| Jamaican designers ready-made for international market
LEFT: An item from Yola Gray's collection which also received rave reviews from representatives from Parsons. RIGHT: One of the items from Shem Deeke's swimwear collection presented at the 'Tropical Glamour' fashion show, held on the east lawn, Devon House, Hope Road, last week Sunday. -Winston Sill/Freelance Photographer Alicia Roache, Entertainment Coordinator When the associate chair from one of the world's leading design schools says your work is fabulous, it is. Cliched fashion term or not, Carmela Spinelli from the Department of Fashion Design at Parsons: The New School For Design, could not resist the urge to say it. She admits it's kind of an overused term, especially when related to fashion, but 'fabulous' is fabulous. Spinelli was making reference to Shem Deeke's swimwear collection, showcased at the Saint International-produced Fashion Face of the Caribbean and Avant Garde designer of the year awards, last weekend.
Oscars Fashion Bonanza: Who Wore What?
As we all know, the Oscars isn't about winning awards at all - in fact, we've already forgotten who hosted the Oscars, what movie won the Best Picture Oscar and what an Oscar actually looks like - because the Oscars is all about lovely dresses and stuff. Oscar night is the one spot on the movie-making calender when actresses can swap the dirty rags that they wear for the rest of the year while playing impoverished drug addict victims of domestic violence for a selection of glamorous dresses with plunging necklines, figure-hugging cuts and other stuff we've read in girly magazines that we don't fully understand. For the Oscars, actresses can make themselves look a million dollars, fashion designers can earn themselves a million dollars and the majority of rational people at home would pay a million dollars to watch something that isn't about the fucking Oscars just for a single blissful second.
Young Israeli design student's fashions light up the international ...
By the time Tatiana Pogrebnyak was 11 years old, she knew she liked to sew and put things together. By the age of 13, she was interested in "the outfit, the cloth, the colors, everything." And by 15, she was studying design in high school and preparing for a career in fashion.
With such early drive, it seemed almost natural that last fall, at the age of 22, the aspiring young fashion designer became the first Israeli to win the Triumph International Fashion Award.
The annual award is sponsored by Triumph, an Austria-based lingerie company, and includes entrants from all over the world. Each year, designers are invited to create an outfit that showcases the company's signature product using a particular theme. The theme for the latest competition was 'Dress Up for Mozart - Rock Up Rococo!' and entrants were asked to create clothing that the famous 18th century courtesan Madame Pompadour might wear if she were to go on a date with Mozart today.
Fashion Report Card
Julia: Hello, Amanda. Thanks for letting me enlist you—Slate fashion writer and astute sartorial critic—to dissect the night's frocks. (And tuxes.) Award-fashion criticism is ubiquitous these days, but (as I noted in this piece) something seems to be amiss on the red carpet. Us Weekly's snippily dim Fashion Police, the certifiable Joan Rivers, the delightful Go Fug Yourself girls—all profess to be on the hunt for great style. But as celebrity dresses attract more scrutiny, stars' fashion choices seem increasingly blah. Amanda: Hi, Julia. There is a sameness to Oscar dresses. It's the stylist problem—most of the actresses hire them. No one wants to end up on the worst-dressed list. Commentators (particularly the television sort) do not suffer risk-taking gladly. Julia: Perhaps we should judge celebrity fashion the way they judge diving or gymnastics: with one score for execution, and another for degree of difficulty.
Oscar night’s fashion highs and lows
But even with their legions of stylists and assistants, not every star looked like a dream on Oscar night Sunday. I suppose the gift bags will have to make up for any bruised egos. Metallics made their presence known. Jennifer Hudson paired her long brown gown with a silvery bronze bolero jacket. A little too casual for the red carpet, but perhaps she is going for that strange cyborg look so prevalent on spring runways. Cate Blanchett was striking in Armani. She proved that slinky and shiny do not need to be flashy to flatter. Jennifer Lopez seems to have a penchant for Marchesa, since she once again chose the designer to meet her sartorial needs. The dress, one of three designed for her, was a delightful combination of jewelry and fabric. The low-key color kept the five tiers of antique rhinestones draped over her shoulders from being garish.
|
