If you want to gauge how hip or unhip you are, just step into a room of college kids — preferably ones studying fashion design, fashion marketing and fashion styling — and you’ll immediately know the score. If you can match their fashion derring-do (voluminous leopard-print hooded jackets, off-shoulder slouchy dresses slashed up to there, a patterned suit worn with a bowtie and a pair of horn-rimmed glasses) and also affect that air of practiced insouciance, with slim limbs, shiny hair, and clear skin to match, then congratulations, you’re hip. Otherwise, you’re just old.
The LaSalle College International (LCI) students’ first fashion show production, Un Nuit Au Moroc, held last week at Warehouse 135, was a celebration of the end of their school term and a culmination of all their fashion lessons. It was also a litmus test for people who long ago left college behind but want to see if they can still pass as “youthful” and “exuberant,” or if they are already well within the acidic (“may asim pa”) side of the scale.
Eight student designers presented collections of their works. The resulting showcase was a wide array of designs, from Forever 21-ish (in style and quality) frocks to surprisingly sophisticated military style coats, from the very commercially viable maxi dresses to the chic, all-white ensembles that seemed to have come fresh off the set of a classic Hollywood movie. Though some pieces didn’t fit so well on the more zaftig student models and a number of outfits were accessorized amateurishly, it was a pretty impressive showcase in general, considering that a majority of the presenting designers — as well as their cheering audience — are barely above the legal drinking age. The clothes were also well-made, the seams generally neat, and their diversity in styles indicated the designers’ varied influences and distinct tastes. Congratulations, designers: you’re all safe (actually, there are shoo-ins for top three, and then there are the rest of you, but still. Very good work from everyone).
The fashion show ended in a jubilant party. While the evening, at times, felt like an indulgence of the students’ precociousness, it was a well-deserved celebration, given that every detail of the event was produced/managed/handled by the students themselves. If their first offering is any indication, the succeeding fashion shows from LCI Manila students would be worth watching out for.