The 2011 UTS graduate fashion parade took place last December – a yearly showcase of shining new talent ready to be unleashed onto the world. This is where young fashion designers debut their thesis collections to an audience of industry guests and peers, and a place where the potential stars of Australian fashion are emerging. This year we were most impressed with the ideas being presented, not to mention the quality of production of the garments – many collections would be right at home nestled alongside established designers and take the notion of “student fashion” to a whole new level. Here is our pick of a few names to watch.
Natalia Grzybowski
Amazing digital prints in sculptural shapes made Natalia’s collection a definite standout. Not only was there a beautiful artistry to her interpretation of florals, mirrored and perfectly placed on the garments, but the clean lines of each piece mixed with 3D details gave them a great balance. She finished with a diaphanous sheer gown that was lovely in its softness as a foil to the rest of the collection. In other news, Natalia was just named the recipient of the Australians in New York Fashion Fund scholarship – a most amazing opportunity to intern in New York this year!
Kacey Devlin
Kacey Devlin is set to launch her debut collection ‘Inceptionism’, jumping from studies straight into starting her label. She’s a bit of a dynamo! Based around a draped, layered silhouette with pieces that transform according to the wearer’s interpretation, her aesthetic is thoroughly modern and picks up on an androgynous silhouette. Check back for more on Kacey, as Absorb produced her lookbook and campaign video, which we will be sharing soon!
Matt Dolan
Girly, architectural and a little unsettling is the collection by Matt Dolan, taking reference from fundamentalist religion and bringing out its dark side. Using latex and printing on it, which sounds near impossible, resulted in latex skirts and our favourite – latex trousers! Some very nifty technique was showcased, like here the jumper has 3D looking shapes formed underneath the fabric with bonded foam. Also stay tuned for lookbook and video for Matt Dolan by Absorb.
Danielle Kremer
We love colour! And Danielle Kremer’s collection was a lovely ode to vibrant hue. A very summer-bright collection with pops of fluro and some great graphic style prints. She also used hardware and woven rope overgarments taken from rock climbing attire, and managed a really nice balance between sportswear detail and a quite feminine, contemporary collection. Danielle also won the 2011 NSW Business Chamber Textiles, Clothing and Footwear award, giving her $10,000 to help start her complementary accessories range ‘LIFT’.
We’re envisioning very promising future careers from these graduates: definitely names to keep note of as Australian fashion keeps growing year by year. If students are graduating with this calibre of talent and skill, we are surely in for some fresh new fashion legacies.
Here we’re finally showing some of the beautiful images we did for new Aussie designer Kacey Devlin late last year. Having just graduated from the fashion course at UTS, Kacey is set to launch her own label – a very modern, utilitarian collection of mix-and-match pieces able to layer up and make them your own. We had great fun shooting this, photographer Maja Baska captured Samantha from Priscillas in a series of action shots – what we didn’t know beforehand was that Samantha was ballet-trained, and so each leap was perfectly poised with beautiful hands and feet! She was truly amazing.
