Runways more than designer clothes and pretty models

This year’s theme was ‘Cirque du Couture,’ which fused fashion and fantasy for a massively… This year’s theme was ‘Cirque du Couture,’ which fused fashion and fantasy for a massively entertaining night. The theatrical show capitalized on its circus theme, using clothing, lighting, a video backdrop, dance routines and perfectly choreographed runway moves to create a colorful and whimsical fashion world.

Models pranced around in outfits from independent shops and major Irish department stores like Arnott’s and BT2. Over-the-top and frizzed-out hair, dramatic makeup and some serious heels complemented the clothing on display.’ ‘ ‘

All the pomp and circumstance over clothing got me thinking about fashion shows and how they came to be the lavish productions we automatically imagine. How did scraps of fabric become a reason to shut down mid-town Manhattan for Fashion Week two weeks of every year?

Not much has been written on the subject, which seems strange considering the catwalk could be considered an enduring and prominent symbol of the fashion industry.

‘The topic of fashion shows remains to find its historian,’ said Valerie Steele, chief curator and director of the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in an article written by Amanda Fortini on Slate.com. But there is some basic background to these spectacles that I found interesting.’

According to Fortini’s article, the first fashion show held in the United States occurred in 1903 in New York City at the specialty store Ehrich Brothers in an attempt to drum up more business from female customers. By 1910, Philadelphia and New York were seeing many of its major department stores following the fashion show trend to lure in customers with their best merchandise on display. ‘ ‘ ‘

The decision to stage shows was likely influenced by ‘fashion parades’ that were being held during the same time as couture salons in Paris.

By the 1920s, things were getting out of control. Fashion shows were immensely popular, growing more and more theatrical and increasingly common. They were attracting crowds large enough so that shows became so disruptive to everyday life that it was necessary in New York City, among other cities, to obtain a license for live models.

But according to Fortini, U.S. fashion shows hit a small roadblock when Germany occupied France in 1940, making it impossible for American buyers, editors and designers to travel to Paris to see the French designers’ collections. Before World War II, it was assumed that American designers were completely dependent on French couture for inspiration for their own collections.

A well-known publicist named Eleanor Lambert decided, however, that it was time to change the notion once and for all. Lambert organized ‘Press Week’ in 1943 to showcase American designers’ works in a location central to writers and editors to make it known that American designers could create beautiful pieces of clothing exclusive of French influence.

Her plan worked. After viewing collections at the Pierre and Plaza Hotels, major magazines began giving credit to and praising American designers for their designs, and ‘Press Week’ continued through the 1950s.

During the 1970s and ’80s, designers began showing their collections in lofts, clubs and restaurants. But in the early 1990s, after several accidents in unsafe spaces’ — like large pieces of plaster falling on models and attendees at a Michael Kors show held in a downtown Manhattan loft — Fern Mallis, the head of the Council of Fashion Designers of America, decided it was time for a change. Mallis wanted to find a venue for all shows in the same space, which turned out to be Bryant Park. In the spring of 1994, New York Fashion Week as we know it today was born.

While some may argue that fashion shows have lost their relevance with the mass production of fast fashion and lesser fashion weeks popping up all over the globe way too frequently, I still enjoyed the endless parade of entertainment and clothing at the minor one I attended on Wednesday, if only because it was nothing more than an escape from everyday reality.

Fortini captures the escape sentiment of New York Fashion Week perfectly by saying, ‘Now, the fashion show belongs to Manhattan the way the movies belong to Hollywood. The spectacle exists elsewhere, apart from our everyday lives.”