Frocks rule. Had he been as passionate a fashion writer as he was a conservationist - and exhibitionist - Steve Irwin might have said that.
As evidenced by pretty much every collection on Sydney's runways this week, the dress continues to be one of, if not the, biggest contemporary fashion story. And while to the ears of the uninitiated, it might sound absurd to say that dresses are currently a major fashion statement - as if they ever went away as a sartorial option for women - fact is, their popularity has waxed and waned over the decades. For the past couple of years however, the dress has been creeping back into collections with a vengeance.
Most major retailers with whom I have spoken over the past three seasons have all echoed the same sentiment - that the dress continues to power ahead on their sales floors. There are dress-specialist labels, dress-dedicated departments now in some department stores and even, it seems, some dress-specialist stores.
Take the Austique boutique over in London. Austique is operated by expat Australian Lindy Lopes and specialises in Australian labels - with 100% of what retailers refer to as "sellthrough" on dress-specialist label Alice McCall, reports Lopes, which means that essentially all the McCall stock that Lopes buys basically walks out the door. Lopes told me that, apart from a few jeans, Austique has only been stocking dresses for the past two years.
I was sitting next to Lopes at last night's Stephanie Conley show. Extremely well-connected (engaged to Brit/Australian fashion photographer Ben Watts, Conley is the soon-to-be sister-in-law of Australian actor Naomi Watts) Conley also happens to do a great dress, a pretty daffodil yellow example of which was famously pictured on Lauren Bush at the US Open a year or so ago. Conley's fresh-as-a-daisy solo AFW runway debut was jam-packed with some of the prettiest dresses on offer so far this week: from sweet floral cotton sundresses to some knockout cocktail dresses in buttercup yellow silk cinched with wide, clear PVC belts.
Almost every collection this week has been groaning with dresses. From the ubiquitous, trapeze-line, waistless shift and sack dresses - some of them perilously short - to pert sundresses, pinafore dresses, a few resilient bubble dresses from last season, and also the far newer, masculine-nosed shirt-dress or shirtwaister, which has been omnipresent. A good case in point, Ginger & Smart's pintucked white tuxedo shirtdress this morning.
Tina Kalivas' spectacular, colour-blocked show yesterday, while at times a little reminiscent of London's Marios Schwab, featured some terrific dresses as well - notably one spectacular black ballerina dress with intricate cutout bodice. This afternoon Fleur Wood showed an ultra feminine collection of dresses, some of the prettiest festooned with delicate lace, with layers of nude-coloured tulle cascading from Empire bustlines.
"Dresses are rocketing" Wood told me straight after the show. "[In] wholesale orders and retail sales... our dresses sold an extra I think 400percent on the year before, dresses to skirts, last summer to this summer. Phenomenal".
"It's the biggest category right now" said Ruthie Miller, womenswear buyer for the three-unit Californian fashion chain American Rag which already carries 17 Australasian brands and by this afternoon was looking to add at least two more - Anna Thomas and Zambesi, both of which collections showed, you guessed it, great dresses.
Added Miller, "I saw the change for myself, as a buyer watching trends.... [that] women didn't realise how easy it was to put on a dress. They were always putting on jeans with a blouse and top, belts and this and that. But it was just so easy to get up in the morning and just put on that dress and look fabulous and not have to think about what shoes go with which shirt".
Noted Mark Werts, American Rag founder who travels to Australia twice a year with Miller, "For us it started in vintage clothing about three or four years ago, when every girl was wearing jeans. The more fashion-forward girls were wearing dresses right in the middle of the jeans boom".
Another expat Australian who is carving out an Australasian-nosed fashion retail niche is Elizabeth Charles, who operates one eponymous boutique in New York and a week ago opened her second in San Francisco.
"The dress is by far my biggest selling item - it's about 90percent of my inventory" Charles told Fashion Season. "Once the dress bubble ever bursts, I hope I'm ready. If it swings around to pants, I think you don't want to be stuck with a heap of frocks".
Original post and comments.
Wednesday, May 2, 2007
A design career punctuated by photo ops: Where to now for Ksubi?
I've just returned from the Ksubi press conference. As per usual it was one great big photo op for Ksubi co-founders Dan Single and George Gorrow: a meet-and-greet with their supposed bestie, international runway walker Erin Wasson.
As already reported, Wasson was recently sent a text message by the Ksubi lads to ask if she'd like to come on down to grace their show tomorrow. She jumped at the opportunity, Wasson told today's mini media scrum.
"So are you doing it for free?" asked someone from the media pack.
"Yeah" said Wasson, a little awkwardly.
For the record, Wasson happens to be an IMG model, and according to an IMG spokesperson, she is contracted and is being paid. As was Lily Cole, last year's international runway ringin at the event. IMG of course owns Australian Fashion Week and it has an interest in promoting its own talent. That's not to say that Wasson doesn't like and wear Ksubi's jeans or that she doesn't know and like Single and Gorrow. But it's worth pointing out this connection, just to keep some perspective.
After the "conference", during which not a great deal was said other than organiser Simon Lock recounting some of Ksubi's antics at AFW's past and some of their upcoming projects (a store in Tokyo, a book of photographs due out tomorrow) - and certainly nothing about yesterday's announcement of the sale of a chunk of Ksubi equity to Quiksilver Europe founder Harry Hodge - Gorrow, Single and Wasson squeezed in together for pics.
This is what Ksubi revels in: photo ops, back pats and prat fall pranks. Their fashion career, since they first launched themselves into publicity orbit in 2001, by sending 169 rats down the AFW runway, has been punctuated by one photo op after another. For the most part I do take my hat off to them: for the ability to keep on pulling publicity rabbits out of hats. I'm all for pushing the corners of the envelope and the label formerly known as Tsubi has certainly gone there many times.
From the models overboard show of 2003 (even Simon Lock at the time admitted he was nervous about the public liability issues of models coming to grief in Sydney Harbour after diving off the Tsubi boat) to the "fabulous nobodies" show of May 2005, you usually never know just what you're in for with a Tsubi show. Some ideas have been clever. Some have been offensive - a case in point, the "porno" calendar launch, for which models (including Michelle Leslie) posed in some very unflattering poses alongside cars and motorbikes. One line of accompanying 'graffiti' was so offensive that I wrote it down for posterity: "It is the code of the semen to f**** a golden prostitute".
And one idea apparently wasn't theirs at all: the famous "two minute" show of November 2004 - when, after making the audience wait for over an hour, models were sent out on a victory lap of the runway, clapping, as if it was the end of the show. London-based Swedish designer Ann-Sofie Back has, I am assured, been doing this very stunt since she first launched.
Ksubi has lapped up all the attention and publicity - and rucked up a A$20million sales turnover in the process, the greatest slice of which has of course come from their killer jeans. Perhaps it's no surprise to learn that they don't like bad publicity. I mean who does in fashion? This business runs on PR and publicists and designers love fashion writers who don't ask the hard questions best. Sydney is not the only town where fashion journos get banned and verbally attacked - Cathy Horyn of The New York Times is currently under a ban from several separate design houses, following negative reviews, including Dolce e Gabbana and Carolina Herrera. Ksubi is the only show this week that I haven't been invited to and there was the incident in New York last September where loudmouth New York publicist Kelly Cutrone - Ksubi's US PR rep - banned me from all her clients' shows forthwith.
I was interested to finally see the dark side of Dan Single on Saturday night at the Willow presentation. I'd heard a lot about it. Totally unprovoked - except save for a series of stories that I have written about the Tsubi/Tsubo trademark dispute which obliged Tsubi to change its name to Ksubi, and the Cutrone incident - Single approached me while I was talking to several other people and made a couple of nasty comments in a loud voice.
When I later attempted to clear the air, by asking just what Single's problem was, he told me - once again in full earshot of a number of people - that after I had made enquiries to some of Ksubi's suppliers approximately 18 months ago, some of the companies had been spooked and it wound up costing Ksubi a great deal of money. He didn't elaborate any further.
At the end of the Tsubi trademark story that I wrote this time last year, I alluded to a major cash crunch that Tsubi appeared to be having in late 2005. That's certainly when I first got wind of it - due solely to the fact that the ragtrade, from Sydney to Auckland, was abuzz with talk about the company.
Who knows what's really going on in Ksubi's world? Many fashion companies experience cashflow problems - and of course some unfortunately also go under. But while Single and Gorrow may have laughed off suggestions from branding specialists this time last year that the trademark changeover cost could potentially wind up in the seven figures, it's probably a safe bet to say that irrespective of the cost, it's an additional expense that they probably did not need at the time.
A Tsubo director told me that his company had been pursuing Tsubi for several years but claimed that Single and Gorrow just kept fobbing off the calls and emails. In the end, Single and Gorrow didn't have much choice - the case almost went to court, which could have cost the duo more money still. Had they nipped the matter in the bud, at a time when most people had never heard of Tsubi, presumably the entire exercise would not have been quite so expensive.
Good luck to Single and Gorrow. It will be interesting to see how this new partnership pans out and just where the Ksubi brand is heading. Hopefully it's onwards and upwards. I don't enjoy having to investigate/report that fashion companies may be experiencing financial problems however the ragtrade is a tough industry and at the end of the day, it's my job.
One thing's for sure however. As a number of fashion creatives have discovered after selling brand equity to investors - there's no such thing as a free lunch.
Original post and comments.
As already reported, Wasson was recently sent a text message by the Ksubi lads to ask if she'd like to come on down to grace their show tomorrow. She jumped at the opportunity, Wasson told today's mini media scrum.
"So are you doing it for free?" asked someone from the media pack.
"Yeah" said Wasson, a little awkwardly.
For the record, Wasson happens to be an IMG model, and according to an IMG spokesperson, she is contracted and is being paid. As was Lily Cole, last year's international runway ringin at the event. IMG of course owns Australian Fashion Week and it has an interest in promoting its own talent. That's not to say that Wasson doesn't like and wear Ksubi's jeans or that she doesn't know and like Single and Gorrow. But it's worth pointing out this connection, just to keep some perspective.
After the "conference", during which not a great deal was said other than organiser Simon Lock recounting some of Ksubi's antics at AFW's past and some of their upcoming projects (a store in Tokyo, a book of photographs due out tomorrow) - and certainly nothing about yesterday's announcement of the sale of a chunk of Ksubi equity to Quiksilver Europe founder Harry Hodge - Gorrow, Single and Wasson squeezed in together for pics.
This is what Ksubi revels in: photo ops, back pats and prat fall pranks. Their fashion career, since they first launched themselves into publicity orbit in 2001, by sending 169 rats down the AFW runway, has been punctuated by one photo op after another. For the most part I do take my hat off to them: for the ability to keep on pulling publicity rabbits out of hats. I'm all for pushing the corners of the envelope and the label formerly known as Tsubi has certainly gone there many times.
From the models overboard show of 2003 (even Simon Lock at the time admitted he was nervous about the public liability issues of models coming to grief in Sydney Harbour after diving off the Tsubi boat) to the "fabulous nobodies" show of May 2005, you usually never know just what you're in for with a Tsubi show. Some ideas have been clever. Some have been offensive - a case in point, the "porno" calendar launch, for which models (including Michelle Leslie) posed in some very unflattering poses alongside cars and motorbikes. One line of accompanying 'graffiti' was so offensive that I wrote it down for posterity: "It is the code of the semen to f**** a golden prostitute".
And one idea apparently wasn't theirs at all: the famous "two minute" show of November 2004 - when, after making the audience wait for over an hour, models were sent out on a victory lap of the runway, clapping, as if it was the end of the show. London-based Swedish designer Ann-Sofie Back has, I am assured, been doing this very stunt since she first launched.
Ksubi has lapped up all the attention and publicity - and rucked up a A$20million sales turnover in the process, the greatest slice of which has of course come from their killer jeans. Perhaps it's no surprise to learn that they don't like bad publicity. I mean who does in fashion? This business runs on PR and publicists and designers love fashion writers who don't ask the hard questions best. Sydney is not the only town where fashion journos get banned and verbally attacked - Cathy Horyn of The New York Times is currently under a ban from several separate design houses, following negative reviews, including Dolce e Gabbana and Carolina Herrera. Ksubi is the only show this week that I haven't been invited to and there was the incident in New York last September where loudmouth New York publicist Kelly Cutrone - Ksubi's US PR rep - banned me from all her clients' shows forthwith.
I was interested to finally see the dark side of Dan Single on Saturday night at the Willow presentation. I'd heard a lot about it. Totally unprovoked - except save for a series of stories that I have written about the Tsubi/Tsubo trademark dispute which obliged Tsubi to change its name to Ksubi, and the Cutrone incident - Single approached me while I was talking to several other people and made a couple of nasty comments in a loud voice.
When I later attempted to clear the air, by asking just what Single's problem was, he told me - once again in full earshot of a number of people - that after I had made enquiries to some of Ksubi's suppliers approximately 18 months ago, some of the companies had been spooked and it wound up costing Ksubi a great deal of money. He didn't elaborate any further.
At the end of the Tsubi trademark story that I wrote this time last year, I alluded to a major cash crunch that Tsubi appeared to be having in late 2005. That's certainly when I first got wind of it - due solely to the fact that the ragtrade, from Sydney to Auckland, was abuzz with talk about the company.
Who knows what's really going on in Ksubi's world? Many fashion companies experience cashflow problems - and of course some unfortunately also go under. But while Single and Gorrow may have laughed off suggestions from branding specialists this time last year that the trademark changeover cost could potentially wind up in the seven figures, it's probably a safe bet to say that irrespective of the cost, it's an additional expense that they probably did not need at the time.
A Tsubo director told me that his company had been pursuing Tsubi for several years but claimed that Single and Gorrow just kept fobbing off the calls and emails. In the end, Single and Gorrow didn't have much choice - the case almost went to court, which could have cost the duo more money still. Had they nipped the matter in the bud, at a time when most people had never heard of Tsubi, presumably the entire exercise would not have been quite so expensive.
Good luck to Single and Gorrow. It will be interesting to see how this new partnership pans out and just where the Ksubi brand is heading. Hopefully it's onwards and upwards. I don't enjoy having to investigate/report that fashion companies may be experiencing financial problems however the ragtrade is a tough industry and at the end of the day, it's my job.
One thing's for sure however. As a number of fashion creatives have discovered after selling brand equity to investors - there's no such thing as a free lunch.
Original post and comments.
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
Veni Vidi Varga: Brunsdon's pinup girls and Vogue's advertiser-friendly TV
Sitting here waiting for the Jayson Brunsdon show to start. It's the same upstairs "OPT" venue as the Lisa Ho, Anna Thomas and Melanie Cutfield shows yesterday - the one that looks a lot like The Salon tent at Bryant Park in New York. Given that that's precisely the tent in which Brunsdon showed in New York in February, this time it really, really feels like deja vu.
Strangely enough however, given the big fish in a small pond factor, I'd say Brunsdon's New York show was fuller than this. There are a few people standing around here due to the seats filling up - but in February, they were standing shoulder-to-shoulder in lines around the walls.
The big difference between the two shows is that this one is happening in the throes of a very warm Sydney autumn, while the other was staged during a bitterly cold New York winter - and gripped by a dreadful gastric flu, I recall sitting through Brunsdon's show wishing that they had not given me a front row seat, because frankly I felt like I was going to have to run out the door at any moment.
I could just envisage The Daily's headline the following day:"Chunder from Downunder!" or, perish the thought, the entry on Kelly Cutrone's www.fashionweekdaily.com blog. So far noone has been able to answer the following question: has anyone, in the history of fashion presentations, ever thrown up on a runway during a show? On that frigid New York evening, I prayed that the first recorded sighting was not going to be me.
Anyhow, to my left, about three seats up, is Dita Von Teese. Two seats to my right, expat Australian model - and newly-minted Victoria's Secret "Angel" - Miranda Kerr. Photographers on the other side of the runway keep training their lenses on both. Sandwiched in between them, as I am, it's a somewhat disconcerting feeling. This is what celebs live for of course - the photo op. Only to later bitterly complain when they can't switch that media interest off at inconvenient times.
Jbrundson1B.jpg
As for the collection, I have to hand it to Brunsdon - as I do also to Josh Goot, Alice McCall and anyone else who is currently juggling runway commitments in two hemispheres. Brunsdon's first show in New York was just three months ago. And yet here he is again with a complete - but very tightly-edited - resort range.
No, Brunsdon is not reinventing the design wheel but he has managed in a very short space of time (three years) to carve a smart niche for himself in the Australian womens classic eveningwear category. Yes his pencil-thin, beaded, tailored cocktail dresses and boleros with built-in corsets owe as much to Roland Mouret as they do to his stated collection inspiration - the 40s Varga Girl - but there were a couple of knockout dresses, both of them in burnt orange silk. Perhaps I have been bamboozled by Brunsdon's New York buzz factor, but I can't help seeing this collection snapped up by a few Manhattan princesses.
Walking backstage afterwards I do a double-take when I spot a woman with dead straight, platinum-blonde hair, wearing a pink smock dress, interviewing Brunsdon in front of a television camera. I can't help thinking that the woman looks alarmingly like David Jones' group general manager for apparel, footwear, accessories and cosmetics, Colette Garnsey.
The woman turns towards me and voila, it is indeed Garnsey - doing a few quick backstage ivs, I am informed by a David Jones spokeswoman, for a video story for Vogue Australia's online division, vogue.com.au. Apparently Garnsey's debut vogue.com.au iv was at last night's Alex Perry show.
Presumably, Garnsey won't be doing any interviews with non-DJs designers. But the question remains, should she be doing any interviews at all? I wonder to myself whether the end piece will be clearly advertised as a David Jones advertisement, whether it will masquerade as some sort of daft industry type-on-industry type interview - or whether perhaps there is any delineation between anything these days at Vogue. It should be noted that the magazine found itself on Media Watch on two occasions recently.
"So do we [the media] get our turn to play buyers now?" I joke, in Garnsey's direction.
"No!" snaps Garnsey.
Original post and comments.
Strangely enough however, given the big fish in a small pond factor, I'd say Brunsdon's New York show was fuller than this. There are a few people standing around here due to the seats filling up - but in February, they were standing shoulder-to-shoulder in lines around the walls.
The big difference between the two shows is that this one is happening in the throes of a very warm Sydney autumn, while the other was staged during a bitterly cold New York winter - and gripped by a dreadful gastric flu, I recall sitting through Brunsdon's show wishing that they had not given me a front row seat, because frankly I felt like I was going to have to run out the door at any moment.
I could just envisage The Daily's headline the following day:"Chunder from Downunder!" or, perish the thought, the entry on Kelly Cutrone's www.fashionweekdaily.com blog. So far noone has been able to answer the following question: has anyone, in the history of fashion presentations, ever thrown up on a runway during a show? On that frigid New York evening, I prayed that the first recorded sighting was not going to be me.
Anyhow, to my left, about three seats up, is Dita Von Teese. Two seats to my right, expat Australian model - and newly-minted Victoria's Secret "Angel" - Miranda Kerr. Photographers on the other side of the runway keep training their lenses on both. Sandwiched in between them, as I am, it's a somewhat disconcerting feeling. This is what celebs live for of course - the photo op. Only to later bitterly complain when they can't switch that media interest off at inconvenient times.
Jbrundson1B.jpg
As for the collection, I have to hand it to Brunsdon - as I do also to Josh Goot, Alice McCall and anyone else who is currently juggling runway commitments in two hemispheres. Brunsdon's first show in New York was just three months ago. And yet here he is again with a complete - but very tightly-edited - resort range.
No, Brunsdon is not reinventing the design wheel but he has managed in a very short space of time (three years) to carve a smart niche for himself in the Australian womens classic eveningwear category. Yes his pencil-thin, beaded, tailored cocktail dresses and boleros with built-in corsets owe as much to Roland Mouret as they do to his stated collection inspiration - the 40s Varga Girl - but there were a couple of knockout dresses, both of them in burnt orange silk. Perhaps I have been bamboozled by Brunsdon's New York buzz factor, but I can't help seeing this collection snapped up by a few Manhattan princesses.
Walking backstage afterwards I do a double-take when I spot a woman with dead straight, platinum-blonde hair, wearing a pink smock dress, interviewing Brunsdon in front of a television camera. I can't help thinking that the woman looks alarmingly like David Jones' group general manager for apparel, footwear, accessories and cosmetics, Colette Garnsey.
The woman turns towards me and voila, it is indeed Garnsey - doing a few quick backstage ivs, I am informed by a David Jones spokeswoman, for a video story for Vogue Australia's online division, vogue.com.au. Apparently Garnsey's debut vogue.com.au iv was at last night's Alex Perry show.
Presumably, Garnsey won't be doing any interviews with non-DJs designers. But the question remains, should she be doing any interviews at all? I wonder to myself whether the end piece will be clearly advertised as a David Jones advertisement, whether it will masquerade as some sort of daft industry type-on-industry type interview - or whether perhaps there is any delineation between anything these days at Vogue. It should be noted that the magazine found itself on Media Watch on two occasions recently.
"So do we [the media] get our turn to play buyers now?" I joke, in Garnsey's direction.
"No!" snaps Garnsey.
Original post and comments.
That's not a miniskirt, THIS is a miniskirt: Alex Perry courts danger and some Central Coast comparisons
What an utter hoot the Alex Perry show was last night. After such a flat morning, with some momentum starting to build after a couple of strong shows - notably Anna Thomas and the very confident debut of Melanie Cutfield - in walking across to Perry's Cargo Hall venue it really did feel like a big, buzzy show.
A long queue of people stood waiting in line to get in, a mini red carpet 'arrivals' section had been cordoned off to one side in order to capture the bevy of Australian celebrities who had turned up for the show. You name them, they were there: Tara Moss, Michelle Leslie, Sophie Faulkiner, Jodhi Meares, I even spotted Ros and Gretel Packer in the front row. They joined the usual horde of Perry's big-haired clients and fans - every last one of the latter, as per usual, guilty-as-sin of major Crimes Against Bronzer.
Inside there was a feeling of minor pandemonium - which was only exacerbated for me by the shrieks of laughter from New York retail ringin, Henri Bendel VP Fashion Director Ann Watson, as she opened up her goodie bag to find a complimentary ironing board cover, courtesy of Perry's sponsor Sunbeam.
"I've never been at a fashion show, where they've given an ironic board cover!" squealed Watson. "I can't wait to take it home and show everybody. In New York City, I don't know anyone who irons their clothes. I think it's because we live in such a service culture - everybody sends out. Next I'm going to get a can of starch to go with it".
The show started, and a series of mostly stick-thin models - three from the tv show, Australia's Next Top Model, on which Perry is of course a judge - charged out to the loud strains of heavily-remixed disco.
There were plenty of Perry's signature floor-length evening dresses and ensembles - the prettiest those with multicoloured skirts over corset tops, cinched by large belts. However the most striking feature of the Swarovski crystal-encrusted collection - many items from which featured satin versions of the moment's fashionable sporty racerback - was the length of the cocktail dresses. Or rather, lack of it. One coral garment in particularly clearly showed the model's buttock cheeks.
"That's a Britney Spears there" noted Watson.
"He definitely had the best models of the day" she added later, just as the models were doing their victory lap at the end of the show. "Why didn't the other designers have these girls?"
Here's Perry's post-show answer - in a quick backstage iv I did with him post-show:
Alex Perry: [stylist] Trevor Stones and I go through this laborious process of casting. It's really important, especially with what I do. If I put girls who are slightly elegant in my show, it gives it a different slant. And this season especially.
So what, you don't want them to be elegant, but brassy?
Well no, but if they're too elegant... They need to be a bit younger, king of racehorse lean, fresher-ooking girls. Because when you put them in something that's so heavily-jewelled, if I put it on somebody who looks a bit more sophisticated, it looks like I'm trying to create 50s Dior and that time is gone so it needs to be like a modern version of that and you do it on beautiful young girls. Casting is really important.
What was the brief you gave them? They were almost like automatons.
Just pummel out there and pummel back. No sauntering and swaying. Get out there as soon as you can and get back as fast as you can.
What was it like working with the ANTM girls?
You know what - they were fantastic. When we did the dress rehearsal, I didn't recognise two of them. I don't know that you would have guessed which ones they were in the show. Everyone would know Alice [Burdeau - the particularly skinny teenager whose weight has been the subject of recent controversy] because she's like a Nicole Kidman-esque kind of girl. But they fitted in seamlessly with the rest of the girls.
It was very short - particularly that coral number.
I took the reference from old 50s swimsuits. You know, those ones that have that panel in the front.
A Terrigal Skirt?
[Laughs] I wanted them to be dangerous. Everybody at some point has done short skirts since the beginning of fashion. And I thought, 'Alright, I'll show you how how to do a short skirt'. I've never touched that territory and I thought, 'I'm going to do it today, I'll jewel it and cut it to almost a dangerous level'.
Do you think you are going to actually sell the shortest versions?
I might have to lengthen them slightly. But those dresses, they could be made in any length and they're still beautiful - gorgeous cocktail dresses. And you know what? Some cheeky little girl is going to wear it like that. So long as she's got the legs. Let's hope it's not a bad leg offender.
Or a Crime Against Bronzer. There were more than a few of those here I have to say.
There could have been. If I had more time, I would have been too. They're tanned. They're healthy tans. They travel a lot. We're here pasty in the middle of winter and they've come back from somewhere. My clients - they can afford to go whenever they want.
Outside the venue, the lack of length of Perry's skirts was a subject of some debate - notably whether The Terrigal Skirt was in fact the appropriate term.
"Yes there's the Terrigal Skirt, which is just south of The Entrance" noted David Jones head buyer David Bush.
He added, "Then there's the Toukley Skirt - where you can actually see The Entrance".
Original post and comments.
A long queue of people stood waiting in line to get in, a mini red carpet 'arrivals' section had been cordoned off to one side in order to capture the bevy of Australian celebrities who had turned up for the show. You name them, they were there: Tara Moss, Michelle Leslie, Sophie Faulkiner, Jodhi Meares, I even spotted Ros and Gretel Packer in the front row. They joined the usual horde of Perry's big-haired clients and fans - every last one of the latter, as per usual, guilty-as-sin of major Crimes Against Bronzer.
Inside there was a feeling of minor pandemonium - which was only exacerbated for me by the shrieks of laughter from New York retail ringin, Henri Bendel VP Fashion Director Ann Watson, as she opened up her goodie bag to find a complimentary ironing board cover, courtesy of Perry's sponsor Sunbeam.
"I've never been at a fashion show, where they've given an ironic board cover!" squealed Watson. "I can't wait to take it home and show everybody. In New York City, I don't know anyone who irons their clothes. I think it's because we live in such a service culture - everybody sends out. Next I'm going to get a can of starch to go with it".
The show started, and a series of mostly stick-thin models - three from the tv show, Australia's Next Top Model, on which Perry is of course a judge - charged out to the loud strains of heavily-remixed disco.
There were plenty of Perry's signature floor-length evening dresses and ensembles - the prettiest those with multicoloured skirts over corset tops, cinched by large belts. However the most striking feature of the Swarovski crystal-encrusted collection - many items from which featured satin versions of the moment's fashionable sporty racerback - was the length of the cocktail dresses. Or rather, lack of it. One coral garment in particularly clearly showed the model's buttock cheeks.
"That's a Britney Spears there" noted Watson.
"He definitely had the best models of the day" she added later, just as the models were doing their victory lap at the end of the show. "Why didn't the other designers have these girls?"
Here's Perry's post-show answer - in a quick backstage iv I did with him post-show:
Alex Perry: [stylist] Trevor Stones and I go through this laborious process of casting. It's really important, especially with what I do. If I put girls who are slightly elegant in my show, it gives it a different slant. And this season especially.
So what, you don't want them to be elegant, but brassy?
Well no, but if they're too elegant... They need to be a bit younger, king of racehorse lean, fresher-ooking girls. Because when you put them in something that's so heavily-jewelled, if I put it on somebody who looks a bit more sophisticated, it looks like I'm trying to create 50s Dior and that time is gone so it needs to be like a modern version of that and you do it on beautiful young girls. Casting is really important.
What was the brief you gave them? They were almost like automatons.
Just pummel out there and pummel back. No sauntering and swaying. Get out there as soon as you can and get back as fast as you can.
What was it like working with the ANTM girls?
You know what - they were fantastic. When we did the dress rehearsal, I didn't recognise two of them. I don't know that you would have guessed which ones they were in the show. Everyone would know Alice [Burdeau - the particularly skinny teenager whose weight has been the subject of recent controversy] because she's like a Nicole Kidman-esque kind of girl. But they fitted in seamlessly with the rest of the girls.
It was very short - particularly that coral number.
I took the reference from old 50s swimsuits. You know, those ones that have that panel in the front.
A Terrigal Skirt?
[Laughs] I wanted them to be dangerous. Everybody at some point has done short skirts since the beginning of fashion. And I thought, 'Alright, I'll show you how how to do a short skirt'. I've never touched that territory and I thought, 'I'm going to do it today, I'll jewel it and cut it to almost a dangerous level'.
Do you think you are going to actually sell the shortest versions?
I might have to lengthen them slightly. But those dresses, they could be made in any length and they're still beautiful - gorgeous cocktail dresses. And you know what? Some cheeky little girl is going to wear it like that. So long as she's got the legs. Let's hope it's not a bad leg offender.
Or a Crime Against Bronzer. There were more than a few of those here I have to say.
There could have been. If I had more time, I would have been too. They're tanned. They're healthy tans. They travel a lot. We're here pasty in the middle of winter and they've come back from somewhere. My clients - they can afford to go whenever they want.
Outside the venue, the lack of length of Perry's skirts was a subject of some debate - notably whether The Terrigal Skirt was in fact the appropriate term.
"Yes there's the Terrigal Skirt, which is just south of The Entrance" noted David Jones head buyer David Bush.
He added, "Then there's the Toukley Skirt - where you can actually see The Entrance".
Original post and comments.
Many Rivers to cross: Fergie's fashion manifesto for the red carpet neophyte
Dita Von Teese wasn't the only international in town yesterday with nervous management. The publicist of Black Eyed Peas frontwoman Fergie was very closely vetting his client last night, while she was sequestered in a little velvet rope-enclosed section next to the stage where Von Teese was due to perform. After unsuccessfully attempting to sidle up to Fergie, I was obliged to politely ask the publicist could I throw a few fashion questions her way. I was wound up after three, so here they are for what they're worth.
Wearing a black and white Sass & Bide bubble dress, Fergie graciously chatted to Fashion Season about her personal fashion choices and the challenges inherent in navigating the red carpet.
Fingers crossed she pops in to a couple of shows later this week. According to her manager, there's a possibility that Fergie might try to squeeze at least one into her schedule, with Alice McCall a strong contender at this stage.
So what is your personal fashion philosophy?
Fergie: Be aware of what's current and what's coming but don't be afraid to make it your own.
And when you are making your own red carpet choices, is there a particular signature style that you tend to go for?
Well I always wear something that represents me, but if I'm doing something that's maybe a bit prim and proper like a.... [hard to hear with all the background noise]. There's always that one piece that, it's something that resembles you and only you. And that's what I try to do. And also, if it's too perfect I'll try to mess it up.
And what about the scrutiny of the media when it comes to celebrities and the red carpet? The potential for a massive slagoff etc... Do you think a lot of celebrities take that into serious consideration - do they worry about it?
Yeah I do but at the same point, sometimes I'll go out of the house and look at myself and know that it's an easy targeted outfit to say something about. But sometimes the comedians [presumably such television commentators as red carpet harpies Joan and Melissa Rivers] are just looking for a quick one-liner. But it's not the comedians who are setting fashion trends. They're usually the worst-dressed.
Original post and comments.
Wearing a black and white Sass & Bide bubble dress, Fergie graciously chatted to Fashion Season about her personal fashion choices and the challenges inherent in navigating the red carpet.
Fingers crossed she pops in to a couple of shows later this week. According to her manager, there's a possibility that Fergie might try to squeeze at least one into her schedule, with Alice McCall a strong contender at this stage.
So what is your personal fashion philosophy?
Fergie: Be aware of what's current and what's coming but don't be afraid to make it your own.
And when you are making your own red carpet choices, is there a particular signature style that you tend to go for?
Well I always wear something that represents me, but if I'm doing something that's maybe a bit prim and proper like a.... [hard to hear with all the background noise]. There's always that one piece that, it's something that resembles you and only you. And that's what I try to do. And also, if it's too perfect I'll try to mess it up.
And what about the scrutiny of the media when it comes to celebrities and the red carpet? The potential for a massive slagoff etc... Do you think a lot of celebrities take that into serious consideration - do they worry about it?
Yeah I do but at the same point, sometimes I'll go out of the house and look at myself and know that it's an easy targeted outfit to say something about. But sometimes the comedians [presumably such television commentators as red carpet harpies Joan and Melissa Rivers] are just looking for a quick one-liner. But it's not the comedians who are setting fashion trends. They're usually the worst-dressed.
Original post and comments.
The Dita factor and Kirrily's urban sport moment
Hurtling in a cab en route to the first show of Fashion Week day two - Kirrily Johnston, down once again at Bondi Icebergs. It's another beautiful day for a fashion meet. Many of us won't be quite as fresh-faced this morning as the last however due to the Dita Von Teese performance last night.
It was well past 11pm when the show finally wrapped and for those of us who then had to produce material to go to air, that wasn't the end of it. I was liaising with my producer until the wee hours this morning, checking that DVT's management had given their 'OK' to the footage for our video packages today.
Von Teese's management obliged all media outlets recording the performance to provide not just the performance footage for approval, but in fact the edited, ie ready-to-air stories - stitching everybody up with a signed contract before they could get through the door.
And look I thoroughly appreciate that DVT has an image to protect, and that some might well be keen to take the images of her writhing on a giant bucking bronco of a lipstick out of context, but I did have to laugh when I spotted what appeared to be dozens of mobile phones whipped out by punters the minute DVT hit the stage to record their own take-home versions of proceedings for posterity. Or YouTube, take your pick (on which currently appears a somewhat raunchier version of last night's show). If you can't stop Saddam Hussein's execution leaking onto the internet, what hope has poor Dita Von Teese of protecting her dignity for heaven's sake?
Now in another cab hurtling back to the OPT for the next shows. Once again Icebergs provided a glorious backdrop to Johnston's jolts of spring/summer colour.
In the case of this season's very sportif collection, the jolts were flashes of canary and saffron yellow and notably, a vibrant Pine Lime Splice green. I liked this collection, particularly the saffron yellow knit and grey marle micro singlet dresses with 'tough chic' exposed zipper and grommet embellishments, as well as Johnston's odes to the floor-length patio dress style, a nice contrast to all the uber minis we saw yesterday.
I liked the lime dress series best of all - all looking like they could have been made out of parka nylon, but which in fact were fashioned from various treatments of silk, from featherlight silk cotton to a glossy, viscose twill-look version. They were bright, breezy and effortlessly chic. But I couldn't help noting what I thought were some far too literal references to Alber Elbaz's just-shown AW0708 collection for Lanvin, the leitmotiv of which collection was a series of massive 'power' sleeves on loose shift shapes. Unlike some others working in the Australian market, Johnston has her own quite distinct aesthetic and, staying 'on trend' aside, I think she should follow her instincts a little more closely next time.
Original post and comments.
It was well past 11pm when the show finally wrapped and for those of us who then had to produce material to go to air, that wasn't the end of it. I was liaising with my producer until the wee hours this morning, checking that DVT's management had given their 'OK' to the footage for our video packages today.
Von Teese's management obliged all media outlets recording the performance to provide not just the performance footage for approval, but in fact the edited, ie ready-to-air stories - stitching everybody up with a signed contract before they could get through the door.
And look I thoroughly appreciate that DVT has an image to protect, and that some might well be keen to take the images of her writhing on a giant bucking bronco of a lipstick out of context, but I did have to laugh when I spotted what appeared to be dozens of mobile phones whipped out by punters the minute DVT hit the stage to record their own take-home versions of proceedings for posterity. Or YouTube, take your pick (on which currently appears a somewhat raunchier version of last night's show). If you can't stop Saddam Hussein's execution leaking onto the internet, what hope has poor Dita Von Teese of protecting her dignity for heaven's sake?
Now in another cab hurtling back to the OPT for the next shows. Once again Icebergs provided a glorious backdrop to Johnston's jolts of spring/summer colour.
In the case of this season's very sportif collection, the jolts were flashes of canary and saffron yellow and notably, a vibrant Pine Lime Splice green. I liked this collection, particularly the saffron yellow knit and grey marle micro singlet dresses with 'tough chic' exposed zipper and grommet embellishments, as well as Johnston's odes to the floor-length patio dress style, a nice contrast to all the uber minis we saw yesterday.
I liked the lime dress series best of all - all looking like they could have been made out of parka nylon, but which in fact were fashioned from various treatments of silk, from featherlight silk cotton to a glossy, viscose twill-look version. They were bright, breezy and effortlessly chic. But I couldn't help noting what I thought were some far too literal references to Alber Elbaz's just-shown AW0708 collection for Lanvin, the leitmotiv of which collection was a series of massive 'power' sleeves on loose shift shapes. Unlike some others working in the Australian market, Johnston has her own quite distinct aesthetic and, staying 'on trend' aside, I think she should follow her instincts a little more closely next time.
Original post and comments.
Monday, April 30, 2007
Thomas the swank engine: Anna T administers a bit of CPR to AFW
After an extremely flat morning, which was punctuated by a couple of minor jolts of colour in the shows of Silence is Golden and New Zealand's Cybele, Anna Thomas gave Australian Fashion Week some much-needed CPR.
And look it wasn't the endless suite of trapeze-line shift and sack dresses that bored the pants off most people - this silhouette has already infiltrated the Australian fashion market, just as it hits the northern hemisphere summer, so we expected to see a lot more of it this week.
It was a combination of poor-man takes of big international names, drab fabric, drab workmanship, dull, dull, dull colours. And some really bad shoes. I found myself asking people, "Does this seem really flat to you?". Which question tended to be greeted with a deadpan expression.
Then came Anna Thomas. And I started feeling like I was back at an international runway event - New York Fashion Week to be precise, with AFW's new "OPT" upstairs venue a dead ringer for the medium venue there that was called last season, from memory, The Salon. Not that the same venue felt like it during the earlier Lisa Ho show.
Slick and commercial yet very fresh, Thomas' collection featured a suite of sweet, gathered peasant skirts in graphic black and white polka dots, short shorts - or as the Americans like to call them, "panties" - boxy blazers and one striking pewter sack dress with a voluminous back.
The dresses were particularly strong, notably Thomas' take on what is emerging as another Australian SS0708 season requisite - the shirt-dress - as well as some utterly charming pinafore and shift dresses such as the banded lime green/black/grey sleeveless shift dress and a softly gathered pewter sundress with black contrast bodice and belt.
The collection had grace, polish and a kind of Roman Holiday ease. Ex-Country Road and also Max Mara, Thomas launched her label in 2002 and apart from taking part in the most recent 'transseasonal' AFW shows in Melbourne in September year, this was her first show at the event's biggest showcase in Sydney.
Let's hope it's not her last.
We had a (really) quick chat after the show:
You launched your label in 2002, why has it taken so long to show in Sydney?
Anna Thomas: I guess we've just been really finding our feet and we didn't want to present anything that wasn't really world-class and that we wouldn't want to put on a catwalk in Europe or in New York. I haven't felt confident enough to do it until this point. I was really happy with the collection and the direction that we took for the show, we tried to make a little bit of a departure from the typical thing that people think about an Anna Thomas collection. Everything just felt right this season.
Original post and comments.
And look it wasn't the endless suite of trapeze-line shift and sack dresses that bored the pants off most people - this silhouette has already infiltrated the Australian fashion market, just as it hits the northern hemisphere summer, so we expected to see a lot more of it this week.
It was a combination of poor-man takes of big international names, drab fabric, drab workmanship, dull, dull, dull colours. And some really bad shoes. I found myself asking people, "Does this seem really flat to you?". Which question tended to be greeted with a deadpan expression.
Then came Anna Thomas. And I started feeling like I was back at an international runway event - New York Fashion Week to be precise, with AFW's new "OPT" upstairs venue a dead ringer for the medium venue there that was called last season, from memory, The Salon. Not that the same venue felt like it during the earlier Lisa Ho show.
Slick and commercial yet very fresh, Thomas' collection featured a suite of sweet, gathered peasant skirts in graphic black and white polka dots, short shorts - or as the Americans like to call them, "panties" - boxy blazers and one striking pewter sack dress with a voluminous back.
The dresses were particularly strong, notably Thomas' take on what is emerging as another Australian SS0708 season requisite - the shirt-dress - as well as some utterly charming pinafore and shift dresses such as the banded lime green/black/grey sleeveless shift dress and a softly gathered pewter sundress with black contrast bodice and belt.
The collection had grace, polish and a kind of Roman Holiday ease. Ex-Country Road and also Max Mara, Thomas launched her label in 2002 and apart from taking part in the most recent 'transseasonal' AFW shows in Melbourne in September year, this was her first show at the event's biggest showcase in Sydney.
Let's hope it's not her last.
We had a (really) quick chat after the show:
You launched your label in 2002, why has it taken so long to show in Sydney?
Anna Thomas: I guess we've just been really finding our feet and we didn't want to present anything that wasn't really world-class and that we wouldn't want to put on a catwalk in Europe or in New York. I haven't felt confident enough to do it until this point. I was really happy with the collection and the direction that we took for the show, we tried to make a little bit of a departure from the typical thing that people think about an Anna Thomas collection. Everything just felt right this season.
Original post and comments.
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.
Original post and comments.
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.
Original post and comments.
Sunday, April 29, 2007
'I've done Dior!': Fish-out-of-water fashionisto Ian Thorpe dives into the Fashion Week swim
We have touchdown. Well, celeb touchdown at least. Having now clocked two full OS show seasons and notably, two celeb-infested New York fashion weeks, and after last May's very disappointing "VIP" turnout at AFW, I have to admit I was a tad apprehensive about the prospect of only having the clothes to review next week. I mean, perish the thought of anyone talking about the clothes at a fashion show these days.
But some bona fide celebs are now in our midst - thanks to tonight's MTV Awards and the Fantastic Four premiere, (and if there isn't already an appropriate collective noun, Fashion Season would like to nominate the following to denote same - a paparazzi of celebs, or perhaps even a Fawcett of celebs). Should any of these wind up popping into the fashion tents, we could be in for some fun and games.
Dita Von Teese of course is a shoe-in. Here to promote her involvement with (AFW sponsor) MAC, notably the brand's Viva Glam lipstick - with a fat $100,000 cheque handed to Sydney's Bobby Goldmsith Foundation yesterday - Von Teese will be on deck at at least some shows as the VIP guest editor of Australian Harper's Bazaar. Just as Cate Blanchett, Sarah Wynter and Elle Macpherson etc... have done in years past.
Anyone present at Myer Sydney City yesterday for the cheque presentation couldn't have missed the celeb buzz in the air, with a score of fans turning up for signings and photo ops with the petite, porcelain-complexioned DVT. Judging by the number of Goths I spotted, the Marilyn Manson factor obviously has not rubbed off either, in spite of the fact that DVT and Manson are now estranged.
No major sightings at the Willow presentation at Carthona last night. But the 'show' itself was nevertheless a sight to behold. Quite apart from the rare glimpse inside this harbourside Gothic mansion - and its superb, wild garden - the Helmut Newton-inspired tableaux of Willow lingerie-bedecked models inside a couple of the rooms provided a sumptuous visual feast. I trust the poor girl who had to lie with her back arched against one brocade sofa for an hour's duration won't require the services of a chiropractor today. We shot a preview video of this retro-look luxury lingerie range last week which will go live tomorrow.
Some pieces - notably the black tulle-swathed, white silk high-waisted knickers and bra - seem far too pretty to cover up. With DVT and her old-worlde Hollywood froufrou style thrown into the mix this season, Fashion Week seems, for the moment at least, to be having a bit of a burlesque-nosed moment.
About an hour later, back downtown in Ultimo, I turned up to the Nicholas X Morley show and was intrigued to spot Ian Thorpe. Thorpe has of course had more than his fair share of fashion moments so I was interested to get his take on the subject.
Here's what he said just before and straight after the show:
So, what are you doing here at the Nicholas X Morley launch?
Ian Thorpe: I was invited by a friend who is a model here tonight [Cheyenne Tozzi, apparently]. So I was asked to come along, which I'm more than happy to do. From what I've heard and from what she's told me I think it's going to be great.
You have been involved with a few different fashion projects. Are you still involved with Autore pearls?
Yeah... I'm not designing jewellery at the moment. Still designing underwear and I'm doing a few more things in the future but that's about it at the moment.
Any new fashion projects?
Nothing I can talk about.
Top secret?
Not top secret, because that means it's coming up soon. But something that's definitely on the radar.
[With the recent doping allegations] You have been going through some difficult issues recently.
I'm still going through all of those things. It's all playing out its due course at the moment. I start filming a documentary tomorrow. So things are all on track.
What do you think about fashion in general? I mean obviously you have always had very close fashion ties.
Yeah.... Fashion for me is kind of you know, it comes and it goes, but it always is a great reflection on kind of social issues and what's going on. At that kind of moment in time. The same as what music does and what art does at that particular time. That's what I love about it. It's seasonal and it's cyclical as well. It's great. All of us love some good clothes, it's as simple as that.
You have also had some special 'fashion moments'. A case in point one highly-publicised leather outfit with boots.
Yeah, I was in Paris.
And you copped a lot of flack over that.
Well you know, I wear what I want to wear and I don't care what people think.
The show wrapped. If you haven't seen the video we shot last week, it's a bright, print-heavy streetwear range of T-shirts, jeans, shorts, longline singlets and babydoll dresses, with a small swimwear component. I'm not too crash hot on a couple of the dresses, which seem a bit fiddly with sheer overpanels, but the prints are very strong and the skinny, cropped, lowrider women's jeans with exposed silver zips and microskirts in the signature crossbone print - either white on black or vice versa - as well as some of the fluoro babydoll smock dresses, tops and leggings looked great.
Ditto some of the menswear, a case in point the baggy pants, T-shirt and matching blazer in the white-on-black crossbone print. Although you probably wouldn't want to wear the latter three together, or risk looking like you had just stepped out of a prison scene from Pirates of The Caribbean.
And the Thorpedo's post-show verdict?
"The rave's back" he said.
Will we see you at any other shows this week?
Thorpe: No, I film a documentary starting tomorrow.
So no Fashion Week for Ian Thorpe?
This is it.
Shame, because Fashion Week induced one of your most spectacular fashion moments: the famous pearl mask you wore to one event.
Yeah, it was a masked ball.
It was very dramatic.
Oh OK, yeah.
So we won't be seeing any more moments like that this week - not even in the documentary?
No definitely not.
But you could do a documentary with Ian Thorpe's greatest fashion moments.
Maybe not yet.
I thanked him for being such a good sport and noted that it was great to see him front-and-centre at a fashion show.
"Hey" he quipped, without missing a beat. "I've done Dior shows!".
Original post and comments.
But some bona fide celebs are now in our midst - thanks to tonight's MTV Awards and the Fantastic Four premiere, (and if there isn't already an appropriate collective noun, Fashion Season would like to nominate the following to denote same - a paparazzi of celebs, or perhaps even a Fawcett of celebs). Should any of these wind up popping into the fashion tents, we could be in for some fun and games.
Dita Von Teese of course is a shoe-in. Here to promote her involvement with (AFW sponsor) MAC, notably the brand's Viva Glam lipstick - with a fat $100,000 cheque handed to Sydney's Bobby Goldmsith Foundation yesterday - Von Teese will be on deck at at least some shows as the VIP guest editor of Australian Harper's Bazaar. Just as Cate Blanchett, Sarah Wynter and Elle Macpherson etc... have done in years past.
Anyone present at Myer Sydney City yesterday for the cheque presentation couldn't have missed the celeb buzz in the air, with a score of fans turning up for signings and photo ops with the petite, porcelain-complexioned DVT. Judging by the number of Goths I spotted, the Marilyn Manson factor obviously has not rubbed off either, in spite of the fact that DVT and Manson are now estranged.
No major sightings at the Willow presentation at Carthona last night. But the 'show' itself was nevertheless a sight to behold. Quite apart from the rare glimpse inside this harbourside Gothic mansion - and its superb, wild garden - the Helmut Newton-inspired tableaux of Willow lingerie-bedecked models inside a couple of the rooms provided a sumptuous visual feast. I trust the poor girl who had to lie with her back arched against one brocade sofa for an hour's duration won't require the services of a chiropractor today. We shot a preview video of this retro-look luxury lingerie range last week which will go live tomorrow.
Some pieces - notably the black tulle-swathed, white silk high-waisted knickers and bra - seem far too pretty to cover up. With DVT and her old-worlde Hollywood froufrou style thrown into the mix this season, Fashion Week seems, for the moment at least, to be having a bit of a burlesque-nosed moment.
About an hour later, back downtown in Ultimo, I turned up to the Nicholas X Morley show and was intrigued to spot Ian Thorpe. Thorpe has of course had more than his fair share of fashion moments so I was interested to get his take on the subject.
Here's what he said just before and straight after the show:
So, what are you doing here at the Nicholas X Morley launch?
Ian Thorpe: I was invited by a friend who is a model here tonight [Cheyenne Tozzi, apparently]. So I was asked to come along, which I'm more than happy to do. From what I've heard and from what she's told me I think it's going to be great.
You have been involved with a few different fashion projects. Are you still involved with Autore pearls?
Yeah... I'm not designing jewellery at the moment. Still designing underwear and I'm doing a few more things in the future but that's about it at the moment.
Any new fashion projects?
Nothing I can talk about.
Top secret?
Not top secret, because that means it's coming up soon. But something that's definitely on the radar.
[With the recent doping allegations] You have been going through some difficult issues recently.
I'm still going through all of those things. It's all playing out its due course at the moment. I start filming a documentary tomorrow. So things are all on track.
What do you think about fashion in general? I mean obviously you have always had very close fashion ties.
Yeah.... Fashion for me is kind of you know, it comes and it goes, but it always is a great reflection on kind of social issues and what's going on. At that kind of moment in time. The same as what music does and what art does at that particular time. That's what I love about it. It's seasonal and it's cyclical as well. It's great. All of us love some good clothes, it's as simple as that.
You have also had some special 'fashion moments'. A case in point one highly-publicised leather outfit with boots.
Yeah, I was in Paris.
And you copped a lot of flack over that.
Well you know, I wear what I want to wear and I don't care what people think.
The show wrapped. If you haven't seen the video we shot last week, it's a bright, print-heavy streetwear range of T-shirts, jeans, shorts, longline singlets and babydoll dresses, with a small swimwear component. I'm not too crash hot on a couple of the dresses, which seem a bit fiddly with sheer overpanels, but the prints are very strong and the skinny, cropped, lowrider women's jeans with exposed silver zips and microskirts in the signature crossbone print - either white on black or vice versa - as well as some of the fluoro babydoll smock dresses, tops and leggings looked great.
Ditto some of the menswear, a case in point the baggy pants, T-shirt and matching blazer in the white-on-black crossbone print. Although you probably wouldn't want to wear the latter three together, or risk looking like you had just stepped out of a prison scene from Pirates of The Caribbean.
And the Thorpedo's post-show verdict?
"The rave's back" he said.
Will we see you at any other shows this week?
Thorpe: No, I film a documentary starting tomorrow.
So no Fashion Week for Ian Thorpe?
This is it.
Shame, because Fashion Week induced one of your most spectacular fashion moments: the famous pearl mask you wore to one event.
Yeah, it was a masked ball.
It was very dramatic.
Oh OK, yeah.
So we won't be seeing any more moments like that this week - not even in the documentary?
No definitely not.
But you could do a documentary with Ian Thorpe's greatest fashion moments.
Maybe not yet.
I thanked him for being such a good sport and noted that it was great to see him front-and-centre at a fashion show.
"Hey" he quipped, without missing a beat. "I've done Dior shows!".
Original post and comments.
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Get it while it's Goot: Target stitches up another designer dynamo
We've seen McCartney-mania. Is it time for a Josh juggernaut?
Two months after Target shelves around the country were stripped bare within minutes of the arrival of a Stella McCartney collaboration collection, Target Australia plans to unveil a top secret project with one of Australia's brightest fashion lights, Josh Goot.
UPDATE: 16/05/07
Well don't say we didn't warn you................ Finally today, the worst kept secret in the Australian fashion industry - thanks to this blog's big mouth - was laid out in the open for all to see.
Yes indeedy, Target Australia has stitched up Josh Goot for a special limited-edition collaboration range. It's a lot smaller than the range Stella McCartney did for Target earlier this year - 12 pieces, as opposed to 42 - and it remains to be seen of course whether the Josh Goot name will resonate as well as McCartney's with Australian consumers, and if the latter will scratch each others' eyes out to get a piece of it in "selected" stores when it launches on June 19. As happened in a number of (the 100 designated) Target stores, with the McCartney mania of March 12th.
But with a veeeeeeery similar looking Josh Goot silver trench coat selling at Browns Focus in London right now for GBP290 (A$692), A$129.99 for the Target version looks to be one hell of a saving. The trench is the exxiest item in Goot's Target range, with prices starting at $59.99.
With racerback tanks, leggings, pencil skirts, cardigans, blazers and yes the infamous jersey trench coat in a colour palette of grey marle, silver, navy, black as well as Kelly green and a cobalt blue - all in a Tencel/wool blend, and in sizes from XS-L - Goot is pushing the signature 'tailored comfort' look of his first range shown in Sydney in May 2005.
As evidenced by the new collections shown in New York in February and Sydney a fortnight ago, he's moving on from that ever-so-slightly. That said, the theme of the latest collection was "future Roman sport". Let the Tarjay games begin.
ORIGINAL BLOG: 26/04/07
Target is the principle sponsor of Goot's Fashion Week show on Thursday May 3 at 9.00am - and its logo appears on the invitation. But although neither the Target or Goot camps were spilling any other beans this afternoon, Fashion Season has learned that a Josh Goot/Target collaboration is due be either announced or else unveiled at Target in mid May.
It won't be without precedent of course in this market. Last year Target unveiled several styles from three other Australian labels, Alice McCall, Tina Kalivas and TL Wood, under the Designers For Target umbrella. A Target spokeswoman declined to confirm or deny whether Goot was the only Australian fashion brand involved with this latest Designers For Target project.
"I can't tell you anything other than Target are supporting me on this show" Goot told Fashion Season. "It's great to have their support - I think they've shown a commitment to young Australian designers over the past year".
The Stella McCartney range was sold in 100 Target stores around Australia. The 42-piece collection ranged in price from $29.99 for a scarf to $199.99 for a trenchcoat. Selling out in some stores within minutes, according to a Target source it was the retailer's most successful sales day ever in this market.
So just what might Josh Goot For Target look like? Dripping, most likely, in the designer's signature urban sport aesthetic.
Goot, now 27, made his runway debut at Fashion Week in May 2004 with a print-heavy streetwear brand called Platform. Launched a few months later his eponymous collection boasted a leitmotiv of "tailored comfort", with a simple concept: constructed wardrobe classics of the type normally made from woven fabrics, the trenchcoat, the blazer and trousers etc..., but fashioned instead from cotton jersey T-shirting. The entire, machine-washable collection came in grey marle, charcoal marle and silver. It earned Goot the 2005 Tiffany & Co Young Designer of The Year Award.
Goot's May 2005 Fashion Week show made an impact here and several months later, the front cover of high-profile US industry newspaper WWD. The brand was immediately picked up by prestigious London retailer Browns Focus and then swiftly by other key international retailers, notably the Colette emporium in Paris and Henri Bendel in New York.
In September last year Goot debuted at New York fashion week - with US Vogue later heralding him as the designer who kicked off the SS07 season's urban sport mood.
Goot showed for the second consecutive season in New York in February. He is committed to showing back in New York in September.
"This is the fourth show we've done in a year which is insane and it won't happen again" said Goot of next week's show, his southern hemisphere SS0708/international resort collection. "I felt that I hadn't finished the job here in this market. As far as positioning the brand and expressing the brand philosophy and mapping out our distribution, all these types of things, I think we have a little way to go, and hopefully the show will be another piece in the puzzle".
Apart from whatever promotion Target may be planning for the Goot project in mid May, could next week be the last Josh Goot show downunder?
"I wouldn't want to say that because that's got a lot of finality to it" said Goot. "I really enjoy showing here. It's in a sense much easeir than showing overseas. It's your own backyard. And I know how much of a role the Australian industry played in helping us build this brand. We've enjoyed a lot of support and in a sense I feel like showing once a year [here] is the least we can do to I suppose keep everyone's interest and kind of say thank-you".
Original post and comments.
Two months after Target shelves around the country were stripped bare within minutes of the arrival of a Stella McCartney collaboration collection, Target Australia plans to unveil a top secret project with one of Australia's brightest fashion lights, Josh Goot.
UPDATE: 16/05/07
Well don't say we didn't warn you................ Finally today, the worst kept secret in the Australian fashion industry - thanks to this blog's big mouth - was laid out in the open for all to see.
Yes indeedy, Target Australia has stitched up Josh Goot for a special limited-edition collaboration range. It's a lot smaller than the range Stella McCartney did for Target earlier this year - 12 pieces, as opposed to 42 - and it remains to be seen of course whether the Josh Goot name will resonate as well as McCartney's with Australian consumers, and if the latter will scratch each others' eyes out to get a piece of it in "selected" stores when it launches on June 19. As happened in a number of (the 100 designated) Target stores, with the McCartney mania of March 12th.
But with a veeeeeeery similar looking Josh Goot silver trench coat selling at Browns Focus in London right now for GBP290 (A$692), A$129.99 for the Target version looks to be one hell of a saving. The trench is the exxiest item in Goot's Target range, with prices starting at $59.99.
With racerback tanks, leggings, pencil skirts, cardigans, blazers and yes the infamous jersey trench coat in a colour palette of grey marle, silver, navy, black as well as Kelly green and a cobalt blue - all in a Tencel/wool blend, and in sizes from XS-L - Goot is pushing the signature 'tailored comfort' look of his first range shown in Sydney in May 2005.
As evidenced by the new collections shown in New York in February and Sydney a fortnight ago, he's moving on from that ever-so-slightly. That said, the theme of the latest collection was "future Roman sport". Let the Tarjay games begin.
ORIGINAL BLOG: 26/04/07
Target is the principle sponsor of Goot's Fashion Week show on Thursday May 3 at 9.00am - and its logo appears on the invitation. But although neither the Target or Goot camps were spilling any other beans this afternoon, Fashion Season has learned that a Josh Goot/Target collaboration is due be either announced or else unveiled at Target in mid May.
It won't be without precedent of course in this market. Last year Target unveiled several styles from three other Australian labels, Alice McCall, Tina Kalivas and TL Wood, under the Designers For Target umbrella. A Target spokeswoman declined to confirm or deny whether Goot was the only Australian fashion brand involved with this latest Designers For Target project.
"I can't tell you anything other than Target are supporting me on this show" Goot told Fashion Season. "It's great to have their support - I think they've shown a commitment to young Australian designers over the past year".
The Stella McCartney range was sold in 100 Target stores around Australia. The 42-piece collection ranged in price from $29.99 for a scarf to $199.99 for a trenchcoat. Selling out in some stores within minutes, according to a Target source it was the retailer's most successful sales day ever in this market.
So just what might Josh Goot For Target look like? Dripping, most likely, in the designer's signature urban sport aesthetic.
Goot, now 27, made his runway debut at Fashion Week in May 2004 with a print-heavy streetwear brand called Platform. Launched a few months later his eponymous collection boasted a leitmotiv of "tailored comfort", with a simple concept: constructed wardrobe classics of the type normally made from woven fabrics, the trenchcoat, the blazer and trousers etc..., but fashioned instead from cotton jersey T-shirting. The entire, machine-washable collection came in grey marle, charcoal marle and silver. It earned Goot the 2005 Tiffany & Co Young Designer of The Year Award.
Goot's May 2005 Fashion Week show made an impact here and several months later, the front cover of high-profile US industry newspaper WWD. The brand was immediately picked up by prestigious London retailer Browns Focus and then swiftly by other key international retailers, notably the Colette emporium in Paris and Henri Bendel in New York.
In September last year Goot debuted at New York fashion week - with US Vogue later heralding him as the designer who kicked off the SS07 season's urban sport mood.
Goot showed for the second consecutive season in New York in February. He is committed to showing back in New York in September.
"This is the fourth show we've done in a year which is insane and it won't happen again" said Goot of next week's show, his southern hemisphere SS0708/international resort collection. "I felt that I hadn't finished the job here in this market. As far as positioning the brand and expressing the brand philosophy and mapping out our distribution, all these types of things, I think we have a little way to go, and hopefully the show will be another piece in the puzzle".
Apart from whatever promotion Target may be planning for the Goot project in mid May, could next week be the last Josh Goot show downunder?
"I wouldn't want to say that because that's got a lot of finality to it" said Goot. "I really enjoy showing here. It's in a sense much easeir than showing overseas. It's your own backyard. And I know how much of a role the Australian industry played in helping us build this brand. We've enjoyed a lot of support and in a sense I feel like showing once a year [here] is the least we can do to I suppose keep everyone's interest and kind of say thank-you".
Original post and comments.
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