Australia Fashion Week is blossoming into a great venue for new talent. There were several designers during the week that really brought a sense of style and uniqueness to fashion. While many designers played with some of last seasons trends and even took on some new one’s. You can easily see that the designers are focused on building their looks and style around there own individual philosophy. One the blessings of Australia Fashion Week is the absence of the abundant attendance of the celebrity guests. While there was a handful at each show, the front row was dominated by industry leaders rather than the celebrity.
One of the strongest trends out of Australia is the full leg pant, which several designers showed exclusively while others mixed the full leg pant with dying skinny leg pant trend. Two designers that really embraced the full leg pant were Chitra’s Closet and Leonard Street. Designer Amanda McCarthy’s full leg pant was a straight drop from the waist. Her look is very relaxed and she showed the pants in several plaid fabrics. At Chitra’s Closet, designer Chitra Mangma’s focus was on a more tailored pant in heavy fabrics.
From Fall/Winter the bubble is moving south – to the hem that is. Even San Francisco designers have moved the bubble shape south for the Spring. Designer Anna Thomas’s focus was on knits and prints this season, but she played with length and finish details like the bubble hem. While designers Crabb and Miraudo reworked the bubble hem at Under Constructions. The duo kept to loose construction and added volume to the skirt hem.
This season knitwear took of at the menswear collections in Paris and Milan. Only a few designers at Australia Fashion Week played with the new trend. One of common knitwear themes carrying from capital to capital is knit cardigans. Designer Alex Zabotto-Bentley showed a few knit pieces one the standout pieces was olive green cashmere cardigan. While Designer Olivia Reeve-Hart showed a series of soft and tailored knit dresses and skirt. One of her top looks is a long sleeve cashmere knit dress with a rolled neckline that is draped low. To finish off her knit looks she showed several double leather belts.
Lengths go up and then they go down, overall, designers show all sorts of lengths from season to season. This season designers are focused on a knee length look that is more tailored and certainly sexier. At Designer Belinda Fairbanks show her knit dresses varied in length but the showstopper was her long sleeve red cashmere dress. While at Dhini designer Dhini Pararajasingham focused on separates for Spring/Summer. Her crowning look is her flared hem pencil skirt with the seam of the skirt finished with a ruffle.
An interesting trend at the Australian shows was the return of the little black dress. For the Australian designers the key pieces to their collection was the little black dress. Practically all of the womenswear designers had at least one black dress in their collection. For designer Anna Thomas she kept to a simple design with her boxy cut black dress with a black silk satin mandarin sachet tied around the waist. For designer Amanda McCarthy, she brought together this seasons balloon shape and ruffles and crafted two really strong black looks. The key look was a balloon shape skirt black dress with the top of the dress finished with a draped look.
Another great trend that we are seeing a little more from each fashion week to the next is embroidery and beading. At Australia fashion week only a few designer showed embroidered and beaded looks. Two designers really embraced the strong statement in their collections. At the Narendra Kumar show, Kumar took embroidery and mixed it with silk-screening in both of her menswear and womenswear. The strongest embroidered look was the white silk chiffon mandarin collar blouse with floral pattern embroidered on the bodice of the blouse and the long sleeves. One of my favorites piece from Australia fashion week is Toni Maticevski’s cream silk crepe sheath dress overlaid with a white organza shell covered with a embroidered and beaded lily of the valley. The organza shell has a cape shaped back while the cream crepe dress is tailored close the waist. A Stunning Look!
Print’s, print’s and more print’s – the more the better! Prints have certainly rained on the Spring/Summer collections. Practically every designer at Australia fashion week had some sort of print in his or her collections. Designers moved between two major print themes this season. From the 70’s earthy color prints at Narendra Kumar and Toni Maticevski, to the vibrant floral prints at Fashionassassin, Dhini and Ananaya.
The crowning trend from Australia Fashion week is one of the lesser roads taken for Spring. Plaids, several designers did not use the strong print but the few who did really gave it some gravitas. From Chitra’s Closet where the plaid took on new life along with full shape looks and even a twist mixed with Windsor check pieces. Then onto Anna Thomas whose plaid wide-pleated skirts gave you a more a fall fell to her Spring looks!
[images viaWireimage.com] & Australian Vogue]
For designer Kiminori Morishita the skinny leg pant is still alive! For most of his collection the design stuck to the rocker chic skinny leg pant. The strongest statements for the collection were his use of prints and outerwear. The opening section was a series of skinny pant looks so tight to he leg that the crotch was tight. As the collection progresses Morishita started loosen up the fit. The models look was very similar to that of the Ramones in the 70’s and Steven Tyler. One of the strongest looks in the opening section is one of the most out of character pieces from the collection. A cream silk damask blazer worn with a white silk vest and a low-rise treated leather pant. While the pant was just a little too skinny for the look this season the sophistication of the blazer and vest is unique.
In the second section there were two strong looks that really went in two directions away from the rocker chic look that opened the collection. First Kiminori went in the direction of American sportswear with several 70’s style sports jacket. The strongest piece from this section was the white sports jacket with a blue and orange stripe design on the font of the jacket. The designer also moved in the direction of the Goth rock with a series of all black looks that incorporated a few unique prints. Like the black snakeskin print on velvet vest worn with a black skinny leg pant and black sleeveless dress shirt and tie. Morishita then showed more American sportswear looks that incorporated key pieces like the khaki p-coat and printed blazers.
There were two must have pieces in the collection. First is the sleeveless gray dress jacket worn with a matching skinny leg pant. The other must have piece is a army green treated leather jacket with a mow collar. The fit of the jacket is loose but still has a tailored look to the jacket. Morishita hit several unique trends from this season like the skinny tie as well as several sleeveless jackets in the evening section. The only miss from the collection was Morishita’s skinny leg pant; I would like to have seen more variations in the collection.
