Best of the Paris Fashion Week showrooms
The 'Americans in Paris' showroom has become a fixture at the Paris Fashion Week. It is organised by the CFDA and the Vogue Fashion Fund, and showcases emerging US and US-based designers, who also vie for a $400,000 prize and the support and mentoring of fashion industry professionals from the CFDA and Vogue magazine.
The prize winner's name has not yet been revealed. The winner will be chosen from the 9 designers on show at the rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honoré venue: Area, Brock Collection, Ji Oh, Morgan Lane, Krewe Du Optic, Rochambeau, Chloe Gosselin, Newbark and Adam Selman. The latter is New York-based and is well-known for his collaborations with pop star Rihanna. He presented a collection inspired by one of the most popular US modernist painters, Georgia O’Keeffe.
Selman's collection was a vibrant tribute to America, starting from a new take on O’Keeffe's classic check shirt: punchy, colourful and decorated with embroidered pouches and trompe l'oeil effects. He also featured gingham motifs on shorts-pyjamas and mini jumpsuits, played with denim, embroidered flowers and long, airy silk evening dresses, and added a quirky, hyper-sexy touch with his transparent shorts-jacket-trousers sets.
Another much-awaited event was 'Swedish Fashion Now', organised by the Association of Swedish Fashion Brands in collaboration with the OFR bookshop at the Swedish Institute, in the Marais district: a three-day show to introduce 8 designers representing the nouvelle vague of Swedish fashion.
The fashion industry in Sweden is going through a very positive phase: it accounts for 11% of the country's exports and it is worth €30 billion, with record revenue increases in the last five years. The event leveraged this success, showcasing several accessories brands and ready-to-wear collections by Diana Orving, House of Dagmar, Hope and Back, all of them already established though still junior to labels like Acné Studio and Filippa K.
A new entry on the Parisian scene was the Dach Showroom, jointly organised by the Berlin Showroom, the Austrian Fashion Association and Mode Suisse. It featured 25 emerging designers and brands from Germany, Austria and Switzerland, among them Tata Christiane, Wendy Jim and Anelia Peschev. One name in particular stood out: Kenneth Ize, a young designer from Lagos, Nigeria, a graduate of Vienna's Applied Arts University. His African-contemporary label for men and women already shows at the Nigeria Fashion Week.
Finally, a date not to miss was at the showroom of Dutch collective We Are Muse. It consisted of four labels each with its own identity - ByBrown (rainwear), Electric Co (knitwear), Jessica Joyce (cocktail dresses) and Loveluha (jewellery) – all of them collaborating in the name of a fictional character, their 'muse'.
We Are Muse is devised as a platform for sharing and exchanging experiences, and showcased its 'four-headed creativity' at a photo happening by artist Cheryl Schruger. The collective introduces a new concept each season, calling on its network of creative directors, graphic designers, film directors and stylists.
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