In GWAND Style
December 21, 2004
| Tucked away in the in the mountains in the heart of Switzerland lies the city of Lucerne. Famous for its lake, picturesque setting and historical heritage. However, we were there, not to soak up the scenery for a winter weekend but to visit our colleagues at GWAND Fashion Festival. GWAND now in its 11th edition is the brainchild of Susanna Vock. The best thing about attending an event organised by someone else is time. Time, a luxury we cannot afford during the four days at ITS# and quite rightly so seeing as we are the hosts. So when we do have time on our hands we really appreciate it. Time to really sit back and absorb the atmosphere, to chat and exchange ideas with our press friends and other people from the fashion world, even to have a lazy Saturday morning breakfast-gobbling up eggs and hashbrowns while chatting to Luca Lanzoni (Glamour Italy). Basically spending time with people. This was actually our second visit to GWAND and we were very curious to see the changes that the GWAND team had put into place. One of the most noticeable changes was the new location. From a huge venue that held over 1000 guests to a beautiful Liberty style hall, giving the fashion show a far more intimate feeling. All we had to do was just sit back and enjoy the show and that is just what we did? It was difficult to sit still in our seats because you could just feel the energy pouring out everywhere and contaminating even the most conservative guests. This is what fashion is really about! Being a competition there has to be winner, although simply just participating made all contestants automatically winners, but someone had to go home with the prizes... One of the most sought over prizes is the Swiss Textile Award, offering €100,000 (not in the form of cash but show-production, PR, management...)! Just the tonic an emerging fashion might need to get through the year without worries(less worries). In order to compete for this prize the designers must have worked in the fashion market for no less than three seasons, their collections must been presented at official PaP shows in Paris, London, NY or Milan and they must already be known among the press. Running for the award was Cosmic Wonder, Eley Kishimoto, Haider Achermann, Sophia Kokosalaki, Laurent Mercier, Lutz and Preen! |
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Something else we had been waiting for was the catwalk exist of Raf Simon's(last year's winner of the Swiss Textile Award) new collection...needless to say it was a treat for the eyes! |
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All of a sudden it was time for the award ceremony... We were on the edge of our seats... Everyone was great but we had our favourite... Those few seconds before reading out the name of the winner seemed like an eternity.. Then "and the winner is... HAIDER ACHERMAN!!" Hourrah!! It was such an emotional moment to see Raf Simons hand over the prize embracing Haider. But there was still more emotion to come ... |
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The emerging fashion designers could also run for Ackermann Prix Pret-à-porter, a €50,000 including commission to design a mini collection which will be produced and sold by the Swiss mail order company. The well deserved winner was the sweet smiling Lutz! More cheers... |
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However junior fashion designers were not forgotten. Five home grown Swiss designers were nominated to run for the Annabelle(Switzerland's biggest women's magazine) Award, up for grabs 1 year stage at Antonio Beradi's studio in Milan! A very flushed Sophie Scheibler came onto the stage to collect her prize! And more cheers? Everyone to dinner and then straight off to party the night away. Late to bed but early to rise, couldn't miss out on the byebye brunch. So many goodbyes and so little time.. In the end we had to rush, there was a train to catch. Back to Trieste with sleepy heads but taking home with us beautiful memories spent with all our friends at GWAND. Huge thank you and loads of love to Suzanna Vock and her team at GWAND. For further information www.gwand.ch |
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