dressing- life skills

It’s the life of the fashion student and more or less the life of everyone whose working their way from bottom to top, to be treated like dirt. You are, in the words of that immortal ‘trainspotting’ character, Renton,
“The lowest of the low the scum of the earth”.

None the less you enter an industry at the very bottom rung of the ladder and although you may hope to be treated like the genius you secretly think you are, you are aware it is unlikely.

It is for this reason I had a surprising experience dressing for a fashion show of late.
The common side profession of fashion students – dressing models – (literally)
Is dangled in front of us as an opportunity to ‘make contacts’ and ‘gain experience’. Essentially its expendable free labour. Although most fashion students realise this after their first dressing experience some of us continue to work as dressers because we hold the flickering candle of hope we will be discovered.
Naive much?

It was for this reason the actions of one Alexander Owen so surprised me, the up and coming designer from small New Zealand town Gisbourne was in our corner of the country showing her collection at showroom 22 last week.
Unlike most designers who rarely ordain to speak to dressers (and if they do its to ask them to fetch coffee or water) the delightful miss Owen made time to speak to the 6 students who were helping her and ask with general interest about our own collections.

Perhaps it is because Miss Owen lives away from the urban nightmare that is Auckland with its fashion snobbery and pretentiousness that she does not realise that designers are far too high and mighty to talk to lowly dressers. I hope she remains uninformed even though her designers are so interesting they will undoubtedly gain her increasing publicity.

The entire experience of her collection was surprising starting with her down to earth nature. Dressers were surprised to see on their models racks sleeves that detached and were then switched with other models and attached to other garments. Whilst this was a nightmare for those of us dressing models for rapid changes in a small area, the collection was intellectually interesting in a way that is rarely seen in New Zealand and seldom seen anywhere but the collections of the likes of Anne Demulemester and ‘Avante Garde’ international designers.

It’s the sort of designs I wished we saw more of in our fashion industry, we have a lot to learn from international designers, and perhaps certain international designers like those I dressed for at London fashion week (who shall go unnamed) could learn something from Alexandra Owen on how to treat volunteer dressers.