London Fashion Week September 2024: 40 Years

Happy 40th to London Fashion Week! 🎊🎉

Well, it's only 5 days long. I've barely settled in and it's over. Fashion Week is about what's hot and what's not. 

This year what surprised me was the public school fashion which makes the wearer look like a schoolgirl. There's something disconcerting about this. Let's see now. Teenage girls adjust their uniform to not look like one but grown women wear it as a fashion statement. Statement of what?

 Infantilizing women? 

Something society is doing by constantly reiterating women should stay safe and all the do's and do nots to go with it, like don't stay out after dark which is basically trying to impose a curfew on them. What do women do in the depths of winter - never go out? It's the biggest nonsense out. Why put the responsibility onto the women? Besides, if women were to ignore it and all stay out late, the streets would become automatically safer. Otherwise, only men have the freedom to walk down the street, day and night. 

Or sexualising teenagers? 

Something which endangers young people, unnecessarily making them objects of male fantasy. Girls then develop unnecessary fears and develop false perceptions which skews their reality. 

Click here for an overview of the fashions at London Fashion Week in September. 

In all fairness, the Kent & Curwen label behind this collection named 'School', are best known as a male fashion house so this brand is probably very comfortable with shirts, ties, and jackets. School uniforms fit into this. The company was started back in 1926 by Eric Kent and Dorothy Curwen who had a creative business partnership together and were married in 1932. However, only a few years later, Eric died in 1939. Dorothy carried on another few decades, dying in 1972. 

The company began by specialising in ties for Oxbridge. Cricket jumpers were another specialisation of theirs. Their brand aims to convey eccentric Britishness through tailoring, sportswear and runway fashion. They have appealed to clients such as the Royal Family, including Diana, Princess of Wales. 

David Beckham was their poster boy but he ended his partnership with them in 2020 and the company was sold to Ruyi, a Chinese company which was a textile manufacturer. That didn't seem to work out. They are now owned by another Chinese company, Biem.

Daniel Kearns is the new creative director. He is also their menswear designer, since 2023, although he was there from 2016-21. His concept was, as I understand it, to go back to the history of Kent and Curwen hence, the public school look. Although they've tried to incorporate genderless styles too, and some outfits are more creative reinterpretations of British School uniforms, other designs I think are too gendered and literal, without much inventiveness or twist on them at all. 

Take a look for yourself at Kent & Curwen's Spring/Summer 2025 Collection on their website, the season that they presented at London Fashion Week this month:

SS25 Collection

Esme on Fashion Style

I came across this thought provoking video by Esme Young today. It's well worth watching for yourself, so take a look on The Great British Sewing Bee 🧵 🪡 Facebook page👇

Esme on Fashion Style

I really enjoyed this video. It's made me think 🤔 💭 There are some key concepts about fashion design that she's summarised here: as a fashion designer (and if you create original, handmade clothing) you need to create a particular style and look, which you can base on your own personal stylistic preferences and your unique personality. What I love about Esme's sense of style is that it's so artistic, creative and her style breaks conventions, thinks outside the box 😍 (and I love a bit of sparkle and fabulousness too ✨ 💖). Inspirational! Spurs me on to go design some clothes and maybe try to sew a few of them together too. I can be quite wacky when it comes to fashion design though: I've been known to design a gathered dress with lots of folds in it by putting a dustbin sack on myself. 🤷‍♀️ I also enjoy keeping a fashion terminology notebook. 📒✍️

I love the way she wears her art, as it were. I can relate to that: my ideal is for my fashion style to transform me into a walking work of art. Sadly, this doesn't always seem very practical in my life, such as when I'm doing a workout! 

I think it's absolutely fabulous that Esme enjoys wearing a jacket her ex-student designed, made and gave her - none of this uptight nonsense that unis like to encourage between students and academic staff! Love that she's appreciated their creative gift ♥️ and continues her relaxed relationship with this ex-student after they've graduated. 👍 

Q&A: 

Do I have a style preference for certain types of statement necklaces and what's my personal fashion style?

I don't focus on necklaces in particular when I want to wear a statement piece of jewellery or an accessory. I'm happy to mix it up between necklaces and bracelets, rings, belts, scarves, hair accessories, brooches, pins/badges, and ties. So eg I'm happy to switch it up between wearing a Jewish Star of David necklace and wearing a Jewish 'Chai' decoration I've attached onto my bag, that I adapted from a keyring. I love collecting keyrings - I incorporate them into my accessories and style. And I currently wear a big bold rainbow bracelet all the time, instead of the Pride necklace I wore last summer. I also have many intersecting identities so it's tricky to reflect all of them all the time in my personal fashion style and creative expression. 

Nevertheless, I do have a bit of a 'thing' for bold designs on ties so I have a tie collection I love and I like to keep adding to. This includes ties of all sizes and thicknesses, from slim women's ties to chunky men's ties and gender neutral ties, and the themes vary from arty🎨, to LGBT rainbow coloured🏳️‍🌈, to music🎶, to physics⚛️. I also collect badges, especially if they relate to LGBT+ statements, art, fashion, music eg some I bought at the museum exhibition of the Supremes. I pin most of these together on my arty graffiti bag to create a personalised statement bag. 

I also have a 'thing' for wearing waistcoats. So I do love to wear statement jackets and waistcoats, be it ones with applique patchwork, or sewn details, or more masculine styles. 

I also like to shift between purely fashion statements eg a bold, colourful, floral scarf that functions as the centre piece of my outfit (imagine Ted Baker style) and making social statements through clothing and jewellery (think LGBT+ statement items, Jewish accessories, and Vivienne Westwood stylish, arty statement clothing range as well as her punk slogans & safety pins style). I also collected punk jewellery and jackets and enjoyed wearing that Vivienne Westwood inspired fashion style too. 

I don't wear any style to stand out to others. I experiment with fashion design and what I wear for my own personal and creative fulfilment and it makes me happy and makes life colourful and exciting. I feel that wearing various styles and designs of clothes is just part of my genderfluidity as well as an extension of being an artist, a bit like Frida Kahlo's clothing was sometimes continuous with her art. The trouble is, unlike my maternal grandmother, I'm not a dab hand at making clothes, so I am more reliant on adapting/customising bought clothes or buying items in independent, creative shops, or markets or boutique stores. 

So for me, my personal fashion style is just a form of expressing myself, hence I wear a huge variety of styles. However, if I had to pick only one fashion style, it would be bold, colourful, unconventional, arty.

Non-binary and Genderfluid Fashion is Not Just a Trend - It's Here to Stay!

Nobody started the gender conversation in fashion - it's always been there in society. You would think this would be common knowledge by now, especially in the UK where Anne Lister (1791-1840) has become so well-known and iconic after the 2019 TV drama 'Gentleman Jack' brought her diaries to life, including her non-binary fashion and her lesbian marriage to Ann Walker. After the global success and huge popularity of the drama, it's returning this month to the BBC! I can't wait to watch it! 🙂🎩 Lister's gender non-conforming masculine attire looks so 🔥 and I can identify with her bold approach to life, her openness about her lesbian sexuality and the way she deals with men as an equal, not as some weaker, opposite sex. 👍 

Nevertheless, it's liberating to have the vocabulary nowadays, unlike in Lister's time, to somewhat succinctly sum up who one is. For example,  that I am a demi(cis)woman/demifluidflux artist who enjoys expressing herself through fashion as well as having fun designing it. What's all that demi stuff? I'll explain in a minute.

For me, clothes are self-expression and I like to explore endless possible types of gender identity and expression through clothes and accessories. The static part of my gender identity is female (same as my sex assigned at birth), I am generally masculine of centre but my feminine side fluctuates in intensity (demiwomanflux). So I enjoy wearing women's clothes that are butch or more feminine. Although I do have to be in the mood for a burst of glamour before wanting to put on some womenswear eg short, tight floral skirts and dresses! Whereas I always feel comfy in less feminine womenswear, gender neutral clothes and sportswear. I am also demi-nonbinary because I have fluid, multigender parts of my gender identity too. I have always found that fashion is a great outlet for exploring and expressing all my genders creatively as well as being able to express my lesbian sexuality through those types of gender identities eg feeling and dressing more sporty lesbian, boi, boyish, soft butch or butch. But because I'm demiflux (a type of genderfluidity), I don't restrict my look by, for example, cutting my hair very short as though short hair immediately marks you out as a lesbian!😅And I can sometimes be seen in a floral print dress, when I feel like it! 

So how does my genderfluidity influence my fashion style? In short, it means I collect a range of so-called masculine and feminine attire, as well as fashion items along the non-binary spectrum, including genderfree to arty other genderedness. For instance, I have a tie collection which includes various women's ties, rock-punk ties, unisex ties, arty ties, a couple of men's ties and a dickie bow tie (what can I say, I loved the prints on them! 😍). And if I prefer the design and features of a men's sports/tennis shoe, I'll wear them (size permitting)! For example, my clay court tennis shoes I wore in my matches were menswear. I loved them and how wonderfully they drained the clay from the soles to be slip-free, even if they were a little long for me! Come to think of it, maybe that's why the coin tosser who didn't stick around to be umpire in my first match had a random fit over my tennis top and insisted I change it in the hut, despite my top being in accordance with the ITF rules on the size of sports label brands on tenniswear. It wasn't the top, it was the shoes! I'm there to play a match not look pretty! 🙄 Personally, I never gave it a thought mainly because my mother equally wears men's tennis shoes. They fit better and give her better foot support for injury prevention. How backward are people who make a thing out of gender and what people wear? 🤔 But then there seems to be an unhealthy ideological trend which tries to interfere in people's private lives and makes them feel the need to moralise over things that are none of their business. That's authoritarian, puritanical and most likely homophobic!

Fashion as a way of expressing gender identity is not to be confused with merely dressing up as the opposite sex. That's just playing with clothes for fun or because you think it's cool. That's fine, but conflating the two is just an offensive myth perpetuated in mainstream media, in ignorant articles such as this:

 https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-10394057/How-dressing-like-dad-latest-fashion-trend-Gen-Z-opt-gender-fluid-look.html

It's sensationalist newspaper articles like this which spread disinformation /misinformation about LGBT+ people and the true concepts behind fashion. We expect better from mainstream media outlets than derogatory comments attempting to attract attention, sell newspapers and mislead readers into thinking that:

1. If I wear more masculine clothes I'm dressing like a dad. No, non-binary fashion is not about playing a game of mummies and daddies! I didn't enjoy that game as a child and could never understand why children kept wanting to play it. 🤷
2. Non-binary fashion means dressing in shapeless figure hiding clothes. No it doesn't, simply look at a variety of the fashion designs and you'll see this is wrong! 🙄
3. Dressing genderfluidly is a fad for Generation Z ie those born between mid-90's - 2012. 🙄 No, I've always dressed genderfluidly and I was born in the 80's! And people have been identifying and or dressing outside the gender binary for centuries! You'd think it would be common knowledge by now, after years of celebrating LGBT+ History Month every February in the UK which raises awareness of people outside of the gender binary. Indeed, why did we need all this awareness when as far back as the 18th century, D'Eon who worked for Louis XIV of France, lived openly as both a man and a woman. However, when fencing he dressed in female attire and from 1777 started to live only as a woman. See this post about Chevalier D'Eon. 
4. Ironically, the author of the article above (Daily Mail) doesn't seem to have noticed that they have a contradiction in it 😕 - while claiming it's a trend for the last few months (in 2022) among woke Gen Z, they consult a stylist who worked with Boy George who has been a pop star singing in non-binary fashion since the early 80's! 🤦 He is considered one of the two most famous examples of androgyny in the 80's, alongside Annie Lennox. The article even admits that similar styles were around in the 90's and early 2000's too while making it sound like it's something new! 🤦 Yes, we have seen it all before, so what's the big deal now? 🤷
5. It seems to me that it only bothers some people more now because it's labelled as non-binary/genderfluid so relates to the LGBT+ community, is popular with even more people and is considered mainstream culture not fringe. When LGBTQIAPD+ had even less rights, people wore it without identifying as anything and since it wasn't considered popular nobody gave it a second thought. Hence, the worry that there is more 'substance behind the aesthetic' seems to me to be more of a political and religious worry and the policing of non-conservative values and social identities than really talking about fashion itself.
6. It's somehow 'woke' to dress outside the gender binary. No, it's not woke. Not that there's anything wrong with being woke, it's simply an African-American term for being alert to injustice, discrimination and prejudice. This term is merely used and abused by those who wish to be insensitive, inconsiderate, insult others as often as they please and discreetly support prejudice. 😡 Yet when others want to do likewise and speak against anti-woke views, they suddenly become oversensitive and want you to pussyfoot around their anti-woke views and walk on eggshells with them! How hypocritical is that! Gender expansive fashion is just the way people have always identified and expressed themselves. Not having non-binary fashion is an active suppression of freedom of speech, self-expression and creativity. It really is as simple as that. 

Such dangerous myths about the fashion style, self-expression and choices of gender non-conforming cis people as well as variously identifying non-binary people (eg agender; gender neutral; genderfluid; genderflux; demigender; bigender; trigender, aporagender etc) is not helping anyone, whether LGBT+ or not. It's not a case of discovering some new identities that didn't exist before. They existed but there wasn't the vocabulary to talk about it. So, a pansexual always knew they were attracted to a person rather than a particular sex. Now we call it pansexual which is just a short cut to say the same thing.

An example which shows how 'non-binary' clothes were considered normal a few decades back is when Judi Dench was clearly wearing gender non-conforming clothes in this interview with Terry Wogan in 1985. Nobody made a thing of it. At least, my mother doesn't think there was any fuss. She wore trouser suits to work as a secondary school teacher. She also wore the occasional tie. In any case, I came across this Judi Dench interview on BBC Archives Facebook. Her outfit could be worn as non-binary fashion today! But it could also be placed in the women's runway fashion section because not every cis woman wants to look like Holly Willoughby who invariably wears ultra-feminine fashion. It's not realistic for women to walk around looking like that all the time and it's unhealthy to do so because ultra-femininity is an artificially created societal construct based on patriarchal stereotypes of women. 

So, it means a lot to me that the fashion world, from high street to haute couture, is finally embracing non-binary and genderfluid fashion designs! 😍💖Some fashion designers see fashion as only part of the lifestyle sector, not art. But for me, fashion is a timeless way to become a walking work of art that nonetheless expresses something true and unique about oneself. 

Here's an article with some fab examples of Non-binary street fashion to enjoy and a piece by the V&A about the gay, genderfluid, fabulous fashion designer Harris Reed. 🙂 Happy Genderfluid Day today! 👖👕🎽👚👔👗🩳🧥🎩👒👛👜💼👠👟👞🥿👡👢🥾💄🎒

For a discussion of genderfluidity, see my blog post, available at:

https://lgbtqiapd2sphilosophy.blogspot.com/2022/04/genderfluid-day-2022.html

Women in Fashion: Vivienne Westwood: London and Paris Fashion Week 2022 (updated 8th March)

Tomorrow is International Women's Day (#breakthebias 🙅‍♀️🙅) so I thought I'd highlight my favourite British female fashion designer - Vivienne Westwood. I watched her runway at Paris Fashion Week and was excited to see that some of her iconic motifs are still used in her collections, as can be seen in her London Fashion Week digital presentation. 

Paris Fashion Week 2022 is going on right now and is focusing on womenswear (February 28 - March 8th). Menswear will be their focus in June, Haute Couture is celebrated in July, before womenswear returns to being centre stage in September. 

I was excited to watch Vivienne Westwood's runway live on their YouTube channel! It's still available to watch on-demand on Westwood's social media and on YouTube . What a visual feast of arty, creative, bold fashion statements! I enjoyed watching every outfit on the runway, the camera angle showing the front, side and back of all the clothes so we can see the different ways the material hangs, moves and any stylistic surprises once the model turns around. 

Her Creative Director and Design Partner is her spouse, Andreas Kronthaler. They have one of the longest lasting and blissfully close marriages in fashion. They met when Vivienne taught him while he was an art student. She was also his mentor. A year later he was working for her and four years later they were married. 💞.  

As I mentioned in my previous post, Westwood was the designer who turned my passion for self-expression through clothing into a lifelong fascination for fashion design, both in terms of appreciating the artistry of top designers as well as being inspired to start my own fashion sketchbook in which to draw my own fashion designs. There's always been something invigorating about her non-conformist, rebellious, anti-establishment, irreligious, irreverent, bold sense of style and I never tire of it. 

At the 2004 V&A exhibition of her work spanning many decades, I had the opportunity to see a range of her designs from punk to gowns inspired by the history of art and historical outfits. Here you can see photos and read a blog post by the V&A about Westwood's historical research and how she incorporates it into her fashion. It also shows how she was producing unisex clothing years ago. All her styles are stunning and amazing to see up close! 😍 They are both artworks and high fashion all rolled into one. I loved the edgy rock/punk genderfluid outfits and was surprised to find that I also enjoyed the classical gowns (given I wasn't someone who wore dresses after the age of 13) especially the mind-boggling shapes and folds she'd created with the flowing fabrics - genius! I'd never seen anything like it and haven't since - unforgettable. Unfortunately, it's impossible to fully appreciate on-screen, you have to stand close to it to analyse the fabric and how it's been sculpted. I've been experimenting with creatively folding and pinning the fabric of my old tops ever since! 

Now, since my latter 20's, I might wear the odd dress or skirt but there has to be something I find arty about them and they are usually also short or shorter. 😉 

I am aware that some of Westwood's punk designs were sexually explicit and would have made Mary Whitehouse's toes curl and driven her to more moralizing 🙄 stemming from her Ultra Conservatism based on evangelical Christianity. It's fashion, Mary, not filth! 🙄🤷And it doesn't mean that just because you like Westwood's punk style, that you are also into BDSM! 🤦Let's not conflate the two! It's simply daring, bold and in-your-face fashion. 

Sometimes I wore punk and rock-and-roll clothes and accessories during my uni days. Nothing too outrageous. I'm sure Prof Susan James saw me wearing such items. She was not in the least bit fazed. 🙂Curious but not bothered. She took it in her stride. As she takes most things!👍 She's not of a delicate constitution. 💪🙂 Here's one item Susan James would have seen during a lecture, as you do - the punk ring on my middle finger. below is my drawing of it on my hand:

This is a self-portrait of my hand and my accessories, drawn from life from my carry around punk/conceptual Art sketchbook (2005-6). The meaning of the words I wrote in my sketchbook at the time as part of the artwork is: F*CK 🤬religious people who tell LGBT+ they'll go to hell, I'll always live my life as a lesbian (pink) and feminist (purple). ✌️🏳️‍🌈💜 This was in response to what I heard in the news. Personally, I've never come across anyone who's said that to me, but then I didn't have anything to do with religious people.  

I bought postcards of some of Vivienne's outfits after the 2004 Westwood exhibition my mother and I went to together. I'm pleased to see that one of my favourite items on a postcard I display in my room is still very relevant to her current Autumn/Winter 2022 collection, namely T-Shirt 'Rock' - Boiled Chicken Bones and Chains (Malcolm McLaren {best known as manager of the Sex Pistols} and Vivienne Westwood): Let It Rock Collection 1970-2. As Vogue pointed out, Westwood's punk era style, including the F*CK slogan and chicken bone motif, has featured in her Autumn/Winter 2022 collection, showcased digitally for London Fashion Week. Click here to see an example of her latest chicken bone top spelling F*CK and how it fabulously evokes the T-shirt 'Rock' (link above). 

Here's my exhibition pamphlet I keep in my sketchbook:

Another ground-breaking aspect of Vivienne Westwood, as I mentioned previously, is that she was ahead of her time in creating unisex and genderfluid outfits before it was mis-labelled woke and mis-attributed to generation Z. 

Like me, GQ magazine also see Westwood as producing genderfluid fashion before the rest of the world woke up to it:

"In addition to being one of the principal architects of the punk movement, Westwood latterly redefined the way women dressed by sending models down her runways in 18th-century-inspired corsets and crinolines, and she was putting men in dresses and kilts long before the fashion world discovered gender-fluidity." 

I couldn't say it better myself! Click here for the quote, full article and photos. 

Vivienne Westwood is also generally creative and an activist. She's not just a fashion designer. She's written an anti-Propaganda manifesto. Vivienne, on occasion, has recited a poem in a dramatic and emotional way. Sometimes she reads an arty letter to convey an important message, such as her Letter to Earth. I often wonder whether she ever wanted to become an actress. 🤔At other times, she posts her artworks and snippets of her writings which often carry a social message. Recently, she has posted snippets of the book that she's writing about what's important to her in her life. She depicts the emotions behind the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. But Vivienne doesn't just express it through art, she's as vocal as ever about climate change, sustainable fashion, anti-war and social issues. And now, true to form, she's appealing for donations to help the crisis in Ukraine. 

There's never a dull moment with Vivienne Westwood. A couple of years ago, she staged a protest by suspending herself in a birdcage outside the Old Bailey at the fabulous age of 79!💖 How rock -and-roll is that! Will anyone of my generation manage this a few decades from now? Unlikely. 😪 Too many have been shoehorned into being so conservatively conformist. 

I'm off to build a birdcage. Come to think of it, I've already drawn a woman suspended in a golden gilded bird-feeder cage in one of my conceptual carry around sketchbooks way back in my youth (well, rising 20). My mother refers to it as the punk-inspired sketchbook.😂 

Here's my glitter ink pen and green highlighter drawing of woman in cage titled: The Gilded Cage in the Jungle of Life: 

Author and First Proofreader, Editor, IT: Liba Kaucky

Second proofreader: Jana Kaucky 

What's Hot at London Fashion Week 18th-22nd February 2022

London Fashion Week (LFW) ended last week. It was showcasing its Autumn/Winter 2022 collections. It's been a part-virtual, part-physical event so there's some photos and videos to see on their website: https://londonfashionweek.co.uk. 

As in previous years, there were three fashion categories for submission at the London Fashion Week: menswear, womenswear and gender neutral fashion. The Council of Fashion Designers of America only introduced the category of unisex/non-binary fashion as recently as 2018 for New York Fashion Week. This brought fashion labels, which focus on non-binary fashion for all genders, to our attention, such as, Vaquera and Telfar. That year, there was also a rise in taking an inclusive approach to choosing models, resulting in more non-binary and trans models than ever before, which I think is great!

I think this is great progress. This move, which has continued ever since, begins to make gender diversive people visible, meaning trans, gender non-conforming and non-binary people can see trends and models they can identify with, rather than only being able to look at cis gender stereotypes that leave them feeling alienated. Non-binary fashion also challenges people's preconceived notions of what clothes and which faces and bodies are deemed beautiful in the fashion and beauty industry as well as mass media. 💪 And anything that challenges pre-conceived ideas is good! Besides, isn't  this what all women have been waiting for, regardless of their gender identity, ever since some feminists, decades ago, pointed out the unrealistic feminine ideals and stereotypes that have been constantly reinforced by fashion and mass media? 

I'm surprised it's taken the fashion world this long to officially recognise non-binary fashion. It's nothing new in society. There are countless examples of women in the past who dressed, lived and 'passed' as men. 

My initial passion for creating fashion designs of my own was sparked by seeing punk rock fashion (some of which we would perhaps now term as potentially non-binary fashion items) at a Vivienne Westwood exhibition at the V&A in London in my late teens. I posted some of my designs I drew in my sketchbook in 2004 on Instagram (September 2020), you can view them here:

outfit 1

outfit 2 

Back of Jacket

Front of top and jacket

Skirt-trousers and headwear

Details

I drew/created these because I felt menswear was so tedious, conformist and uncreative that there might be a lot of scope for new and exciting fashion designs that could free up gendered fashion ideals and trends. Since the only two categories I kept hearing about back then was menswear and womenswear, I nominally named it menswear but in reality it was non-binary fashion before it's time.  

I think a lot of people assume that non-binary fashion (and inclusivity) is some new fangled trend that has recently taken off with teens and 20 somethings on social media in the last few years. No! Non-binary gender identities and fashion is something I, and people of all ages, have felt and connected with all their life. It's simply that now we have more awareness and access to online educational resources to express our thoughts and feelings through specific gender identity labels and descriptions to better convey our perspective on ourselves and life. 

So What's On?

There are two schedules listed on the London Fashion Week website: one digital and one in-person list of events so head to the digital schedule for online content. Also, check out the list of designers tab to learn about fashion designers and find their social media profiles. There seems to be more designers listed than put forward a catwalk show. For instance, Victoria Beckham is listed but, although she attended LFW, she did not submit a runway show. Apparently runways are extremely expensive to do so even major British household names such as Burberry didn't participate in them! In which case, why don't they submit more videos and online material? Surely this would be more cost effective and at least we can all see the latest looks online and learn more about the fashion houses.

During the pandemic, a range of online content began to be shared as part of fashion weeks, such as designers' diaries, podcasts, webinars, virtual showrooms and so on. I think all the footage from Fashion Weeks around the world, whether it's online content or runway shows, should be made available online. A list of invitation only events that we only hear about second hand from fashion journalists is unsatisfactory. We don't all have an invite! Mine never came in the post, I blame the high winds 😂. I'm all for in-person events and think it's high time London Fashion Week returned to business as usual after two years! However, releasing plenty of online fashion week content should not be a temporary pandemic substitute for runway shows. I think it should become part of the future so we can all participate. It should be both.

Surely the whole point is generating interest in fashion. If we are not interested and excited about the fashion world then who is going to follow what's hot 🔥 and buy some fashion label items or something close to its style off the peg? Fashion should be for everyone, not a closed shop, outside of the real world for a select few. What's the point of that? 

So I searched around to see the latest looks at London Fashion Week online. Here's a quick look behind the scenes and you can feast your eyes on some of the most fabulous styles at London Fashion Week:

British Fashion Council on YouTube 

Hot Up-and-coming Fashion Designers

There was an emphasis on up-and-coming fashion designers, comprising of new labels as well as graduate shows organised by Fashion Colleges. I think it's a great idea for Colleges to showcase their students and recent graduates. 

This YouTube video shows you a runway displaying the designs of London College of Fashion MA graduates: click here to see their runway show and here for their digital presentation. 

Academic subjects don't showcase their students at all, and even PhD students are often expected to show they have the approval of their supervisor/s before even being allowed to submit an abstract to a conference! Talk about lack of academic freedom! Yet these fashion design graduates are submitting to London Fashion Week which is so much more prestigious and fabulous than any academic conference - and it's headline news! I really loved some of the designs from the MA students.

I think London Fashion Week has shown how young people starting out do not need to be dismissed and sent to the bottom of the pile for being too inexperienced or somehow not capable. That's disrespectful and unnecessarily holding them back when they need exciting opportunities to dive into! And such submission opportunities should not be restricted by age, qualifications, affiliation or how recently they have graduated. 

Returning to LFW: There were also some stunning and innovative new fashion labels and designers that are making their mark generally. Vogue wrote an excellent report on standout runway designers:

https://www.vogue.co.uk/fashion/gallery/london-fashion-week-aw22-highlights

For me, just judging by the sample photos of the fashion styles of these labels in this article, my favourites here are the first two featured:

Designers Emma Chopova and Laura Lowena's skirt suit with a sporty twist, worn by a male model of colour; 

Richard Malone's skirt trousers - I used to have a pair of trousers with an in-built skirt around them which I loved wearing! Which is why I later designed a skirt-trousers item myself but with a stronger non-binary twist (see skirt-trouser link to my Instagram above). I don't think we see enough of the trouser/skirt in fashion! ❤️ This article terms his style wearable art, which is exactly how I see fashion! He is quoted as aiming for appreciation, individuality and experimentation. I really identify with this outlook!

A young designer who is quite new on the fashion scene is Harris Reed. He has already designed for Harry Styles and is making a name for himself by rocking non-binary fashion design! Click here for an article on him and a photo gallery of 6 of his latest genderfluid fashion designs. 

Hot Trends to Look Out For

This is a handy article which summarises what the latest trends are to have emerged from this London Fashion Week:

https://www.drapersonline.com/product-and-trends/catwalks/the-trends-to-know-from-london-fashion-week-aw2 

This is a useful guide because, although there are overall colours and designs that are declared to be all the rage throughout 2022, you don't always see these trends prolifically within the latest collections across all the seasons or across all new and top designers. 

Here's a summary of the top looks they have listed from London Fashion Week:

- Lavender/Lilac: it's been all the rage for London Fashion Week and I think it's a beautiful, timeless colour that should never be out of fashion

- Halternecks: this doesn't feel especially 'now' to me because I have been wearing them since my early teens! But it's always a classic look and fun to wear and style with other items

- Denim outfits: a timeless look although difficult to keep finding new and creative interpretations of it

- Suits: I always love a good suit! I have several women's jacket and trousers suits, waist jackets. I also have a collection of ties and even a dickie bow tie

Nevertheless, I can't say that all these trends feel especially recent and, to me, some versions feel a little tired from trends in previous years. However, it does give me an excuse to dig out some of my favourite clothes I've loved for years, rewear them (rewearing is a fashion trend in itself now) and give them a new twist for 2022! 

I've started with London Fashion Week because I'm in London. 

Now Fashion Week has moved on to Milan! And tomorrow Paris!

Given the war in the Ukraine I've been impressed with Armani's response to it by putting on a silent catwalk in Milan. That speaks volumes and is poignant!🇺🇦 #standwithukraine #istandwithukraine 

About this blog

What am I doing here? 

Originally, I incorporated Fashion into my Art blog but found myself talking more about my Art and not wanting to interrupt it with something different, like fashion. Then I found myself talking about my Art but thinking more about fashion. So I decided on a separate blog for each. That way I just might get on and write for both.

Fashion has always interested me. I blame my mother who dressed me in about 2-3 different outfits every day when I was very little. She also bought me quite fabulous dresses and accessories from an early age and involved me in the decision making. Without realizing it,  I was hooked. I loved fashion. I went around shops looking at the various items of clothing and had my phases of what I liked.

My mother didn't pass judgment even when I wanted to wear see-through tops with not much underneath. I had fads growing up: There was the:

orange fad

the jeans fad

the all-in-black fad

the halterneck fad 

the midriff fad

the platform shoe fad and still going on

the wearing ties fad and still going on

the punk fad 

the rock fad and still going on

the street fad

the grunge fad (came back into fashion 2018)

the ripped jeans fad (=grunge; rough around the edges, rebellious against the norm) 💪

the glam dress fad and still going on

the lace fad and still going on

the flower print fad but I'm very fussy about this style, it's a Ted Baker style and still going on

waist jacket fad and still going on

short cardigan fad

the nail art fad

the stick-on-body jewellery fad

patterned tights/socks fad

short skirts fad

chequered shirt fad

And whatever else I've forgotten fad and more!

These were all fashion fads but they all expressed something about who I was and how I was feeling. The same is true today!

Now I have branched out and enjoy following fashion houses. I make my mind up what I like or don't like very quickly. But I still wear clothes according to how I feel. Consequently, I don't wear what's hot if I'm not feeling it! Conversely, if I don't like the fashion it can be as hot as it likes, I won't wear it! I also love restyling my own clothes. So fashion is an obsession I've had as far back as I can remember. 

On this blog I shall feed this obsession. My aim is to enjoy fashion. I'm not interested in being negative about fashion designers, that's not my thing. If I don't like something I'll say so but that doesn't mean I don't like that fashion house or designer. It's just that particular design. 🤗