MANILA, Philippines — It was like the State of the Nation Address (SONA) red carpet all over again at Filipino fashion designer Michael Leyva’s Filipiniana fashion show last Tuesday held in Goldenberg Mansion, Malacañang Complex, Manila.
Dubbed “Isang Pilipinas,” the show began with an amazing laser and video projection show that made the newly restored Goldenberg Mansion come alive – a marriage between old Filipino architecture and new smart technology. The projection show presented Leyva’s inspiration behind the collection – Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao, by sharing the stories of indigenous textile weavers from the country’s three major islands.
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Live music from the Manila Philharmonic Orchestra added nostalgia into the show, as the orchestra navigated from the “kundiman” or Tagalog romance songs of Luzon, to popular folk songs such as “Waray-Waray” for the Visayas collection and “Dayang-Dayang” for Mindanao.
Opening the show for the Luzon part was actress Heart Evangelista, who first made an appearance by the mansion’s second floor window, as if simulating a “babae sa bintana” (woman by the window) about to be serenaded with “harana” (traditional Filipino courtship song).
Heart then descended the stairs, as seen in the projection, and opened the mansion’s grand doors before walking down the mansion’s pavement and around the fountain in a grand pearl-studded Terno aptly called “Perlas ng Silanganan.”