Three for one with Nicholas K, Whitney Eve and Mara Hoffman
Thursday, September 10th, 2009By Nadine Kam
Nadine Kam photos
On the street with model and representatives of Bagir, Ltd.
At this point I don’t even want to know how many hours I’ve been awake. Left Honolulu at 4 p.m. Wednesday and got in at 10 a.m. New York time, but really 4 a.m. Hawaii time, with only about 2 hours of sleep. Figure I’ve been up 46 hours now, and it’s not pretty. I don’t know why I thought it made sense to arrive day of.
On top of all my woes, I decided to pick up the iPhone 2 days ahead of departure when T-Mobile wouldn’t let me extend my contract (two months to expiration) to pick up the G1 phone at the discounted price for newbies. (Isn’t that just plain wrong when they treat newbies better than current loyal clients who have been with them for at least six years? So much for their so-called “mobile makeover” initiative. Plus, locking people into two-year contracts is also wrong. It might have been OK two years ago, but technology evolves so fast now, it’s a lifetime. Phone companies better watch it. First they lost the lock on phone numbers and the two-year contract is going to be the next battle.)
Anyway, I had put my entire schedule into the iPhone, only to find it updated all the times to fit New York time, so fashion shows at 9 a.m. were moved to 3 p.m., 4 p.m. to 10 p.m., etc. Some had moved to the next day. Had to fix all the times, adding to my aggravations.
Well, you always know you’re getting close to the tents when you see a guy in his underwear and plastic jacket. That would be a model for the Israeli clothing company Bagir, graphically conveying its eco philosophy and Eco-Gir, a suit made from 30 PET recycled plastic bottles. (The real suit would look like fabric.)
I was first lured to the Nicholas K, and Mara Hoffman show because it promised to make life easy for editors with its three-in-one format. It’s a great way for designers to pool resources as well.
But it’s been two years since my last fashion week and I was worried that having three designers would present delays and anxious about the 2 p.m. show’s late start because I also had to make it to the Ports 1961 show on the other side of the tent at 3 p.m.
Men’s casual wear by Nikolas K, with some of his womenswear designs below.
I had put the timing question to Twitter, and those who responded suggested it wasn’t a good idea to accept back-to-back invitations because shows often start late. That didn’t make sense to me. It might be true for Marc Jacobs and others showing outside the tents, but inside the tents, there’s a tight schedule and designers have to follow it or risk botching it for the next designer.
So I booked as many as I could, except when there was a direct conflict, in which case the company that sent its invite the earliest won.
I took my seat, but figured that once the show started, they wouldn’t want anyone crossing in front of their cameras, so I decided to stand near the entrance so I could run if I had to. By 2:45 p.m. I was really, really anxious, so left after seeing the Nicholas K show of men’s and women’s sportswear. I really wanted to see what kind of dresses Mara Hoffman would come up with next, but I didn’t want to risk losing my seat at Ports and becoming an SRO. So, after one long wait in line, I was back in another line. And, after about 10 minutes in my seat, people from the other show started trickling in.
Mara Hoffman’s show appears on a monitor inside the tent lobby.
All was not lost. The shows are captured on video that loops on screens in the lobby area so I could watch what I missed. As I expected, Mara Hoffman’s floor-length and short dresses were beautiful, appearing to be as light as a feather and full of soft, feminine, billowy movement. Any woman wearing one of her creations, in colorful geometric prints, would turn heads, whether at a spring garden party or evening event.
Whiney Eve showed very girly dresses with a lot of sheer laces and silver metallics. She also showed some prints that remind me of some vintage kimono prints, with their mix of purple, orange, green and white. It’s a very Asian-inspired palette.
If I had to decide on the trends for spring 2010 after Day 1, I would say there’s an Asian influence, and also heavy white and jeweled metallic look, both echoed on the Ports runway. I imagine people will still be feeling poor six months from now, but they’ll want to feel rich and wear things that will perk up their spirits. I think that is what designers will be giving us in the days ahead.
Whitney Eve designs, above and below, on one of the monitors in the lobby.
