Taking place at Nuit Blanche in Toronto, the Art of Fashion competition is a chance for Canadian fashion designers to raise the bar when it comes to being audaciously creative.  From the press release:

TORONTO, ON, August 17, 2010 – Designers across Canada are invited to enter the 12th annual Art of Fashion design competition and trunk show in Toronto, where the winner will be awarded a minimum cash prize of $1000, a complimentary professional photo shoot with model, hair and makeup, street-level exposure in the window display of one of Toronto’s top fashion outlets, and more.  Entry deadline for this career-launching opportunity is Tuesday, August 31^st, 2010.

The design competition and trunk show will take place at King West Fitness in Liberty Village during Nuit Blanche on Saturday, October 2^nd, 2010.  To apply, designers should visit www.artoffashion.org/labelleepoque and fill out the submission form before Tuesday, August 31^st, 2010.

I was invited to customize a pair of Brown’s shoes for the Frugal Fashion Week Gala at the Bata Shoe Museum on Friday.  The shoes I received were bright red patent, just like the Dr. Martens I customized with Ashley Rowe.  I wanted to try dripping instead of splattering and Ashley kindly indulged me in her studio.

She did a super-hot pair of boots which you just get a blurry peek of here.  Want to see Ashley’s and so many other customized Brown’s shoes? Best blog friend Anita is also doing a pair, among others. Buy a ticket to the gala on Friday here.

I am so thrilled to be participating in the second year of the YES/TFI Passion for Fashion program.

This is a FREE program for entrepreneurial young people, ages 16 – 29, offering seminars on business skills and fashion skills – not only useful for designers, but also for up and coming stylists, writers, illustrators, event planners… anyone interested in building a career or a business in the fashion world.  I teach one of the seminars, on visual presentation for fashion.

There’s more – those who complete the program are eligible to take part in a business plan competition with the chance to win a cash prize of $1000 and 50 hours of free business and fashion industry mentoring from the Toronto Fashion Incubator.

Interested?  You should be!  There are just two orientation sessions left — click here for all the details.

Upside Dive at 269 Queen Street East in Toronto is currently featuring my Trash Fusion paillette dress in their window.  So if you ever wanted to get a closer look at every little piece of plastic ephemera that I singlehandedly stitched, one by one, you should take a stroll down Queen Street East sometime in the next week or so and visit the shop.

Thanks so much Mike for kindly offering to give my effort in recycled fashion such a well appointed home for a couple weeks!

There’s lots of stuff to look at at Upside Dive – kitschy knicknacks, handsome housewares, vintage vestures for ladies and gentlemen, and soft spoken sibling shopkeepers.  Check out their blog for a taste.

What a thrill to get to work with Juan Carlos of Magnolia to create an exclusive paper doll, and an even bigger thrill to blow up the doll 800% to create a window display!  We had an intimate little party last night, made a little smaller by torrential rain, and so I freely enhanced the picture above to give you a sense of how the window really looks… below is the non-enhanced version.

Its fun, you can get a peek under her Carrie dress as you walk towards the shop.

I spent the evening cutting out paper dolls and chatting with some of my favourite people – above this is Carrie Hayes, who designed the dress the doll wears in the window.  If you visit Magnolia, you will find books, giclee prints, and laser prints of the dolls for sale, so you too can cut out and play with designer paper dolls.  The exclusive Magnolia doll herself is a gift-with-purchase – and since her wardrobe is inspired by the spring merchandise, you can choose a matching item for yourself if you like.

Thank you to all our brave friends who didn’t let the rain stop them from coming to share the night with us.

Here I am, visiting Magnolia the doll in her window while my party is in full swing.  The window will be up for the month of June, if you are in Toronto you should go visit the shop and take a closer look!  These photos (except for the top two) are all by Raymund Galsim.  Thanks Raymund!

Big thank yous and hugs to Juan Carlos and Magnolia for such an amazing project!

Heads up, fashion designer all-stars!  There is a special discount just for you to the Julian Roberts Subtraction Cutting Tour, for just a week only, CLICK HERE for more info.

What is this and why am I recommending it so wholeheartedly?  Check out this post for more enthusiasm and explanation.

Every year, Toronto Fashion Incubator runs a competition for the most promising young designers in Canada.  The contestants are run through a series of judging panels over the course of six months, culminating in a runway show at the ELLE show.  This year, sponsor Mattel heated up the competition by putting real money on it, a cash prize – $10,000 – amazing!

Anastasia Lomonova brought the drama with some really lavish dresses.  Anastasia was a classmate of mine for a couple years at Ryerson before taking off to Montreal and launching her label. Lots of texture and style – sometimes piled on, sometimes a lighter touch.  Its so neat to see someone’s style developed so far beyond fashion school.

House of Groves was leather, studs and riding crops, but the crowd really applauded when the full-skirted silhouette (lower right) came out – it seems like after so much tight and short, a great full skirt falling below the knee just feels like a breath of fresh air.

Diepo is lingerie transitioning towards cocktail – sort of night-to-later-that-night.  The runway was white and slick and all of the designers sent their models out in treacherous heels – so that all came to a head with the model on the lower-right – as she walked out her shoes seemed to literally fly off her feet and skid off both sides of the runway – you can see a gentleman picking it up in the background.  I’ve never seen anything like it.

Birds of North America brought the closest thing to colour that we saw that night – dusky navy blue, brown and burgundy.  The style of the dresses was more of the twee stuff that usually comes down New Labels runway in years past as opposed to the dominant theme of tough-sexy stuff we see this year. Maybe this shift in style is reflecting changes in the judging panel this year.  I often wonder, watching New Labels, whether the lengthy, involved judging process is a good thing – it seems to result in a certain homogenization among the contestants – or are our most promising Canadian designers really so alike?  The lack of statement colour on the runway was a bit disappointing – are we afraid of colour?

Paris Li‘s collection showed some sharp tailoring and some pretty sophisticated looks that suggest dressing for success.  Over all, all of the designers showed really chic, wearable designs – and perhaps the similarities make it a bit fairer to judge each designer against the other – but then again, at the end of the show, I couldn’t really think of which designer had really raised the bar. It reminded me a bit of the Press Breakfast at Holt Renfrew recently which was similar in the monotony of hues. When so much about fashion is personality, I wonder why designers don’t try more aggressively to differentiate themselves from one another.  Or are the designer really just catering their wares to the tastes of their curators? Either way, it leaves me with a taste for something more.

Lastly, each designer showed a few LBD looks made especially for their sponsor, Barbie.  These were all fun looks and here at least, all the blackness was part of the brief.

Anastasia Lomonova, House of Groves, Diepo, Birds of North America, Paris Li.

This year’s New Labels winner is Anastasia Lomonova – congratulations!  Thanks so much to Faulhaber and the TFI for inviting me to cover the event.

Evan Biddell is a designer with a flair for showmanship, and he is a designer who excels at notice-me clothes being worn by beautiful, confident women.  For his show at FAT, he teamed up with vintage dealer Refinery to notch the volume up using vintage clothing as materials – and better yet, he got his most outgoing friends to model the clothes. Pastel Supernova opened the show, and set the tone for a cast ready to steal the spotlight.

This is the kind of show that FAT does best – the models are fiercely unique, cartwheeling for the cameras.

Usually Biddell’s friends sit front row at his shows, and this time they had assigned seats too – mind you assigned with playful nicknames – which they strutted past.

“Sunny with a chance of Gail” had the most wonderful outrageous outfit, and turned the cameras on the audience for a change.

For the curtain call the enthusiastic models all took their seats and applauded their outfitters.

… and they stayed in their seats to watch the next show.  Somehow Biddell managed to pack the most memorable runway moments into a short fashion show that I have ever seen.  Cheers to all the lovely models for a job well done.

If you’re in Toronto, and love fashion and art that is exuberant and provocative, you must go to FAT.  All the best fresh talent does.  From the press release:

TORONTO ALTERNATIVE ARTS AND FASHION WEEK 2010

Location: Studio City, 1 Pardee Ave. Liberty Village

Dates: April 21-24, 2010, 6pm – 1 am every night

Price: tickets $25 at select locations, $30 at the door/night, $70/week pass (4 days)

Its hard to believe that it has been four years since my own turn on the runway at my old fashion school.  Ryerson School of Fashion‘s grad show is called Mass Exodus, and its the best show in Toronto to see really exciting, unusual, and sometimes just plain weird ideas that only a fashion student would have the time and freedom to think up and proceed to spend six entire months executing.

There is usually about 50 grad collections, and these are just a small selection, in no particular order, with my comments.  I think it was one of the strongest groups of designers I’ve ever seen in Mass Exodus (curated by Sarah Casselman), and it was really touching to see them all get to take a curtain call. It really is a grand accomplishment to complete a small collection on your own for the first time, so every graduate deserves admiration and congratulations.

Adelaide Kim‘s collection is striking for its maturity and sincerity.  The items are wearable, want-able, classic and yet still novel – the use of transparent plaid organza for a jacket was a really neat concept, executed very cleanly.  Of all the collections, this was the one I can easily imagine being worn and recommended by fashion editors, who love that type of loose, unfussy, wry sophistication.

Amanda Kew Lee‘s collection was pretty much the ultimate in obsessed fashion student indulgence.  A slew of recent trends – studs, leggings with transparent panels, studs, pagoda shoulders, studs, headbands, studs – amped up to the next level.  Executed with devastating diligence, this collection is like a lovingly made time capsule, making the recent past seem like something worth getting nostalgic about just six months later.

Bianca Liu went the extra mile and designed her own textile patterns – really lovely, delicate, watery, painterly patterns that my poor photos do no justice to.  I only wish some of the tops were a bit longer – something about the proportions – or maybe its how the clothing has been combined – seems awkward around the hips.  But the overall sense of looseness, and the measured choices of colours, really made this one a stand out for me.

A2B by Jade Sullivan-Vallentyne was a playful pass on casual clothes for men.  Great jeans, hot colours, an affectionate evocation of Slater and Zack from Saved By the Bell, a snarky subversion of hipness.  Tacky and terrific.

Genevieve Pearson‘s outerwear was just so slickly executed – and outerwear is challenging to do – it looked so totally pro.  The all-blackness was a bit predictable (would have loved to see these in colours!) but the confidence and quality is just outstanding.

Romandin by Cristina Sabaiduc had the most adventurous fabrications – chicken wire and silicone caulking are what gave these garments their tremendous structure and texture, without giving away their identity as hardware.  Cristina is expanding her collection to show in FAT (Fashion Art Toronto) – I am really intrigued about how she will develop her themes further.

I didn’t manage to get a decent photo of Sofronov by Aneta Sofronova , thankfully the designer let me use these drawings (which are AMAZING) from her website.  Its truly modern menswear that nods to technological habits and interprets traditional tailoring details without being too precious about it. Neat.

The finale collection was all golden hues, and abundant clusters of raw-edged floaty fabrics by Emily Baker and Andrea Spano.