a single Australian model for the first time in four years. Several Australians were, however, involved in the show. For the sixth consecutive year, Sydney jeweller Jenny Mercian created some spectacular showpieces, including this fringed corset, above. And New York-based Sydney expat casting director and show producer Kannon Rajah can be seen in numerous shots sending the models out onto the runway. 

Flake's Alexander McQueen fake

Interesting new tv spot by iconic British chocolate bar maker Cadbury Flake, which airs tonight in the UK. Produced by an outfit called Fallon, according to Creative Review the clip was directed by Baillie Walsh and features Russian model Yulia Lobova, who is suspended mid-air dressed in a flowing yellow dress that was fashioned from 200 metres of fabric. The dress was designed by British couturier Antony Price, who just told vogue.co.uk that "The idea came from looking at the edges of the Flake bar and the look of a Portuguese man of war jelly fish... It took a while playing around with the frills of the dress to make it look like Flake bar edges. I do think this form of pleating is very directional - it may well creep into my next collection." Frockwriter can't help thinking that there may have been another source of inspiration for the concept - one a little closer to home for Flake and Price than Portugal.

Below is a video of the finale of the Widows of Culloden Fall/Winter 2006/2007 show of the late, great British designer Alexander McQueen, who took his own life in February.

Staged in Paris in March 2006, the show concluded with a spectacular, ghostly illusion of Kate Moss that was projected inside a giant glass pyramid in the centre of the stage. Wearing a diaphanous ballgown - that is not too dissimilar to the Price/Flake version - Moss appeared to float in the air inside the structure.

Although dubbed a life-sized "hologram" by many, McQueen's longtime show producer Simon Kenny later told me that it was in fact a Victorian era parlour trick called Pepper’s Ghost.

UPDATE 09/06/10 at 3.25pm: Creative Review updated its story overnight to point out that the Flake ad director Baillie Walsh in fact also directed the clip of Kate Moss for McQueen's show in 2006. "I'm not sure how Walsh can be 'stealing' his own work" notes CR editor Patrick Burgoyne, responding to comments that the Flake clip is a ripoff of McQueen's 2006 catwalk stunt (comments that were posted after frockwriter's post FYI). On closer inspection, however, the McQueen illusion was created with the assistance of several production houses, including not only Simon Kenny's Souvenir Scenic Studios, but also Glassworks and Gainsbury and Whiting. But who actually came up with the idea?

UPDATE 14/06: Evidently McQueen's company believes he did. The company is now considering legal action against Cadbury.

Viktor & Rolf's Freaky Saturday

Alexander McQueen might be gone, but we still have a a couple of showmen/women left, Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren at the top of the list. The Dutch duo is renowned for the theatricality of its shows (which frequently upstage the actual collections). Some experiments have gone wrong – a case in point the Fall Winter 2007/2008 show from three years ago, in which models were forced to walk the runway in bizarre metal light rig harnesses. Noone ate the catwalk and just as well, as they could have seriously injured themselves. The duo was subsequently widely accused of misogyny (a common criticism of McQueen). Here is the post I did from that show from Paris for smh.com.au. No such criticism of Saturday’s show, which is being billed as one of the best of the season, if not the best.

The collection, called ‘Glamour Factory’, was set against a monchromatic backdrop painted with graphics of industrial cogs.

The predominantly black and grey collection would most likely have passed largely unnoticed had it not been for the clever staging, which starred 43 year-old American model Kristen McMenamy in her second runway outing this season, after Calvin Klein's show in New York three weeks ago.

McMenamy wore 23 looks. All at once.

Piled, Russian doll-like, under layers of coats and dresses, she walked to a rotating disc in the middle of the runway and stood there like a store mannequin, while the designers peeled off the layers right down to a nude-coloured corset.

As the duo undressed McMenamy, they dressed each of the remainder of the model cast – every last one of them, as per usual, young enough to be McMenamy's daughter - in her discarded clothes. Think Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan in Freaky Friday, just swapping sporty fur-lined anoraks, tweed boyfriend jackets and bodysuits, satin smoking jackets and LBDs, instead of minds.

By all accounts, McMenamy was re-dressed in the garments as the models returned from their turns on the runway.

The climax was delivered by way of a giant panniered skirt which was inverted and transformed on McMenamy via a drawstring, to a cape with a behemoth Elizabethan collar.

You had to be there obviously. But for everyone who wasn’t, the above video gives a taste. Here is the entire collection in photos.

Needless to say, no backstage dressers were required.

RAFW ditches the Big Top

sass & bide SS0809 @ the studio/getty via daylife

Well we did say it was going to be the Recessionista edition. In a nod to the economic downturn, and a reluctance on the part of designers to book the largest, and most expensive, Rosemount Australian Fashion Week show venue - The Studio - frockwriter can reveal that organiser IMG will most likely can The Studio altogether this season. As it emerges, designers have been fighting over time slots in the two most cost-effective show venues - the Cargo Theatre and the OPT room - and leaving The Studio with no takers. The Studio is RAFW's largest show venue, a purpose-built marquee that is traditionally erected on the Circular Quay foreshore. At a cost of A$15,000 + GST The Studio (capacity 650) doesn't seem that much more expensive than the OPT (A$13,000/450) and Cargo Theatre (A$11,000/300). This fee includes all show production aspects, minus models, hair and makeup, PR and ticketing. But the bigger the venue, the greater the costs all around, including ticket printing, postage etc.. And in this environment, it seems hardly surprising.

Sydney is not the only fashion city to feel the pinch of the economic downturn.

The just-wrapped Fall/Winter 0910 show season was marked by numerous show cancellations and cheaper static presentations or video alternatives (eg Halston, Temperley and Gareth Pugh). This was particularly true of the American event, where of course the retail market has been very adversely affected.

But even Milan Fashion Week cut one full day of shows off its schedule.

IMG tells frockwriter that the upcoming SS0910 showcase is definitely not being cut back to four days, from five. Apart from the traditional student and New Generation group shows that usually take place on the Friday, at least one brand reports that it already has a confirmed Friday time slot: Anna & Boy.

Just a reminder that this blog has been tracking the RAFW schedule as it comes together - and before its official release, which at this stage is slated for April 15.

The information comes directly from the designers or their spokespeople.

Four weeks out, the schedule already boasts 31 names that say they have confirmed they will do solo presentations. Those confirmed include some very big local names, from sass & bide – which is definitely now doing a presentation and not a runway show – to Willow, Kate Sylvester, Aurelio Costarella, Lisa Ho, Zimmermann and Ginger & Smart.

There will still be a tented venue on the ground level at the Overseas Passenger Terminal, primarily for registration and sponsorship purposes.

The biggest challenge, says IMG, will be engineering dual preparation areas behind both the Cargo Theatre and OPT show spaces, as shows will be bumping in and out much more quickly than if there was a third show venue to take some of the pressure. Additional tents may have to be constructed to accommodate this.

Graeme Lewsey, IMG FASHION Asia Pacific director of communications, told frockwriter:

“It’s a bit of a challenge, but it's not going to be a problem - if that's what we need to do because that’s what the industry is looking for, then that’s what we'll do. It's becoming really obvious that people want to be more comfortable with the slightly smaller venues. Nothing else changes apart from the fact that we have to build these double backstage areas. We’re not troubled by it and it's not affecting the number of designers that are going to be showing. The industry is defiant that it's got a lot to sing about and we’ve got a strong industry and we’re already seeing some really great labels that are coming back. There is a subsantial domestic focus this year. It's going to be important for designers to show at RAFW to strengthen what is a really important part of their business – their domestic business".

Traditionally the venue for all of IMG's group shows, The Studio has in the past also showcased the event's biggest solo show names.

In 2008, these included sass & bide, Easton Pearson, Michelle Jank, Alex Perry and Camilla.

In an interview this week, sass & bide’s Heidi Middleton told this journalist that her company spends A$200,000 a season showing at New York Fashion Week.

Considering that exports account for a mere 20percent of sass & bide's A$25+million sales turnover, that is some investment. But it does not of course take into account the international publicity generated by showing at a major international fashion event.

With the US retail market flatlining at the moment, and therefore a slim possibility of an immediate ROI - at least in the US market - it is not difficult to understand why sass & bide and several other Australian brands have skipped NYFW for the past two seasons.

Grand central: Zac Posen's 50-finger discount

By all accounts one of the most remarkable shows in what has been a very strange New York Fashion Week, Zac Posen’s Thursday night presentation earned him a standing ovation. Dreaming of multiple Steinway pianos for his runway, Posen contacted the American piano maker – which he describes as “the last luxury company in America” – and told them he could only afford one. Steinway not only provided five Steinway grand pianos for nix, they threw in five Steinway Exclusive artists: the 5 Browns, five Mormon siblings from Utah who call themselves "classical music's first family of piano virtuosos". The show starred Australians Myf Shepherd and Catherine McNeil [whose gf Freja Beha Erichsen follows directly behind McNeil at the 44 second mark]. Here is IMG's edited video of the show. And here's a chat with Posen, recorded in Melbourne last March, when he was out for the release of his Target capsule collection - during which interview he discusses the concept of "fashiontainment".