PUMA and LCF

Broadwick Street was heaving on Wednesday night to the sound of tunes spun by GoldieRocks and FrankMusik, the occasion was Pumas style collaboration with London Colege of Fashion.

First year students competed to turn a plain black t-shirt into a directional new design thats theme was "fashion meets music" hence the musical guests on the night that were all willing to give their opinion on the final designs.

Two of the winning designs by by Lauren Greenwood and Angela Brandys are lucky enough to see their designs come into fruition with the all conquering ASOS putting the designs into limited production to sell online.

On her success Angela had to say, 'Being part of the competition run between LCF and PUMA has been a really inspiring and affirming experience. It was the first time I had ever had an opportunity to be part of anything like this and think that it's great that PUMA gave so much support and celebrate young creative talent. I enjoyed the challenge of coming up with a modern and creative yet wearable design, and was really pleased that my design won a place under the innovative category.'

It's understood the designs will be available on Asos.com come October so keep your eyes peeled.

Elite Model Look UK

Wednesday I attended the Elite Model UK final held at The Last Days of Decadence in Shoreditch.

Elite is an internationally renowned modelling agency its 'Model Look' competition has been going since 1983. However 2009 was the launch of casting calls in the UK and there were ten girls that made it to the UK final with the winner going on to China in October for the world final.

Cindy Crawford, Linda Evangelista and Gisele Bundchen have all competed in the Elite Model Look contest so the girls are in good company!

It was very much a family affair at the event with the hopefuls nearest and dearest there to cheer them on to victory. Alongside the quaking next of kin were selected press and journalists and on the judging panel were heavyweights from Elite, fashion brand Miss Sixty, Elle, Tank and You magazines.

The winner was announced as Nyasha Matonhodze from Northampton who will go on to the finals in October representing the UK. Good Luck to her and hope she can do herself proud over in China!

Pure London

Sunday I visited Pure London at Kensington Olympia. Pure London is one of the UK's leading trade fashion events for sourcing womenswear and young creative fashion.

It was my first time visiting the show and I thought it had a great vibrancy about it. Although the range of brands is vast and varys considerably in terms of market type, the set up worked well and the brands that stood out were those that paid attention to detail to small things that add an atmosphere to the compact exhibitor space. The importance is to get the brand profile across within a quick glance, it could mean the difference between maintaining the wondering eye of the independent buyer or the competitor next door benefiting from the custom.

The brands that caught my attention were those with eye-catching visual merchandising set ups. Yumis' mannequins wouldn't of looked out of place in a Harvey Nics window display and at Supertrash it was the key items they had picked to display which drew the crowds such as a leather biker jacket with emphasised shoulders.

Of course being a fashion event there was the all important party afterwards! The exhibitors party took place at The Crescent Club complete with a Bruno impersonator as compere and 'Pete Sinatra' (who didnt go down quite so well!) think the clue was in the name with that one!

After that on to No5 Cavendish Square with the party hosted by AppleBottom jeans. A great day had by all and that was just day one- two more days of the exhibition to follow! Visit http://www.purewomenswear.co.uk for more info on the event.

Fashion Business Club

Meeting at the Swarovski Crystallized Lounge just off Regent Street opposite Libertys for the latest Fashion Business Club networking afternoon. I was fortunate enough to be invited to attend by co-founder of the club Courtney Blackman and couldn't wait to hear the guest interviewee Malika Dalamal, London Editor of Dailycandy.com, talk about how she chooses the brands and services they feature and the overall business success of the site.

For those that haven't heard of the Fashion Business Club....
"Very simply, FBC (Fashion Business Club) is a members-only club, created on the basis of bringing bright-minded, fashion business professionals together six times a year at an informal venue to listen, learn and do business together. The ethos of the club is generosity and the desire to share knowledge along with at least two-years’ experience in the fashion business to gain membership.
Members include home-grown and internationals, well-known and aspiring designers, art directors, journalists, photographers, stylists, buyers, brand managers, make-up artists, graphic designers, copywriters, retailers, creative directors, PRs and more."
http://www.fashionbusinessclub.net/index_main.html

I attended the event which was filled with really inspiring people-mainly women- from all areas of the creative industries. Attendees included the creative director of Browns Caroline Burstein, illustrator Daisy de Villeneuve, Frances Card former brand director of Cocosa and now director of Frances Card Consultancy, online fashion retail and content consultant Leon Bailey-Green.