Last week the capital city of the Czech Republic came alive with fashion during the biggest fashion event of the year - Mercedes Benz Fashion Week. Compared to the other fashion weeks all over the world, the Czech one is really quite small. Yes, there is something going on during the whole week - conferences, exhibitions, parties, some shop-openings - nevertheless, the shows themselves took place only for three days and presented only 19 Czech and Slovakian brands and designers.
As I have already been in this world for quite a while, I must honestly say, I did not have very high expectations from Czech designers. They are not bad but they have never had the qualities of the world's leaders. There is a diametral difference when it comes to details and the whole attitude. Czechs and Slovaks are talented without a shadow of doubt, nevertheless, in the final presentation on the runway there is always something that is missing. Sometimes the styling, sometimes details and sometimes the inconsistence of the whole collection.
However, maybe because I did not expect much, I was very positively surprised. Designers like Tomáš Macháček and Lukáš Linder introduced very consistent and modern collections when they were following actual trends including very smooth overlap of unisex and femininity. Additionally, Tomáš Macháček also should be praised for dark and gloomy presentation achieved by great styling - what is not something you could see very often in the Czechoslovakia area.
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Tomáš Macháček model styling - extreme make up
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There is actually much more to write about each designer and I do not really want to get that deep. Nevertheless, last thing I want to mention when it comes to designers is the inspiration. Because, sometimes, it really seems that there has happened quite more. When you follow fashion weeks all over the world and you really keep yourself up to date with collections of renowned designers than you can see things, and I mean things. A few times while I was watching the runway, it came across to my mind that I already saw this somewhere - and it could be either just the iconic design or the object itself. I saw Dior's Haute Couture S/S15 shoes, Kenzo, Alexander Wang, Dior sunglasses or Christian Louboutin sparkling wedding Stilletoes.
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If you can see shoes from Dior's S/S 2015
Haute Couture than you've got a point |
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| And hello Kenzo, is that you? |
Aside of the creative side of the fashion week, let's talk about the organisation for a bit. I cannot complain about the choice of spaces - ZIBA in the street Na Příkopě in the heart of the city centre was a wonderful combination of etheric architecture and modern settings, and the skatepark at the island Štvanice was an ingenious idea. Nonetheless, the management was in one word a mess. It seemed like that no one actually expects to come people who hadn't bought tickets because, honestly, if you were dressed certain way the security or staff wouldn't bother to ask you for any accreditation. The most I saw from any kind of checking was when I came to usherette asking about seats. And seats, man, seats are other story.
First to understand is that if you weren't invited than you could buy two types of tickets, either for standing for 700Czk (around 25 euro) or so called VIP for 10,000Czk for one (370 euro) or 15,000Czk for two (that's 555 euro) when you had access to two more shows, one extra party and you were
assured to always have a seat. Are you starting to see the problem here? Probably not when it comes to the normal ticket, I also have none with that one but
those VIPs. You know, when you buy two tickets that cost you
such an amount of money than you expect to get some kind of service like being seated first and not standing in a crowd of people while waiting for the beginning of the show. And let me tell you, you are not getting it. The price of those tickets are just so ridiculously high compared to the treatment that you really want to cry, and I'm not even exaggerate here. If you came a little before the show started than it could happen to you that you didn't have a seat anymore, if you came on time for the show than you could spent even 20 minutes crammed in a crowd before they let you in. Yeah people, totally not worth it.
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| My shoes finally getting the attention they deserve - Jeremy Scott for Adidas (by welling.com) |
As a last word to the MBPWF I must say that
I liked it. It may sounds weird after the amount of criticism I've given out here, yet it is necessary to understand that this is still very young event going for only
5 years. It wasn't perfect - neither organisation, collections, models, styling nor settings, nevertheless, I didn't expect none of those to be and I was very nicely surprised quite a few times. The designers are getting better, the locations are more cleverly chosen and some are not scared to experiment with styling and make up. In addition, you could see the highest concentration of originally and well dressed people than
ever before and that is always something to look forward to. Because to really see
a style in Czech, you really have to search.
But about Czech street fashion later, there's too much to talk about.
With a lots of love,
