Mark Fast’s fall/winter 2011 collection is amazing! Fast partnered with Canadian leather goods manufacturer and retailer, DANIER this season to bring a dynamic and sexy collection which had me itching to buy.

As you look at the pictures below, Fast mixes the softness of his signature knitwear designs with the sleekness and supple quality of leather – brilliant! The use of leather introduces a different dimension to his knit dresses and as noted on Style.com shows “he's not a one-trick pony.”

A small capsule collection will be in select DANIER stores this October; it’ll be interesting to see how this collection will be translated for the Company’s customer. I really hope much of the original designs, adventurous and sexy nature of the clothing is maintained. Nevertheless, I’ll definitely be one of the first people in line to purchase my Fast piece.

Images courtesy of DANIER

London Fashion Week has come and gone, and unfortunately for the fall/winter 2011 season I wasn’t able to attend. My trip to London, England, last September happily coincided with a family event; however, this season that wasn’t the case and due to the practicalities of life (i.e.: work, finances, scheduling, etc) I watched the shows and read the reviews from the sidelines.

One designer’s progress I was most interested in monitoring during London’s Fashion Week was Christian Blanken.

When I saw Blaken’s spring/summer 2011 collection last season his design direction leaned towards incorporating American sportswear and British street fashion. This season Blanken’s latest collection maintains his sportswear philosophy, but incorporates more refined tastes. The inspiration for this season “is loosely based on the Claude Chabrol film ‘Les Biches’ and the Diaghilev ballet ‘The House Party’.”

The collection provides an array of highly wearable and classic basics, primarily using the colours of black and white; while accent colours, such as navy blue and jewel tones, adds feelings of richness and vibrancy. Depth and character for each piece of clothing is created using materials with texture such as jersey, satin, silk organza, fur and leather.

There is a distinctive design DNA when looking at Blanken’s last two collections; spring/summer and for fall/winter 2011 are perfect examples of a designer’s progression from one season to the next, while at the same time, maintaining his aesthetic and creativity.

Images from Catwalking.com

For this week’s Shoe of the Moment blog entry, I’m doing something a little different and featuring select designs from Georgina Goodman's spring/summer 2011 collection.

While covering London Fashion Week in September, I had the opportunity to visit Goodman’s exhibition and see her shoes up close and personal. Her creations are whimsical and at times seem to draw inspiration from the children’s story Alice in Wonderland, particularly from the fictional character of the Cheshire Cat.

The combination of vibrant colours – bright yellows and hot pinks – stripes on the outer and sole; and the embellished word “love” are a mixture of thought and fantasy. Therefore, it doesn’t come as a surprise that this collection is titled, “Adventures in lucid thought.”

Images from Georgina Goodman

Just before the start of LG Fashion Week, The Room (at the Bay Queen Street) marked its one year anniversary with a two day event called, “God Save the Queen” celebrating London’s contemporary fashion. A slew of Britain’s top designers were brought to Toronto for a cocktail reception, fashion panel and trunk shows.

When I saw the designer names on the “God Save the Queen” invite I was floored that the Bay secured so many  talented individuals. In total, there were nine designers: Charlotte Olympia Dellal, Giles Deacon, Mark Fast, Erdem Moralioglu, Jonathan Saunders, Marios Schwab, Nicholas Kirkwood, Tom Binns and Mary Katrantzou. Leith Clark, editor of Lula Magazine, was also on hand to celebrate the launch of her pop-up store within The Room for November 2010.

The designers

The cocktail reception

There were so many beautiful clothes and shoes on display at the cocktail reception that I could not help but snap pictures of pieces which stood out on the floor. The workmanship and detail put into these garments is tremendous.

The panel discussion and trunk shows took place the day after the cocktail reception which featured Charlotte Olympia, Erdem Moralioglu, Giles Deacon, Marios Schwab, Nicholas Kirkwood and Jonathan Saunders. Author and broadcaster, Bronwyn Cosgrave moderated the panel which delved into topics such as the London fashion scene, each of the designers’ careers and the financial challenges of presenting a runway show.

“God Save the Queen” was the fashion affair of the year and funnily it made me think of the parallels of this event with that of my recent trip to cover the spring/summer 2011 shows at London Fashion Week. Can you image what The Room will do for its anniversary in 2011? I’m sure it will be even more spectacular.

Image gallery #3: pictures #2 and #4 courtesy of the Bay

Over the past year I’ve met a lot of people through social networking, be it through this blog or on Twitter. One of those people is Courtney Blackman, Co-Founder and Co-Chairman of the Fashion Business Club (FBC). She kindly reached out to me after I published a FBC video in a blog entry this past June and since then we’ve become pen pals.

Courtney is a woman of many talents – in addition to her work with FBC – she is the Founder and Director of Forward PR, sits on the board of the Ethical Fashion Forum and sat on the advisory board of the Fashion Summit 2009. During my recent trip to London we had the chance to meet for the first time, I asked her a few questions about her involvement in the fashion industry and work with FBC.

1. How many seasons have you been involved with London Fashion Week? 

Probably about 11 or 12 seasons, a mix of both attending and working; when I first got into the fashion industry in London I was working as the in-house PR Marketing Director for a fashion designer. After that I open my own agency.

For the first few seasons I attended London Fashion Week and we would get clients that would be exhibiting at as exhibitors, it was only within the last few seasons we started doing PR for shows.

2. How has London Fashion Week grown and developed over those 12 seasons?

It’s moved around a lot, it used to be in Chelsea at Duke of York Square, then it moved to the Natural History Museum and now they’ve moved to Somerset House.

There’s also been a noticeable difference since Harold Tillman has taken over as Chairman of the British Fashion Council. It’s much more business oriented and there’s a lot more communication; they send out a lot more e-mails communicating about the fashion industry and the impact it has on business as a whole in the UK and how much money it brings in. I think that’s better because it makes the general public understand that fashion is a viable industry and gives so much to the country. They’ve also pulled in Boris Johnson and David Cameron, really trying to get the government involved because it is an important industry.

3. There’s a prevalence of street fashion photography and bloggers at London Fashion Week – it’s much more visual and concentrated. What’s your take on this?  

Street fashion photography is really big, it started with the Sartorialist and now everyone is doing it and getting in on the action. Everyone has their part during London Fashion Week; you have the editors, you have the journalists, you have the people who dress crazy and then you have those who photograph these people.

The bloggers are like micro celebrities in their own right; they dress a certain way, blog and they want to get photographed.

London is such a creative city, a creative country – there’s always been that kind of feeling to Fashion Week.

4. How did you form the Fashion Business Club?

A year after I launched my own PR company I met my now business partner, Alison Whelan. We conceptualized FBC and communicated it to people within the fashion industry in London and had such a great response. We held our first meeting just to see how many people would come and 75 turned up. Then we went to the drawing board and decided how we want to make it function. 

FBC has just past four years of being in operation and it has grown so much. Meetings are always the last Thursday of every other month at 3:00 p.m. We’re partnered with Swarovski Crystallized (our venue partner), with Vogue.com (our media partner) and we’ve just partnered with MyWardrobe so they dress Alison and I for events. We also just launched FBC TV last year, so we film all of our meetings.

Our next meeting is on September 30^th we’re having Laura Bailey; she’ll be interesting because we’ve never had a model and never had someone involved in the ethical fashion industry – she’s also a journalist and entrepreneur.

Dolly Jones (left) interviewing Laura Bailey (right) during the September meeting of FBC. Click here to read FBC’s blog about this interview.

5. What are the future plans for FBC?

We always found it quite fascinating to have our own venue instead of nesting in another location, but we’ll see because that’s a big under taking – it’ll need financing and investors. We’re going to keep working with Swarovski and keep bringing in amazing speakers.

Image #1: photograph by Venetia van Hoorn Alkema

Image #2: from Fashion Business Club Blog photographed by Sam Atkinson

London Fashion Week – I came, I saw and I conquered (so to speak). After attending my first fashion week outside of Toronto, I’d like to share a few observations of my experiences. They are:

Toronto vs. London: I was a little nervous going to LFW by myself. I wasn’t sure what to expect or generally how, as a blogger from Toronto, I’d be received. I was on my own, swimming in a much larger pond than normal and it reminded me of two things:

• Stepping out of your comfort zone is a good thing, it expands your horizons and gives you a different point-of-view of the fashion industry
• I appreciate Toronto’s fashion community more, no matter how much some people will complain how small it is. Our city and its fashion industry has a lot of talent  and in terms of attracting international attention and recognition it’s not exactly on par with London, but who’s to say it won’t happen in the near future?

Focusing on the business of fashion: the exhibitions at LFW really serve the purpose of connecting designers (of all talents and specialities) with potential buyers. This is where the real financial transactions are made between designers and retailers – not on the runway.

No public admittance: LFW is not open to the public which is a nice change; it separates all the riff-raff from those people who are there to work, prevents overcrowding at the venue and minimizes the seat stealers at the catwalk shows.

Street fashion photography: street fashion photography is prevalent at LFW and many people attending the fashion shows at Somerset House appear to (at times) intentionally dress to be captured on camera, or they just like to hang around the entrance of the venue.

Diversity on the runway: I was happy to see diversity on LFW’s runways, both on and offsite. Models of various ethnicities were casted by designers; however, I didn’t see any plus size models in the catwalks shows I attended.

High heels ≠ comfort: cobblestone and high heels do not mix, I have the sore feet and one blistered toe to prove it.

Long live paper invitations: paper invitations are not dead and it was nice to receive a stack of invites in the mail when I arrived in London. It makes you feel special and still carries that old school charm – needless to say my cousin, who I was staying with at the time, was very jealous that I recieved more mail than her.

My fourth and last show for London Fashion Week was held at an offsite venue at the chic Il Bottaccio. After being absent from the fashion scene for 10 years, British designer, Elizabeth Emanuel was making her return to the catwalk with a spring/summer 2011 collection dedicated to the little black dress under her line, Art of Being; accompanied with hefty corporate backing by Jaguar.

Emanuel’s name may strike a familiar chord as she is famously known for “creating the royal wedding dress for Lady Diana Spencer and her infamous black evening dress worn at her first public engagement with Prince Charles.” Emanuel’s colourful history alone sparks a lot of interest and that evening London high society came out in droves to support the designer, as well as see her latest creations.

The collection takes inspiration from Emanuel’s involvement with co-designing Lady Diana’s black dress and Audrey Hepburn’s role in the movie, Breakfast at Tiffany’s. As the dresses are all in one colour, Emanuel takes a daring approach by presenting the garments in varying lengths – either very short or to the floor – and provides an extensive range of styles such as off the shoulder, strapless and a two-piece ensemble with a blazer and matching skirt.

Materials such as silk moss crepe, satin and Chantilly lace add to the depth, detail and texture of the garments enhancing its luxuriousness.

Added bonus of the evening’s event was a live performance by Sonique whose singing and energy kept the crowd engaged, as well as perfectly matched the modern approach to Emanuel’s little black dress collection.

Information courtesy of Elizabeth Emanuel

After seeing two popular shows in the tents at London Fashion Week, I was keen on experiencing the subtler face of its events; a presentation by a designer where I could get a closer view of the execution of skill and fashion vision. It’s no secret I’m partial to smaller, more intimate presentations and UK designer, Christian Blaken fulfilled just that.

For spring/summer 2011, Blaken looks towards athleticism by combining the aesthetic and style of American sportswear and British street wear. Named, nine this collection focuses on “the freedom and movement of the body... the poise and strength, as well as the idea of the human body as a work of art and object of performance and beauty.” To further this concept, he casted several athletes (Britain’s Olympic hopefuls) in the show: Jodie Williams, Tasha Danvers and Vicki Barr.

A calm energy settled in the room as models and athletes walked around in luxe sportswear in neutral colours made from fabrics such as nylon, jersey, gold lamé and perforated goat suede. The wearability of these garments is apparent as athletes struck poses by crouching and balancing on one leg, displaying their strength and skill, and durability of the clothes.

There’s a wide range of separates in the collection that follows the guiding principles of American sportswear. Most garments are cut to emphasize a relaxed and modern fit; trench coats, shift dresses and leggings added to the versatility of the collection. The only obvious structured pieces are the bomber jackets which Blanken presents in several cuts and colours – my favourite is one in gold lamé which embodies the edginess of street wear.

Overall, Blanken’s nine takes a minimalistic approach for s/s 2011 but it’s in the subtleties of this collection – its neutral colour palette, versatile fabrics and modern approach – where it draws strength and beauty.  

Information courtesy of Christian Blanken

After David Koma presented a collection of subtly armoured ballet dresses, Holly Fulton followed immediately presenting her spring/summer 2011 collection which took everyone on a psychedelic trip to the 1960s.

When you look at Fulton’s past collections she has the skill to transport you to another world where the seriousness of fashion is left behind. She is known for her trademark art deco prints and over-the-top (yet tasteful) embellishments; be it in clothes or in jewellery using Swarovski crystals. Furthermore, her ability to rejig the shift dress – her signature and most dominate silhouette in her repertoire – is second to none.

This season Fulton continues the element of fun as she presents a collection that has you envisioning yourself sipping champagne on the shores of Saint-Tropez on a yacht – perhaps with the Old Spice guy. This season she also shows a wider breadth of her design vision; there are more clothes to play with in this collection such as feathered skirts, artfully decorated maxi dresses and wide legged trousers.

A bright yellow, perforated leather dress with martini glasses imprinted on the skirt is a real stunner and would be hard to miss as you runaway on that yacht. However, Fulton also shows a softer side with shift dresses in white and pink with cloud-like patterns.

Fulton’s zest for life is clearly conveyed through her collection this season, but this lively attitude should not be mistaken for a lack of skill or seriousness when it comes to designing and tailoring clothes.

Photo of Holly Fulton s/s 2011 handbag from Telegraph UK

I’m back from London, England, and it’s been a whirl wind of a trip; it wasn’t a vacation where you sit around and did nothing. I was constantly on the go experiencing the city, as well as the sights and sounds London Fashion Week (LFW) had to offer.

My first show for London Fashion Week was an early one, at 9:45 a.m. Do the fashion glitterati wake up that early? Apparently they did and so did I. Designers, David Koma and Holly Fulton were both scheduled to show their collections back-to-back in the tents that morning and it was a full house with everyone vying for spots to see their latest creations for spring/summer 2011.

David Koma presented first and sourced much of his inspiration from his Russian roots and the arts, particularly the ballet. As you look at the pictures captured, from start to finish, Koma’s collection was a natural and logical progression of designs; colours changing from light to dark and daywear to evening wear. My interpretation of this collection is a characterization of a woman who experiences life from an age of innocence, who undergoes and at last reaches maturity.

Overall, silhouettes were body conscious and much of the opening designs were in whites and pinks, simply cut with subtle font detailing and full skirts. The hips are accentuated and are the focus for majority of Koma’s designs throughout. Peplums and pleats often contrasted the clothing which they were attached to appearing in a separate colour, such as in black.

There’s a change in the mood of Koma’s designs as the collection goes from cool whites to vibrant yellows and powerful blacks – the Koma woman grows and matures. The cut of the garments become more daring and intricate along the neckline, chest and shoulders where materials, such as snake skin and gold lamé create patterned stripes and armour like designs. It’s here, in the mid to latter half of the runway show, where Koma fully draws me into his collection. I can’t resist his black dresses, especially ones adorned with gold that take on a futuristic approach.