Source: Harpers Bazaar

The Australians in New York fashion foundation held its third annual summer party a few weeks back and as the winner of the 2010 grant I was lucky enough to attend and meet some of Australia’s finest exports to New York. The night is the key fundraiser for the scholarship which co-founders Brana Wolf, Malcolm Carfrae, Julie Ann Quay and initiated to offer a leg up in the industry for young Australians in the fashion industry. With a special performance from three amazing ladies from Pricilla Queen of the Desert (every good night should be started this way,) the balmy evening took a more relaxed turn with iced cold drinks ready to quench any New York thirst. With last year’s winner and runner-up, Georgia Lazzaro and Simon Roberts, and this year’s runner up, the dapper Mitchell Oakley Smith all present, it was a great opportunity to finally meet everyone. As the recipient of the 2010 scholarship I can’t out into words how grateful I am to the founders for utilising their position as industry leaders to help foster the next generation of creatives. Check out the website for all the coverage from the night and information on how to apply for the 2011 scholarship. It may be only July but it’s always good to start thinking about these things early!

Oh…and happy 4th July!

Source: a little wicked, 2010, Lorri Ott

After outstaying my welcome at Alice’s house downtown, I’ve finally set up shop in Brooklyn (Brookers as the out-of-towners-who-want-to-pretend-their-locals say). I’m a month in at my internship at Proenza Schouler and I can’t speak more highly of the team there, and of course the designers themselves!
I’m still working on developing the Link project, but that has taken a back seat whilst I’ve been moving countries. Finally I have wifi- it scares me how dependant I am on the world wide web. After reconnecting with the www I’ve started to catch up on long over due emails and posts that have been rattling around my head for weeks.
Before I drop my next post I want to send back a little blog love to a good friend who is in her final year at RMIT fashion. Apart from sharing some kind of strange design/fashion/style/music brain with her, I’m lucky enough to see how her major project is unfolding. I read Kate’s tumblr religiously- it’s a feast for the design eye and her wit will put a smile smack bang on your face. The masthead of her tumblr may suggest she’s a cliche, but you K T Lang are the real slim shady!
I can’t wait to share some images of her work but for now I thought I’d include Lori Ott’s resin piece which was featured on a recent post of Katie’s.
Don’t worry there’ll be plenty more where that came from-she’s a star.

Source: Ragtrader March Issue 2011

There’s only one thing that erks me more than tardy blog entries…excuses for tardy blog entries, so don’t take the following as an excuse. In the last couple of weeks my post code has changed to a zip code and I’m finally in New York! I hopped on a plane to NYC and started my internship at Proenza Schouler four days later. Sorry to disappoint, but two weeks into the internship there are no horror intern stories to report! Everyone has been so welcoming and I can’t wait to see how the SS12 collection develops.

Now for some backtracking. During this year’s Loreal Melbourne Fashion Festival, Ragtrader approached me to come up with a list of questions I would like to ask respected Melbourne designer Arthur Galan. As a graduate you always have more questions than answers so it was pretty easy to come up with a list-the hard part was narrowing them down to ten. Arthur was really generous with his answers so I recommend having a read of the article. Thanks to Assia for putting the piece together!

During the RMIT Level Ten Exhibition at GPO I was invited for a quick Q & A with the team at tradecreative. They captured the spirit of the exhibition beautifully, doing justice to the hard work on display and behind the scenes. Enjoy.

Here’s one of the last images I haven’t uploaded from the shoot in December. It’s one of favourites because it shows the detail of the garment really well, putting on show all that hard work.

In other news, it’s taken a while but here’s the link to an article RMIT published on their website- it’s always great to have your achievements recognised. This is another post I found on my travels at wonderMODE.

And finally, I’m slowly starting to get ready for the US of A. Seeing all the coverage from NY Fashion Week is making me wish I was there already- I’ll have to wait another month until I can get my New York fix! More details to come.

Hope you like.

All Images: Dazed Digital- Morgan O’Donovan

Iris Van Herpen showed her first couture collection in Paris last week and I haven’t been able to stop googling images from the show. I first came across her work last year whilst studying. Graduating from the repected Arnhem Academy in July 2006, her profile has been on the rise since, releasing amazing collections and collaborating with designers outside of fashion. Every interview I have read on her lets me in on her process a little more. I posted a collaboration she completed with Benthem Crouwel, two renowned Dutch architects, last year. Listening to other designers talk about their work, I can’t always relate to their philosophies, however Iris’s work is quite unique in that she is totally driven by her curiosity in the mundane. Philippe Pourhashemi described her work as a ‘reinterpretation of reality’ (I love it when writers can put things so simply).

Iris’ aesthetic doesn’t necessarily align with my work, yet her search for the newest innovations and technologies to push her designs does. “I like surprising myself and being amazed at things”. For me that’s why I love design, it’s a blank canvas that has infinite possibilities that you could never begin to scratch the surface of (hope that doesn’t sound as pretentious as it did when I was typing it).

Follow the links for more coverage of the S/S11 Couture coverage.

Dazed Digital
A Shaded View on Fashion
Fashionista