In a runway version of bringing the mountain to Muhammad, the organizers of Concept Los Angeles Fashion Week, which has hosted a slate of runway shows, presentations and installations at the Spring Arts Tower in downtown L.A. for the last two seasons, Wednesday announced plans for a one-day, four-designer presence during New York Fashion Week, with several days of Los Angeles shows planned for mid-March.

Dubbed Concept New York Fashion Week at the Audi Forum (the car brand has signed on as an event sponsor, as has Toni & Guy salons) will take place on Feb. 14 at 250 Park Avenue in New York City, with runway shows by Los Angeles-based brands MartinMartin and Mike Vensel and Russian label The Muscovites. The name of the fourth label (and whether it will be presented in a runway or presentation format) has yet to be announced.

Fashion Los Angeles, a group that has spent the last two years planning an event organizers hoped would revive Los Angeles Fashion Week and give the city's fashion designers national exposure, has decided to postpone its inaugural event -- which had been set for Feb. 1-7 --for another year.

"We're postponing until 2012 to work on building up sponsorship and fashion-presentation-ready designers," said Fashion Los Angeles co-founder and Chief Executive Michael Venedicto.

Venedicto said the group had hoped to raise $1.5 million in sponsorship pledges for an event to be held in tents on the roof of the parking structure across from Walt Disney Concert Hall at 1st Street and Grand Avenue, but had not reached that goal.

He declined to say how much of the needed funding had been raised to date, only that to move ahead

Fashion Los Angeles, a group that plans to launch a Los Angeles Fashion Week event in February 2011, is making good on its oft-repeated mantra of "focusing on L.A. fashion 365 days a year," and exhibit A can be seen -- and shopped -- Friday through Nov. 14.

That's how long the curated fashion, jewelry, art and furniture pop-up space will be open for business on the ground floor of the Main Mercantile Lofts at 620 S. Main St. in downtown Los Angeles.

The only requirement for inclusion in the debut "Meet the Public" pop-up -- aside from being some of the organizers' personal favorite brands, retailers and designers -- was that the  participants be L.A.-based.

That's how established local fashion designer Yotam Solomon's rolling rack ended sharing a sales floor with Midcentury Modern furniture from Novecento Antiques, a table of T-shirts by barely launched label Seam Ripper, polka-dotted and bow-festooned dresses by Chelsea Rebelle and the styrofoam-painted artwork of Jaime Scholnick. (An exhaustive list of the more than two dozen participants is available at the group's website.)

Although I took an admittedly quick spin through the space (I needed to jet across town to catch a theremin performance in Max Azria's living room -- true story), it was the inclusion of things such as the furniture from Novocento and the artwork by Scholnick that I appreciated -- things you could spend your entire life traipsing across the city and never stumble across, on display a few feet away from the things that brought you in the door. 

Scholnick, represented by the CB1 Gallery, left a particularly lasting impression. The artist has been using acrylic paint to transform the odd-shaped pieces of Styrofoam used to pack and protect the printers, televisions, mirrors and whatnot of modern life into lasting art that looks surprisingly heavy.

She's been turning discarded Styrofoam into art for about a year -- ever since she unpacked a heater she'd bought at Costco and ended up with a pile of odd-shaped pieces.

"I approach them like fossils," Scholnick said. "They used to hold something, and I transform them."

Which is actually a pretty good analogy for what the curated pop-up -- and Fashion Los Angeles at large -- is trying to do: transform a fossilized notion of presenting Los Angeles fashion to the world not by thinking outside of the box, but by by looking at what the box already contains and doing something different with it.

Meet the Public, 620 S. Main St., Nov. 5-14, 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Monday through Friday, 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Saturday and Sunday (subject to change).

-- Adam Tschorn

Photo: "Fossil Tower," 2009, by Jaime Scholnick (Styrofoam, gesso and acrylic paint). Credit: CB1 Gallery.

 

 

 

 

Designers, publicists and fashion fans are baffled by the sudden cancellation of World Coast Management's L.A Fashion Week, which had been slated to take place Oct. 20-25 at L.A. Production Studios. Fourteen designers were listed on the roster of WCM's website to show their collections for spring/summer 2011 during three nights of runway shows which were to be bookended by a party and a trade show. But many of them found out only on Wednesday night that the events had been canceled.

WCM's events were scheduled as part of a two-week-long series of fashion-related events with various sponsors collectively known as "L.A. Fashion Week."  Jennifer Uner, publisher and organizer of the umbrella fashion calendar on www.fashionweekla.com, said she received an e-mail from  info@lafwofficial.com -- the WCM fashion week website -- saying the events had been canceled.

Besides locals, designers from Hungary, Germany and Mexico had planned to show their lines during the WCM events. As of Thursday,  no official notification had been given to designers or their publicists by the event's producer, Susan Costa. Costa did not return calls from the Times seeking comment, but the WCM website has recently been amended to state that all runway shows planned under the “Official L.A Fashion Week” banner have been canceled. No official statement has been released by WCM as to why the event suddenly shuttered, but according to Uner, a media alert containing no contact information was circulated from “info@lafwofficial.com” saying the event's organizers had been unable to obtain necessary permits from the city Fire Department.

In an e-mail Thursday, deigner Anh Volcek, creative director of  L'une Collection, and publicist Heather Witbeck of Shine A Light PR expressed the outrage felt in the fashion community: "As designers, creative directors, and publicists, we are outraged and utterly disappointed that Costa did not look into this [the permit issue] before signing up designers."

Meanwhile on Friday, Fashion Los Angeles, a group that is organizing a new round of fashion presentations set to debut  in February, announced it has joined forces with Two Point Oh LA, an organization that includes 80 of Los Angeles’ biggest fashion and beauty bloggers, to offer the displaced designers an opportunity to meet with local media. The Bloggers’ Cafe event is schduled to take place at Fashion Los Angeles headquarters, 600 S. Spring St., Suite 1708, Los Angeles, from 4 to 8 p.m. Saturday.

-- Melissa Magsaysay

Photo: A look from designer Jen Awad's fall/winter 2010 collection. Awad was one of 14 designers who had planned to show their spring/summer 2011 collections at the WCM L.A Fashion Week event. Credit: Kirk McKoy / Los Angeles Times.

Instead of fussing over models backstage, Bon Jovi's Richie Sambora and Nikki Lund — designers for the White Trash Beautiful brand — hung out in the front row of their own fashion show, gabbing with actress Heather Locklear, Sambora's ex, and other friends before the lights went down.

And the runway presentation, which closed the Sunset Gower Studios Fashion Weekend on Sunday night in Hollywood, echoed the designers' easy-breezy attitudes.

The line's Spring 2011 collection was full of airy, colorful boho maxi dresses; tighter T-shirt jersey frocks with beaded fringe, a la Pocahontas; sari-style layering tunics; and suede and leather raw-edged skirts affecting Raquel Welch in "One Million Years B.C." 

The line was, surprisingly, wholly un-trashy. Still, a little last-minute backstage micromanaging would have made all the difference.

While many of the pieces themselves were on-trend in an Urban Outfitters-cum-Rachel Pally kind of way, the show's awkward styling knocked many of the ensembles down a few pegs.

There were too many fussy necklaces, cheap-looking belts and silly blinged-out shoes, especially considering how "done" the models' hair was (in really cool multi-braided side-ponytails -- see photo below). Fringey silver earrings just don't feel modern — especially when there's already so much going on.

Too much action is also the collection's downfall. There's an instinct to hyper-embellish classic silhouettes. A denim shorts romper, for example, has enough going on without adding a panel of strange, contrasting fabric down the back panel.

But where the designers (Lund and Sambora?) succeeded was in creating a handful of feminine looks that felt young and kicky. Some of the best skinny cargo pants I've ever seen walked the runway — cut beautifully to hug, not strangle, the thighs. And there were many floor-sweeping, rainbow-hued dresses that felt chic and sunny, but also rock-star-cool. 

-- Emili Vesilind

Photos: (top) Designers Richie Sambora and Nikki Lund and Kimberly Caldwell from "American Idol" sit in the front row of the fashion show. Credit: Getty Images

(bottom) Sambora and actress Heather Locklear's daughter, Ava Sambora, who walked the runway for the second season, is seen backstage. Credit: Getty Images

Since IMG and Smashbox stopped hosting what was widely perceived as the official Los Angeles Fashion Week in 2008, there have been scores of suitors trying to romance that fickle beast — making bold claims about reviving and renewing a city-recognized fashion week in L.A.

Most hopefuls quickly fell by the wayside, unable to pin down sponsors or show-worthy designers — or both.

So normally we wouldn't give much credence to organizations claiming to be the "official" producers of a new, spiffed-up fashion week. But the extravagant plans and extensive legwork put forth by a new company, Fashion Los Angeles, has us believing that L.A. Fashion Week may be living and breathing again.

The company, which was launched in early 2009 by partners Michael Venedicto and Jeff Warrington, two Angelenos with backgrounds in graphic design and marketing (Warrington) and awards- and fashion-show producing (Venedicto), plans to launch a fashion week from Feb. 1 to Feb. 7 in a village built from prefab buildings on top of a parking lot near the Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Yes, you read that right. The duo plans to erect a mini-city of small and large venues (which they will truck in for the week), offering brands various platforms — many of which will be digital — in which to showcase their work.

The company will release the names of its major sponsors at an invite-only event on Sept. 15, but Venedicto said the two have a deal with a tech firm that will make it possible to show a large portion of the presentations through new media technology including touch screens, live feeds, imagery and film.

"Only about one-third of the 65 designers we hope to have will actually have runway shows," Venedicto said. "Not every designer is appropriate for the runway -- like [lines based on] jewelry, shoes and handbags."

No brands have been announced for February (and with a project of this magnitude, that lineup will make or break the event), but the roster won't be limited to L.A. brands. "We're also looking to reach national and international designers," Venedicto said. "We've had around 50 people inquire about [showing]. And we're currently putting together an advisory board that will decide who presents and how they present."

The partners plan to woo major retailers to the shows the old-fashioned way — by paying for their trips. "We will be paying for some buyers to fly in," he stated frankly. "We’ll have to take care of certain people to get their attention." And retailers not on site for the event will be given access to seasons that will be produced online, before deciding if they want to take the plunge and fly to L.A. for the event.

The company's financial transparency is a huge point of difference from past players who've tried to give L.A. Fashion Week a go.

Venedicto said Fashion Los Angeles is close to closing a deal with the mayor's office to get the official seal of a city-sanctioned event — and that approval process has stipulations. "They've been burned by other companies before ...," he said, "and they’re putting a very stringent program in place for us to prove ourselves. So we're in the last leg of approvals."

To get Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's seal, the company has to be funded a minimum of 55% — which Venedicto said will be a reality as of next week — and those funds will need to be placed in an escrow account to secure them. "We can’t actually utilize 80% of the funds in the account, so the platform can be accomplished and there’s no chance we would roll out," Venedicto said. "We actually felt more comfortable doing it that way. We’re stand-up guys."

The deal has proven popular with sponsors, which include Caruso Affiliated and reportedly a major car company that will be announced at the Sept. 15 event. "I’ve done some major presentations, and have had a long-reaching career," said Venedicto, who's produced for nearly every major awards show, including the Emmys and the Oscars. "But despite that, I have to prove myself to the fashion industry. Escrow account has given us some legitimacy."

The company is currently focusing on the February shows, which will put L.A. Fashion Week on the worldwide show schedule before the New York shows (it's historically been at the tail end of the schedule) to coincide with L.A.'s awards season, which Venedicto hopes to incorporate into the event.

But as a year-round company, it will also be working with sponsors on local events, such as Bloggers Café, which showcases designers to select groups of bloggers, and -- eventually -- mobile boutiques and fashion shows housed on flatbed trucks that will tour college campuses.

"I tip my hat to the other producers who have tried to do this," Venedicto said. "But they’re never garnered everyone’s support. They’ve never gotten PR support, city support and designer support all at once ... We’re halfway there in terms of truly making an incredible splash in February. We want our whole industry to have a voice. And that’s why I started to participate. I saw some wonderful possibilities."

-- Emili Vesilind

Illustration: The Fashion Los Angeles Village, as designed by Marmol Radziner. Credit: Fashion Los Angeles

Get out your scorecards and sharpen your pencils; there's a new "week" on the Los Angeles fashion week horizon -- and it's billing itself as "the first official LA Fashion Week."

Promising a format that includes "European-style runway shows, brand presentations and sponsor lounges," the new event is the result of a partnership between local PR firm World Coast Management and LA Production Studios. It is scheduled to take place at the latter's 18,000-square-foot facility at 1025 E. 16th St. in downtown Los Angeles, starting Oct. 20 and ending either Oct. 24 or 25.

“We’re really excited, we’ve been working for about a year on this project,” said WCM's Chief Executive Susan Costa, "and it’s going to be an actual fashion week and not just events and parties." (Costa is referring to the traditional fashion-week format in which designers stage catwalk presentations that showcase an  upcoming season in front of a seated audience that consists of retail buyers and fashion press.)

Of course the immediate question is: Just how does the new event plan to succeed when the catwalk is

It turns out Gen Art's reunion-party reboot during Los Angeles Fashion Week in March was more of a death rattle.

Wednesday afternoon we received a mass e-mail from Ian and Stefan Gerard, the founders of  the showcase for emerging fashion designers, musicians and filmmakers, informing us, "As of today [May 5] we have halted all operations."

A copy of the letter, in its entirety, is posted at the organization's website. The short version is that, after an 18-month struggle to stay afloat, during which there was an announced merger with and later split from Rock Media & Entertainment, the final nail in the coffin came "when a major, new, corporate partnership unexpectedly collapsed a few weeks ago."

Gen Art's co-founder and Chief Executive Ian Gerard couldn't be immediately reached for comment on the identity of the potential corporate partner.

The organization, which started in 1994, was based out of New York, with offices in Miami, San Francisco, Chicago and here in Los Angeles, and, by its own count, hosted more than 100 events a year, including film festivals, photo exhibits and parties at the Sundance Film Festival.

But the group is familiar to members of the Los Angeles fashion community as the organizer of "Fresh Faces in Fashion," one of the most reliable showcases and launchpads of local up-and-coming fashion design talent, and a group that would routinely soldier on with its scheduled events even as Los Angeles Fashion Week seemed to disintegrated around it.

For a sense of the group's influence on the local design community over the last 16 years, one need look no further than the March 16 "Alumni Reunion" celebration at the Hollywood Roosevelt's Tropicana bar that was supposed to signal Gen Art's reemergence as a solo entity. The list of featured alumni designers included Eduardo Lucero, Rami Kashou, Jared Gold, Louis Verdad, Jeffrey Sebelia and Katy Rodriguez.

-- Adam Tschorn

Past All The Rage coverage of Gen Art

Follow All the Rage on Facebook and Twitter.

Photo: The Leyendecker collection shown as part of Gen Art's "Fresh Faces in Fashion" showcase during Los Angeles Fashion Week in October. Credit: Kirk McCoy / Los Angeles Times

Who needs a runway when a rack is better?

L.A. designers Katy Rodriguez, Gregory Parkinson, Emily Jerome and Jerome C. Rousseau hosted a cocktail party Monday night at the Palihouse Holloway in West Hollywood to preview their fall lines. A few garment racks in the courtyard, a little informal modeling and some vino were all it took to make this one of the most compelling events of Los Angeles' disjointed Fashion Week.

Of course, the clothes were pretty great too. No jeans and T-shirts here. These designers sell to the likes of Barneys New York Harvey Nichols and Ron Herman.

The group was coming off a trip to Paris Fashion Week earlier this month, where they showed their collections together in the "5 From California" showroom at an art gallery in the Marais, along with Jenni Kayne. The idea was that their combined experience and contacts (not to mention a collective air of L.A. cool) would get them more bang for the buck than if they rented spaces on their own at trade shows or in hotel suites.

Los Angeles Fashion Week had already ended (twice) by the time we stopped into a fashion / film collaboration Wednesday night, and honestly, the last thing we wanted to do was navigate a seedy stretch of Sunset Boulevard en route to a dinner party. But boy, we're sure glad we did, since it acquainted us with a new designer whose work --and name -- we're all likely to see more of in the future.

That name is Stacey Clark, a 2008 FIDM graduate who hails from Victoria, Canada. Holding court at the Eighth Veil Gallery while "Dual," a five-minute collaborative film by Alia Raza that featured the designer's clothes on Alli McCullough Cripe and Annakim Violette (the latter of which also happens to be Tom Petty's daughter) spooled in the background, Clark, whose long red hair, fair skin and sleek black hobble dress (from her own line) made her come across like a flame-haired version of Morticia Addams, explained that her label Odilon was named as an homage to the French post-Impressionist painter Odilon Redon.

While downtown “fashion week” festivities have commenced, a few events still linger on the Westside, showcasing local designers in nontraditional venues and presentations.

The L.A. Fashion Collective highlighted four contemporary collections at a crowded cocktail party Wednesday night. Looks from the fall/winter 2010 lines of Dolan, Barlow, Jane Oh and Ai for Ai were on display at Bond St. inside the Thompson Hotel. Two models donned one ensemble for about five minutes then changed into another designer’s clothing, giving ample time to take in the black cocktail dresses and slouchy fleece pants, but difficult to see everything in a timely manner.

But the party seemed to be more about support than actually seeing the clothes. Guests at the event were a mix of fashion folk and friends and fans of the designers who excitedly snapped pictures and seemed genuinely thrilled for their moment.

And from the clothing I did see, Ai for Ai shined as an interesting collection of fluid and modern separates with a slight goth undertone. Think "Twilight," grown up and much more girly.

-- Melissa Magsaysay

Photos: A look from Dolan, left, sisters and Ai for Ai designers Carol and Elizabeth Ai with models wearing looks from their line and a look from Barlow. Credit: L.A. Fashion Collective

A gothic-cum-pagan sensibility reigned at Tuesday night's Concept fashion event (of which the Los Angeles Times' Image section is one of several media sponsors) at downtown's Spring Arts Tower.

There were Wiccan-style floor-skimming dresses and jackets, worn by models with deathly white faces at the MartinMartin show; faux leather black minidresses and long hooded capes at Jen Awad; and two real severed pigs heads, part of a macabre-themed fashion installation (thanks for the memories, Skin Graft). 

But peppering the sinister style were some decidedly cheery moments.

Jen Awad, who launched her namesake collection at the BoxEight shows a year ago, mixed moody, "Matrix"-style futurism with 1940s Vargas Girl looks -- which translated into faux leather dresses, coats and boleros dripping with fringe made from strands of faux pearls.

The young designer went even more literal with her '40s references with a series of fit-and-flare dresses with deep sweetheart necklines done up in eye-popping jewel tones (styled with that big, curled '40s bang and fingerless leather-ette gloves). The overall effect was slightly jarring -- should those two genres should ever collide? -- but we commend Awad for giving it a go, and pulling out some memorable looks.