Janet Smith
SA Fashion Week 1997
Designers who’ve paid fees of between R10 000 and R40 000 each to present their ranges are pinning their sumptuous fabrics on what could be a renaissance of fashion for fashion’s sake at South Africa’s first ever fashion week. Sponsors like Audi have invested R80 000 for each of the nine shows.
Although designers have necessarily had to create their own range at their own cost, accommodation and flights have been sponsored, and VIP tents will be catered to exhibit clothing to clients in a more intimate environment. Errol Arendz, whose work appeared yesterday on the same bill as Norman Callan from The Boys, Julian and Thomas Red, says the showcase has changed his life and given him a feeling of being “relevant” again.
But Sonwabile Ndamase of the South African Fashion Designers Association isn’t convinced the designers who’ve signed up are as relevant as they think they are. His opinion is that the industry continues to marginalise black designers, who “don’t have the money to pay the entry fee and don’t look at the discipline just as glamour.”
But despite Ndamase’s assertion, there’s a coming-out party ambience to the showcase. Designers are lush with the vogue of South Africans dressing up again after a post- election slump.
Gerhard van Rooyen of Thomas Red in Cape Town yesterday presented his pret-a-porter and couture summer line in soft natural tones and wilder animal prints. Then there’s The Young Designers Emporium. Paul Simon’s 10 Emporium designers are expected to trash any hint of crusty sequins with their finale on Sunday.
Some other designers on the programme: Edgars and Planet E; Jenni Button, Hilton Weiner and Marianne Fassler, and HipHop, Marc and Michael Couture, De-Patri and Andre Croucamp Couture.
The Audi SA Fashion Week 1997 is at Sandton Square in Johannesburg on August 15, 16 and 17. Tickets are R35 and all garments will be on sale after the shows