8 April 2006

Canberra Centre Winter fashion show

| Kerces
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The Canberra Centre has been giving the average punter an opportunity to dream of glamour with a series of fashion shows. I went along to one of these on Friday afternoon.

Canberra Centre fashion show

As JB and I arrived the models were showing extravagant white lacy underwear. I later decided they must have done the underwear first because it would have been the hardest to get on and off.

White underwear

Now I am an avid reader of Cleo and Cosmo, plus I have that fashion bible CityNews at hand so what follows is my interpretation of what on earth these models were wearing. That said, I came away from the show with the distinct impression that more than half the outfits they had shown were actually wearable, unlike what frequently turns up in magazine fashion shoots. For this I applaud those who put the show on.

This autumn, those summer dresses don’t need to be thrown away because you can wear them with a jacket, shrug or scarf to keep warm. There was quite a bit of this shown.

Red dress

Stockings also help keep legs warm, and are a big feature this season.

Blue dress with stockings

Of course the best way to keep warm, especially in Canberra is with a coat. Trenches are still hot and there’s quite a bit of tweed still hanging round from the 50s look last season.

Green coat

For the men, think grandpa-ish: vests, argyle jumpers and cardigans. Plus leather jackets and denim never go out of fashion.

Leather jacket with argyle jumper

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After a brief few seasons where it took a back step (even fashionistas added some colour to their outfits!), black is back with a vengence this year.

Black top and jeans

Heels with everything of course, although the nasty taste for wedges still seems to be lingering. Note the underwear visibility of this ensemble.

Pink translucent dress

It transpired about this point the models were from the Lizzie Wagner Academy and the MC was none other than Ms Wagner herself.

Lizzie Wagner

The colours of the season are all rich tones, called by most ‘berry’ colours — blackberry, mulberry, raspberry, blueberry and so on. These are matched with earthy colours plus the occasional splash of teal as seen in the trench on the right here.

Richly coloured jackets

Hats are hot too, although not something I’ll be picking up as I almost always feel stupid with something on my head. I did once have a hat something like this one, but a friend parked half a case of beer on top of it for the best part of a week.

Floaty top with skinny jeans plus hat

I should mention too that a girl came up to me about halfway through the show and asked what I was taking photos for. I briefly explained about the RiotACT and she asked if I could send her some of the pictures. It transpired she was an advertising and promotions coordinator for the Canberra Centre, and she gave me approximately $24 worth of coffee vouchers for my trouble. My first paying photography job!

Man's purple vest with shirt

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Much to the disgust of anyone who isn’t a stick, skinny jeans are back and it’s near impossible to get anything else these days. But they do look great on those with the legs and self-confidence to pull them off.

Brown trench and skinny jeans

A tailored but relaxed look seems to be the go for men’s casual wear. Jeans as per usual but nice jackets. Plus stripes are in for everyone (apparently a la 60s mod).

Casual jacket with stripey jumper

JB thought this girl looked like Inara from tv series Firefly (and recent movie Serendipity).

Inara lookalike

As with any winter wardrobe, boots are a necessity. Heels, flats or (ick) wedges, this season’s boots are pretty much any colour and with embroidery or buckle embellishments. What seems not to be making a comeback this year is the ug boot, thank goodness.

Purple dress with lace-up boots

I fell in love with this bomber jacket with (faux) fur trim on the hood. The colour is just so bright and cheerful for winter. (By the way, real fur is also back, in spite of the best efforts of PETA and their paint buckets).

Blue bomber jacket

The hipster era is over, with high waists back on all the designers’ catwalks. This look can be transferred to dresses with belts on the waist rather than the hips. This all emphasises an hour glass figure and is advocated by Cosmo as flattering for ‘curvy’ girls (read anything larger than size 10).

High-waisted pants and dress belted at the waist

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The big new thing this season is what both Cosmo and Cleo call Victoriana style, much to JB’s disgust (“It’s either Victoriana OR Victorian style but you can’t have Victoriana style!”). This means lace and blouses with ruffles as well as pencil skirts, tights and stockings (as mentioned previously) and lots of bows.

Victoriana blouse and pencil skirt

Collared shirts with jumpers over the top is a neat if preppy look for men and one which should be easy to achieve without having to buy many extra clothes.

Sweater over collared shirt

I didn’t particularly notice him at the time, but in all my photos this guy came out looking pretty thick. Here he is as a football player pretending he’s a lawyer.

Dressy men's wear

This outfit shows off the pencil skirt, with a ruffle for accent, plus a berry coloured cardigan with a belted waist.

Pencil skirt and berry jumper

Argyle tops are also again in fashion for women (in the shop where I work they walked off the shelves last winter). This model only appeared in this segment and the finale and she seems to be a token older woman.

Argyle cardigan with high-waisted pants

This style of dress has a special name which I cannot for the life of me remember, but it has been being worn on red carpets all around the world for the past six months or so. It’s very elegant and again emphasises an hourglass figure.

Brown dress

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Once upon a time I would never have dreamed of putting yellow and pink together, but darken both colours and they seem to go fine.

Mustard shirt with mulberry skirt

One of the fashion aspects of West Wing I love is all their loooooong warm coats. I could very easily see myself in this one in Washington (the boots are pretty cool too).

Long brown jacket with fawn boots

This was the only other all black outfit in the parade. Note the bag — I read somewhere the other day (it’ll have been one of the aforementioned three mags) this season’s It bag is berry coloured with buckle trims. Lucky I was given something matching this description for my birthday!

Black dress with berry-coloured bag

I think this dress is a nice alternative to black and the patterns make it just that bit more noticeable.

Charcoal dress with black branch pattern

Once again we see The Bag, or something like it anyway. Plus a scarf, which you practically cannot go without if catching buses in winter here in Canberra.

Green cardigan, grey skirt, scarf and berry bag

At the end of the show all the models walked the catwalk, applauding the audience for some inexplicable reason. And so ends your taste of this season’s fashions.

Finale

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jamius maximus4:46 pm 10 Apr 06

I’m a dag and I wouldn’t know what I am talking about, but target have some decent shoes. It’s just that occationally they kind of start falling apart a little early. But you pay much less.

Of all places, Target got a plug for their boots IIRC.

The shows only seem to have been on last Thursday, Friday and Saturday. And I have no idea where any of the specific clothes came from, sorry, except to say the Canberra Centre somewhere. Print out the photo and take it round to all likely shops asking?

Nice work Kerces. Any idea when the next show in the series is? (or which store those boots in the first shot came from !)

$50-$60/hour approx

I wonder how much they got paid for that? (the models that is)

O M G those Lizzie Wagner fashion shows freak me out.

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