Advertisement

Lifestyle

Woe is Toronto Fashion Weeks?

So I hear you’re frustrated by the glut of fashion shows in Toronto this month. Sorry, I don’t feel your pain.

But before I mount my high horse and tell you to suck it up, let’s start by recapping what’s happened to the city’s fashion show schedule this season.

About every six months the city’s fashion media, front row fixtures (some of them like to be called “socialites”, others are just good at stealing seats), style-curious consumers and a buyer or two pack themselves into a dark room where designers present the clothing they want you to wear next season.

Street style bloggers stalk the space looking for statement shoes (in Toronto, that usually means anything ALDO), someone throws a disposable razor at you every ten seconds and you constantly wonder if your ass has gotten bigger or they just downsized the seats again to cram an extra 200 people into the room.

It’s all very glamourous but the consensus for the last few seasons is the week’s schedule needed to be edited down to two or three days, ensuring only the cream of our designer crop gets to show.

That shorter calendar didn’t materialize this season and issues with a few new venues messed up its timing. This month’s fall shows were supposed to take place last week, then this week before being double booked with Passover and Easter from March 28 to April 1.

Designers are an antsy bunch and some of them didn’t want to wait, resulting in three weeks of run-up-to shows that peak tonight with presentations by Fullum & Holt, Thieves, Penicullus Bellum and Paul Hardy. Breeyn McCarney, Greta Constantine, NADA and Philip Sparks have already shown and there are events on Thursday and Friday for Line, Thomas and Cult de Laissez Faire.

That’s only eleven extra shows, the number of presentations New York Fashion Week crams into an average hour, but the stretched out schedule has resulted in Twit-fits and flustered cocktail party breakdowns of “I can’t believe I just received another invitation!” It’s all too much, I know, but as I usually find myself saying to one griping and groaning group or another during the lead up to fashion week, no one is holding a gun to your head saying you must participate.

On Monday, The F-List‘s Leesa Butler posted a constructive suggestion to deal with the segmented schedule. She tweeted “If we’re going to have a rogue fashion week in T.O. could we at least pick 1 venue? A Canadian Milk Studios anyone?!”

It’s a good idea since most designers who show off site do it because it offers them creative flexibility though it would still limit their ability to negotiate sponsorships.

But it also makes me think our designer community has more to offer than two or three days can contain. And let’s not forget, fashion week is about them, not us.[rssbreak]

Advertisement

Exclusive content and events straight to your inbox

Subscribe to our Newsletter

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

By signing up, I agree to receive emails from Now Toronto and to the Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions.

Recently Posted