Dear Shaded Viewers,
In a world where we are questioning how many pieces of clothing we need, how much product we can put out there and the state of the world’s economy, fashion is having a tough time. Luxury sales are matched by challenging times even for the lower price brands, and how people shop has shifted, political strife, war, economic uncertainty and huge shifts in consumer groups, all add to fashions increasing vulnerability. Technology and the growth of Ai increase nervousness and employment fluctuations. Sustainability and ethical sourcing are just one of many flags flying above the fashion business. So why another fashion event?
Since the global pandemic, and in the face of so much change, security and safety has become the antidote to anxiousness. What we know, and what we value has become more important and looking inward, to local rather than global has gained strength. Pride in our own cultures, lifestyles, traditions, and aesthetics has become much more important and for Spain and Latin countries the heritage is both established and familiar, yet full of potential.
CLEC Fashion Festival is about Valencia and Spain; it is about local designers and creative talents from a train journey away. It’s about the future but built on a brilliantly firm creative foundation. Balenciaga onwards has shown that the creative threads in Spanish and Latin fashion are strong, timeless, and open to endless reinvention.
This was my third visit to the festival and it’s easy to see both a spirit and a creative power in Spanish fashion, and this event hosted in Valencia, which speaks to the Latin community. It is a complete contrast to the Scandinavian aesthetic, totally different to the Belgian approach to fashion, as will be so clearly proven next year in the exhibition devoted to the Belgian Six in Antwerp. It’s about identity, which is for example, showed in Paris on the day all the Japanese designers show.
The use of silhouette and volume, the return repeatedly to black, the use of lace, and the cut of flounces, ruffles and frills from traditional dress are signatures which reoccur again and again in Spanish fashion.
Each year Miquel Suay and his amazing team offer a range of young designer’s work, also established names, and also show designer’s thoughts on sustainable fashion, the theme underpinning the entire event. With support from local people from councils and colleges through to the audience, the energy and commit to the event is wonderful. The two-day event takes place in the space age setting of the City of Arts and Sciences. This is a brilliant location with the fragmented white mosaics and the skeletal buildings, with huge arcs soaring upwards, dipped into pools of glittering water, and surrounded by tropical gardens, the outside world almost ceases to exist.
So, let us us look at the clothes and the collections. Let us start with the finale from established Madrid based designer Agatha Ruiz de La Prada. With a label that covers every clothing possibility, from baby to daddy, and much more the exuberant, joyful look of the work is famous. It is a superbly edited creative narrative, with colour, pattern, and shape consistent and true to its own rules. Uptempo and life enhancing the models laugh, twist, and skip down the runway, brining whoops, and applause form the audience. Each look be it men’s pyjama suits of a flounce hemmed shift dress are perfect. The editorial eye never falters as the designer offers each look and piece with its amazing colours expertly balanced to add into almost any wardrobe. To wear with jeans, basic black or navy, or whatever the customer wants, it is life away from the runway is entirely at their command. Brilliant.
“Isabel is my name” created by Isabel Peña originally from Chile now Valencia showed on the first day. With black plus white predominating the collection used volume and silhouette in apparently conventional ways until each look got closer and a subversive element was visible, flounces and ruffles, but with a single padded support inserted and glimpse of one pleated ruffle. A long thirties style black slipper satin evening skirt and top where the ties holding the look together swayed and floated. A blouson draped back view which was extended into a train by long silk fringe, or a gigantic sailor top with a piped outsize collar balanced by a short crinoline skirt and pom pom encrusted shoes. It’s all about balance and surprise, the red was a zinger as it exploded onto the catwalk. It is about confidence and a sure eye, it is about authentic, original creative fashion talent.
Alvaro Machero also from Madrid. His work might be linked to another Spanish designer from the 1960’s Paco Rabanne but the thread is quickly transformed by a softer approach to metallic links and chains. There s a sexy sway and a dancing lightness to this designers’ inventions, models swished and spun as the min skirts and tiny shift dresses whizzed past. The fit and finish were couture standard, not a loop or chain dropped, not a model fell out of her look, it was beautifully made and realised. Clearly the designer has clients who demand the highest standards, and he is meeting them!
Swimwear is difficult to write about some it is such small, pieces of clothing, however Dolores Cortes showed a terrific collection from swimsuits to micro bikinis, all with exotic patterning merging several cultures and eras. Cleopatra and Kismet, Lost Horizon and Babylon were contoured U.K. in swathes of beach cover ups, sarong s and even jet beaded body suits. It was masterfully made and cut, from the simplest one piece to an asymmetrical draped costume fir for Hollywood and Esther Williams.
Devol Studio are from Alicante, and they use “discarded textiles and forgotten garments.” The collection was a delight with also many hand painted flowers and flourishes added on top of wild pattern combinations. A man’s shirt in several stripes and checks, a flouncy Marie Antoinette skirt in dozens of stripes and ribbons, over dyed lace peeing out from under reconstructed white t shirts or a mad white on white layered skirt with every possible fabric patch worked together. The silhouettes cleverly warmed form sexy and short to oversize and easy, from tight jersey to easy wear cottons. A huge washed black sweatshirt with extra long sleeves was shown as a shirt dress, and it was ornamented with a delightful couture bow at the next made from a man silk tie.
Finally from group shows I’d like to highlight Athropocenespain whose articulated looks were fascinating and perfectly realised as they walked the catwalk, also Fernando Carbonell whose witty patchworks had surprise swing tags, and brilliant colour interplay alongside a true instinct for silhouette with a Marie Antoinette style dress with train which trailed barely constructed pieces behind the model. The blue and red patchwork looks showed how tonal matching requires an expert eye to succeed. Finally, Irati Berastegi worked threads and wisps of lightness I fringe and swirls on a long slender dress that must have taken hours and yet looked effortless ethereal.
Tony Glenville
