Wow! It was a hot one in Las Vegas last week for the August round of fashion trade shows. The good news from the plethora of shows was the almost unanimous feedback from exhibitors that the numbers this year was at least as good as last year with some reporting better sales.
Phew! It would have been a disaster for all concerned if the arrows started pointing down again – which they could have quite easily done given the doom and gloom prophesies of a double-dip recession that are doing the rounds, and the current stock market swings.
The August round of Vegas shows showcase Spring/Summer of the following year. Let’s hope the buyer optimism reflects the long awaited turnaround in the industry through the first two quarters of 2012. One sales representative told me she thinks that people have decided they are sick of the hard times, and have started buying again. This is the best business news I have heard for a long time because recessions usually end when the people decide they have.
I started the week at the MAGIC shows at the Mandalay Bay. I was most interested in Workroom, Project, and PoolTradeShow.
Workroom
Workroom is the fashion forward section of the entire MAGIC Marketplace. The clothing, accessories and shoe brands are carefully selected, juried, and well worth a close look.
The space has the look and feel of a working collective. At some booths, designers work at sewing machines in front of their collections, ready to engage as required. The almost 100 brands that were represented impressed with their handmade quality and diversity of textures with design ranging from thoughtful to inspired.
Visually, I wasn’t as blown away by Workroom this time as I was in February. In fairness, the February show is showcasing Fall/Winter, which gives the designers more scope for fabric choices, layering and therefore design opportunities.
There was plenty of color, though more muted than the most of the other ready-to-wear that I saw for the rest of the week. As well as the red, pink, and yellow that were everywhere, the Workroom designers had plenty of black, dark grey, and Hunter green on offer.
The 80’s western look was well represented as it was elsewhere.
The Jonathon Simkhai collection particularly impressed me. Several pieces accented with bright color panels and trims are inspired by sports uniforms – they would look fantastic on any dance floor. A flecked section of the collection is inspired by school composition book covers. His use of distressed edging is finished perfectly.
It was fantastic to see Australian collections in Workroom. The Sydny Showroom specializes in Australian collections. They were showing bless’ed are the meek (“doing well” according to Elizabeth Lewis, one of the principals of Sydny) and Flannel – two collections that I saw at Rosemount Australian Fashion Week in Sydney in May. Elizabeth also works with Ladakh, an Australian collection that seemed to be doing very good business in Project.
Another Aussie collection on show was ksubi.
I have to mention one piece that caught my attention every time I passed the booth. It was a khaki and olive two-tone safari jacket by Publish. I have never worn a safari jacket but I might just wear that one.
Project
Project seemed huge this time. There was plenty of foot traffic from the first morning. Project is where you’ll find the most influential and commercially successful contemporary brands in the marketplace.
The feedback from the show varied between “about the same as last year” to “it was awesome”.
I saw a lot of color that was paradoxically either almost neon or muted and tonal – red, pink, fuchsia, yellow were the most dominant. As usual, there were lots of prints. Printed pants and skirts were prominent.
Pants are big for Spring/Summer. The maxi-skirt is still popular.
Styles had cleaner lines than in the past – the bodies are more fitted and constructed than the flowing, draping look of past seasons.
Tanks of all types were huge. I saw a lot of straw, wide-brimmed hats, which have carried over from last year.
Shoes are also very important. “It’s all about the shoes”, is how one friend in the business put it. Shoes are structural and architectural; the bigger, the better. Get your platforms out!
PoolTradeShow
I called it!
In my blog, The Madness that is the MAGIC Fashion Trade Shows – Day 2 & Show Review, from February, I said that I would prefer to see the Project, Workroom and Pool connected to make sure the young Pool designers are not missed. That is how it was configured this time, and it made all the difference. It was easy for the contemporary buyers to just keep on walking through, rather than skipping it if they were crunched for time. (They had Pool stuck away in it’s own function room last time – the foot traffic stunk! A friend of mine who did it was very disappointed.)
Pool was fun as usual. Lots of emerging contemporary designers showing the full range of clothing, shoes, bags, hats, jewelry, accessories of all kinds. There is also a cash and carry section.
The whole section is bright and colorful. They have drink, food and candy giveaways each day. Over caffeinated (or something) hipsters goofing off in the aisles helped give it a carnival feel at times.
Now that Pool is connected to the main Project floor, I would definitely consider putting out the cash to exhibit here.
Day 1 lasted well into the night at the PoolTradeShow Opening Party at The House of Blues at the Mandalay Bay. DJ Harvey had us grooving into the wee small hours.
Keep an eye out for my Day 2 wrap …
Paul Brindley
www.paulbrindleyconsults.com
