Every Week Is Fashion Week

By Sharmin Musca on October 17, 2014 in Other

These days it feels like there’s a fashion week happening somewhere around the world no matter what time of year it is. From Stockholm to Shanghai and Tokyo to Delhi, cities across the globe have claimed their own weeks to showcase their home-grown fashion talent.

While writing this month’s piece, New York is centre stage and designers there are going beyond the catwalk, staging performance pieces rather than shows. The design house Opening Ceremony, for example, is producing a short play by Spike Jonze, with performers wearing their costumes – sorry, collection.

Perhaps the rise of these non-traditional shows is due in part to fashion playing a bigger role in reality television and entertainment in general, as well as bloggers changing the way we consume fashion. Then there’s the viral factor and the rise of the social media review – last year’s Givenchy show was described as being ‘made for Instagram’.

For those who find fashion week’s seasons baffling, here’s a quick rundown. The seasons shown are always at least six months ahead, for the northern hemisphere. So in September you see clothes for their following Spring/Summer, and in February you see clothes for their following Autumn/Winter. It certainly works well for fashion forward Aussies because the season matches exactly with what we want to wear right now, so we can adopt the looks early.

Clothes on the catwalk are usually samples only put into production after buyers from large stores put in their orders, but technology and a thirst for fast fashion have really sped things up. You can now literally buy things straight off the catwalk – Burberry, for instance, sold bags and accessories live from the catwalk at their AW13 show.

What were the trends that came out of fashion week for Spring/Summer 2015, you ask?

Dressed Up Skirts – The mini and pencil skirts were seen doing double duty as extra chic belting worn over shirt dresses and even gowns.
The Rise Of Suede – We’ve been conditioned to accept that leather skirts, shorts and dresses are the staple of warmer weather, but designers are now playing with the softer, rich and decadent suedes in high slit dresses and cool minimalist separates.
Soft Pastels – Many designers opted to work in pretty pastels instead of saturated colour this season.
Crop Tops Are Here To Stay – You’d be wrong to think that you’d see the end of crops tops as there were plenty of bare midriffs on show.
Glorious Flats – Another enduring trend was the glorious flat shoe, which was even seen paired with eveningwear.

On the streets I found: (Alice is the brown haired girl and Michelle is the blonde)

Name: Alice
Occupation: Chartered accountant
Lives: Kensington
Fave item this season: A floral headband.
Street Style: Alice wears a black dress by Showpony with a hat from Top Shop, shoes by Boohoo and a bag from The Iconic.

Name: Michelle
Occupation: Receptionist
Lives: Kensington
Fave Item for the Season: A large necklace from Kookai.
Street Style: Michelle wears a playsuit by Ally, shoes from New Look and a bag from River Island.