John Galliano is one designer embracing the confusion between summer and winter in the fashion industry
Changing trends and styles are the stuff that the fashion industry is built on. But some of the biggest changes the multibillion-dollar global industry is undergoing have more to do with global warming than the usual shifts in season and taste.
In New York last month, international designers showed their resort - or cruise - collections. It’s an increasingly profitable avenue for the industry, promoted with expensive catwalk shows and celebrity-studded parties. The warm-weather designs, which arrive in the shops in the US in November, are sold alongside winter clothes which, fashion observers say, may no longer be very wintry anyway.
Collette Dinnigan is one of the few Australian designers who creates an annual cruise collection, with her new range already travelling from Sydney to Los Angeles, New York, London and Hong Kong this month, and soon to Paris. But many international buyers who attend Rosemount Australian Fashion Week’s spring-summer collections in Sydney in May buy our summer ranges with the view to selling them during the “cruise” period in their home market. When our summer collections hit stores in Australia in late July and early August, US retailers will take delivery of their orders in November.
“The fashion seasons and the weather seasons are equally off-kilter,” says W magazine’s Trina Lombardo. “They’ll put bikinis in the stores in February and winter clothes in the stores in July when the weather won’t turn cold until December. Everyone’s talking about season-less clothes or clothing for all climates.”
Originally designed for a niche market of wealthy women going on beach holidays in January and February, the cruise collections are an increasingly important component of the fashion business.
Of the several dozen presentations in the US last month, designer John Galliano won praise for his fantasy fiesta-inspired Christian Dior catwalk show in New York and Chanel’s Karl Lagerfeld threw an Esther Williams-inspired pool party in Miami with synchronised swimmers.
Some designers see changes in their business to do with climate; others say they have clients worldwide, particularly in the increasingly important Eastern and Russian markets, who need clothes for different temperatures at different times from the Western market. “Women are demanding new things outside the typical season but it’s also climate-related,” says Harriet Quick, fashion features editor of British Vogue. “You can now buy lighter things all year round.”
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