Fashion Calendar Chaos

This is a longer post than I usually write, to talk about a lecture that I had last week that was honestly so interesting and inspiring. So, one of the reasons I took the course that I did was because they promised that we would get an insight into the ‘behind the scenes’ of the fashion world and not only would that help my future career but it is also something that massively interests me. When I walked into my lecture and saw that it was about the ‘fashion calendar’ (in other words, the ins and out of fashion week) I was more than excited to get started.

The first thing to note is that Fashion month always starts in New York, then to London, followed by Milan and it ends in Paris. All of the city’s have their own ‘dna’ so a set of trends that are always shown and that make up that fashion week. In New York they tend to show collections that are associated with the pure and minimalistic trend, they also show a lot of active and sportswear, the designs for the Met Gala and lastly the trend that revolves around the ‘practical and working woman’. Designers that choose to show in New York included old guard designers – Calvin Klein, Oscar De La Renta, and new guard designers – Off White and Victoria Beckham.

London is known as the ‘melting pot’ as a lot of the new generation designers who are fresh out of university choose to showcase their talent there. London is also know for its rebellious, eccentric spirit, I think this was set up by classic designers such as Vivienne Westwood and Alexander McQueen. And lastly London loves to show collections which include heritage tailoring as this is something London is known for due to Saville Row. Old Guard designers- John Galliano, McQueen and Vivienne Westwood. New guard- J.W. Anderson, Christopher Kane. New, new guard (fresh talent)- Charles Jeffrey, Molly Goddard.

Milan, the city known for its bright colours and joyful collections. A perfect mix of humorous and romantic/sexy. The collections are also very complimentary to the climate there. I find Milan the most interesting as it’s so vibrant and exciting, it also shows designers that you are probably more familiar with. Old guard- Versace, Prada, Dolce and Gabbana and Gucci. New guard- No.21, Philosophy Di Lorenzo.

Lastly Paris, the most romantic and feminine city. The fashion shows there tend to show a historic influence and the collections are about high quality and craftsmanship. In recent years Paris fashion week has really upped its game and its very different to how it was a few years ago and I think thats due to so many upcoming designers taking over old fashion houses. Phoebe Philo for Celine, Olivier Rousteing for Balmain (you’ll be familiar with him if you’re an avid Kardashian follower) Anthony Vaccarello for Yves Saint Laurent, Maria Chiuri for Dior.

So I honestly found this lecture so interesting especially the fact that there is in’s and out’s to how each city presents their shows and how the designers decide where to show their collections. I’ve been telling anyone who’ll listen about this lecture so I was super excited to write this post and I hope you’ve enjoyed it as much as I did or that you’ve at least learnt something!

Hollie Rose x