Australian Fashion Week

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Australian Fashion Week is a twice yearly fashion industry event showcasing the latest seasonal collections from Australian and Asia Pacific Designers. The Spring-Summer season collections take place at the International Passenger Terminal Sydney's Circular Quay in April or May of each year, while the Trans-Seasonal collections are shown in September. As of 2007 the Trans-Seasonal Collection are held in Sydney, having formerly been held at Melbourne's St Kilda pier.

With a growing profile on the international fashion week circuit AFW has helped bring high acclaim to a number of Australian designers such as Alex Perry, Zimmermann, Toni Maticevski, Collette Dinnigan, Leona Edmiston, Ericaamerica, Easton Pearson and Gwendolyne.

Started in 1995 by CEO and Founder Simon Lock the event now known as Rosemount Australian Fashion Week (formerly Mercedes Australian Fashion Week)^[1] has become a high profile media moment on the fashion calendar, helping to ensure Asia Pacific designers a place on store shelves the world over. The event is also important in showcasing the talent of young up-and-coming Australian designers and their labels. One such designer is Mick Ferraro, creator of the 'Deuce' label. The week has also spawned valuable spin off events such as Mercedes Start Up and a number of high profile charity fund raisers.

In 2005 Simon Lock sold Mercedes Australian Fashion Week and its parent company Australian Fashion Innovators to the New York-based International Management Group^[2]. Lock declined to reveal the size of the deal, which industry sources estimated could have been worth "several million dollars", or to reveal whether he has an equity stake in IMG FASHION Asia Pacific.

In 2007 many major Australian fashion designers, who had previously shown at Australian Fashion Week, were not included in the schedule. These included the likes of Zimmerman, Sass & Bide, Wayne Cooper, Morrissey, Leona Edmiston, Akia and Toni Matecevski. Most would return in 2008, however, with IMG providing much more comprehensive schedule as a part of their rebuilding of the event.

In 2008, Australian Fashion Week was hosted by Rosemount, displaying big names such as Alex Perry, Akira and the return of Sass & Bide launching their new label Sass & Bide Vie