SFF08 – Qiu Hao’s Something’s Growing

Sarah and I were ALMOST going to give Qiu Hao a miss, because who IS Qiu Hao?He’s a pretty talented Shanghainese that graduated from St Martin’s (Just like Jo Soh of Hansel). I only got to know about this after a brief google search that led me to two videos –

I liked to organic, earthy feel that reverberated through the easy-on-the-eyes drapery crossed with minimalist shapes in video, so I grabbed Sarah and I some tickets! It was worth it 😀

In this collection for the SFF08, I don’t know what it is supposed to be really, but there was this recurrence of a loosely draped and layered lobes(?) on shawls, jackets, and other pieces. The reason for their presence intrigues and evades me all at the same time. There is also this delightful haphazardness in the exaggerated lengths of stray cloth falling precariously from wraparound tops and dresses. These two aspect keeps your eyes hooked to the runway. There’s so much movement in the pieces, especially since the models were walking at lightning speed(!). (Never mind that the music was a tadddddd bit loud and there was this cute little boy on the opposite shielding his ears from the might speakers)

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Different treatment of the lobes – soft, lush and layered vs stiff, staggered and few
Photos from Yahoo! News

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Hypnotic strands of fabric trailing the models’ a tad too-fast-too-furious walks

(An aside: yes, I do realise how bad my pictures look in comparison to the professionally taken ones. I shall borrow the bf’s camera and hopefully leech some of his leet skills for Wednesday’s show :D)

Most of the pieces had these cute peekaboo (because it’s not exactly bare) back from an over shoulder and looped back drape.

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I think the picture explains it better, haha!

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The designer, Qiu Hao flanked by two lanky models
Photo from Yahoo! News

He said in the video that fashion is about chance and I’m glad he managed to chance upon that. We could use something like chance and luck in the future too! Talent too, of course. I think if he weren’t a fashion designer he might become a monk (look at his head!), haha. I get the feeling that he’s pretty down to earth, un-hoity-toity and friendly. He only has a very loud pair of gold shoes, lol.

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Shiny, happy gold shoes!
I think the show was quite a visual feast, if you look out for the littlest details (: Pity the turn-out wasn’t good enough to fill the entire tent.

Yay for emerging international designers!

Bazaars/Fleas – Rapunsale

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Rapunsale’s an official fringe event of the Singapore Fashion Festival 2008!

Held on Saturday, 5 April 2008, look out for Singapore labels like Hansel (which will be selling sample pieces from Abracadabra! – I like this collection most :D) and Nicholas at The Loof.

I think I need to make a trip down on Sunday, it seems pretty bewitching!

And I have a weakness for wispy font!

Us on Harper’s!

Turns out that Harper’s Bazaar churns out a daily 4-page fashion fix recording the previous day’s shows. Cool!

Especially cool because somehow we got in it – Issue #3 Sunday, March 30, 2008 under the Style at the Tent column! So here’s what we wore (See second picture, from L-R)

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Jo
Top: Layered Tube from Topshop
Bottom: Denim bubble skirt from Playhoud by Greyhound in Tangs Playlab
Shoes: Patent wedges from Itto & Otto
Bag: Wood and bead clutch from Martina Pink in Tangs
Accessories: Gilded rubber bangles from Urban Outfitters

Sarah
Dress: Self-designed and tailor made
Outerwear: Trench coat from G2000
Shoes: Patent peep-toe heels from Far East Plaza
Bag: Snake-skin clutch from Accessorize

Woot!

Mayybe we should change that to Wott! instead, haha!

SFF08 – Ashley Isham

Sarah and I have been attending a few shows at the Singapore Fashion Festival and we were lucky enough to be randomly allocated front-row seats, yo! (Okay, so it was only two shows so far :P)

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Outside the tent

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The proximity of our seats to the runway!

The very first show we went was Ashley Isham, where he showcased his Spring/Summer and Autumn/Winter ’08 collections (according to Harper’s Bazaar).

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It started off with edgy-prettiness with a variety of long and mini ensembles of white and speckled black, cinched in with a clean black and white waist.

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Then came in pops of red! orange! and purple! and red and purple together, broken up by dark emeralds and plums!

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Now that we’ve eased in to colours, shiny glimmering plates of blue surfaced on the skirts and dazzling sheets of silver plastic were gathered into pretty, and hypnotic folds. I swear, I HEARD the plastic material as the models sashayed past. Ooo, it was so close, the details were pretty overwhelming. I was tempted to stretch a finger out to feel the material haha.

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The kind of dress you could hear ruffle!

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Glimmering plates and boggling prints. These are genius!

There was this absolutely gorgeous printed dress that Pinks (Sarah) and I went gaga over. It makes you want to swoon over it, paint rainbows and nibble on strawberries and cream 😀

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Pictures that don’t do justice to an aweeeeesome dress

I was kinda hoping there would be more of his outrageous stuff, the kind of thing you have to see in the flesh. What with the sumptuous metallics and diaphonous fabrics!

More shows pleaseee!

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Blows faux snow from the runway to make my wish!