Sold-out student runway showcases tomorrow’s designers
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- 22 hours ago
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Maggie Pappas spoke to student fashion designers showcasing their work today at Melbourne Fashion Week.
Talented student fashion designers will showcase their collections at the sold-out Student Collections Runway today in Kensington for Melbourne Fashion Week.
Amongst the next generation of designers are Flora Bellemo and Stephanie Hockey, whose inspirations towards their collections are stylistically different, but both challenge social perceptions and issues through creativity and boldness.
Stephanie Hockey will debut with her collection ‘Girl Girl, Grown Up’, inspired by a childhood Barbie doll her sister discovered in her studio, named ‘Cocaine Barbie’, that became the muse for her collection.
“It looks worse for wear. It’s seen better days. It’s sun-bleached and has really messy hair. She looks like a Barbie that was found at the bottom of a costume box,” Hockey said.
For Hockey, laughter is part of her creative process. If she finds something that makes her laugh, she has a rule that she has to do it, and this was Cocaine Barbie.
Her inspiration also came from camp theory and its use of humour, bad taste and loud expressions that helped Hockey craft an aesthetic for “this love of girly, feminine, bright things and this camp expression of femininity.’’
“This expression of femininity inspires women to have this form of escapism. I really made this collection for women like me, or people like me who enjoy dressing in bold, bright and powerful ways.”
This year's theme ‘Come As You Are’ celebrates individuality and creativity and invites everyone to join and take part with free open-air runway shows, workshops and a series of curated exhibitions.
A highlight of this year's free program is an Australian first exhibition at Federation Square featuring the Oscar-winning Wicked screen costumes of Glinda and Elphaba, designed by Paul Tazewell, the first person of colour to win an Academy Award for Best Costume Design.
This will not be Flora Bellemo’s first debut, as her previous designs have been in New York Fashion Week.
Her collection, ‘Ephemeral Perils’, explores how humans are “drawn towards short-term payoffs in our species longevity exhibited in everyday life with governments and cooperations taking band-aid approaches to human-induced climate change,” she said.
Flora's collection has been selected as a finalist in the student runways. (Images: Eden)
Ephemeral Perils will showcase animal skeletons and human muscles with raw scenes, bright colours, laser cuttings and a contrast between luxury, raw and rough textiles, she said.
“I wanted to do something that discusses the climate, but I wanted to look at why we don’t take action on climate change. Instead of necessarily critiquing every person, I wanted to look at our overall response to climate change.”
As the curtains are drawn up tonight, Hockey and Bellemo will showcase their hard work, uniquely driven collections to an audience that will not only represent the early stages of their career but also stir conversations.
