Easton Pearson....................................Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Carriageworks, Sydney
Thursday, May 2, 2013
Showing posts with label Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia. Show all posts
Easton Pearson..................Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Carriageworks, Sydney
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
Easton Pearson............Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Carriageworks, Sydney
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
The Courtier.........................Easton Pearson, Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Sydney
Saturday, April 27, 2013
Wonderland..............................Easton Pearson, Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Carriageworks, Sydney
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Lewis Carroll's Alice finds herself washed ashore on the banks of Wonderland and right in the middle of an outrageous Caucus-Race. My trip to Australian Fashion Week was much the same: racy and extravagant at Sydney's Carriageworks. A fine swim at Coogee's sea baths prior to the shows added to the atmosphere of being awash in another world. Like in the seawater, colours flashed by on the runway and in the surrounding fashion-pack.
As in Wonderland, Fashion Week has many doors to pass through to gain access to the actual work on show. Once you pass through one door, there is another, and then another, all different sizes and some with guards. I tried my best to shrink through the hierarchy, making it back stage and to my seat towards the back of the audience. But thanks to the wonderful help of stylist Lesley Crawford my adventure in Sydney really took off and I was promoted to the front row.
From the Caucus to the Royal Court! The front row at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week is hallowed ground for fashion editors, power-bloggers, stylists and celebrities. I was nervous sitting there and very aware of the wonderful performance of the guests around me, a show that is often more important than the actual collection presented. However not so for Easton Pearson’s vibrant collection HyperReal.
As staff peeled back the plastic sheets concealing the catwalk, DJ Jonny Seymour built an intense atmosphere with Zoe Keating's eery track Into the Trees, and so the ritual began. A wild parade of courtiers flowed onto the runway in a collection brimming in colour, beaded details and couture-like volume. Like Carroll's classic tale this collection was timeless and untouched by contemporary trends. It was a unique take on dressing, refined by the designers Lydia Pearson and Pamela Easton, who have based their label in Brisbane since 1989.
If the collection was untouched by contemporary trends, I could still see its place on the street and in contemporary life. Magical in style and production but not out-of-this-world in terms of practicality, so I am inspired to post drawings of real people I’ve seen wearing related looks. Australia may seem far from Paris but viewing this collection in the flesh felt everything like the experience of Haute Couture. Sydney was exotic, bright and full of optimism, but HyperReal was an even grander Wonderland.
LG
From the Front Row..........Easton Pearson, Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Sydney
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
The Last Sitting...................................Kate Sylvester, Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Sydney
Friday, April 19, 2013
Famed actresses and Americana were the clear propositions announced in Kate Sylvester's Spring Summer 2013/2014 runway presentation. And nothing speaks of Hollywood more than scenes of sets backstage, mirrors laced in lightbulbs and frantic staff milling around starlets.
Such a world was exactly what I found when led into the passageways of Carriageworks to preview the collection entitled; The Last Sitting. Here Kate was directing her own LA story by preparing her models to play a character; a new Marilyn Monroe, a contemporary one.
I quickly started sketching all the imagery that whirls past so quickly on the runway; shoes, skirts, makeup and hair. This glimpse backstage gave me information to fuel my drawings but also insight into the story and inspiration underpinning the collection.
The bright lights of the runway set created the atmosphere of Bert Stern's photographic studio, whose legendary images of Monroe set the colour pallet for the collection; skin tones, lipstick pink and pearl.
As the models practiced their exits, I took in the collection; here translucent organza skirts and rose embroidery give the collection the femininity Marilyn dreams up. But masculine bomber jackets (albeit studded in gold stars), sporty caps and the use of leather throughout the collection reminded me of the actress's complexity and ambiguity. These signifiers perhaps noting her loneliness and of course the consequence: the ever present men.
In The Last Sitting Kate takes the emblems of these lovers and pairs them with the signatures of the starlet. Building a contemporary wardrobe that speaks of this complexity, rather than just a Hollywood daydream. Joe Dimaggio's baseball mitt is transformed into leather jackets and skirts with its cross-stitched detailing even reaching the boots.
Kennedy's knits and Arthur Miller's button down shirts are present, but its the tan baseball leather that dominates. This dramatic contrast to the feminine details propel the collection, and harks back to that very Hollywood tale of dark meeting light.
LG
The Last Sitting..........Kate Sylvester, Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Carriageworks, Sydney
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
Jonny................Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Carriage Works, Sydney
Sunday, April 14, 2013
Sarah Murdoch..........................Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, Carriageworks, Sydney
Saturday, April 13, 2013
