Mercedes Benz Fashion Week 9/8/07- Academyof Art University

I was really looking forward to my last show of the night in the Bryant Park Tent, featuring recent grads from the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. Although it's great to see what the established designers will be wowing us with come Springtime, the young designers can get away with a less commercial look, and their enthusiasm is palpable. With 9 different designers showing 5-10 designs each, this show progressed very quickly from one designer to the other. It was obvious that many family and friends were in the audience, and they spontaneously cheered as their favorite designers, models and clothes filled the runway with the sort of riotous color and sometimes over-the-top fashions that fill young designers with palpable energy. This San Francisco-based design school has been showing their brightest and best graduates at fashion week since September, 2005. The school puts their proverbial money where their mouths are, supporting their graduate designers to help them launch their careers and have their collections seen by as many industry people as possible. And what better place than NY Fashion Week? This long report features just a sample of what we saw last night, with some "fashion stars" sure to be born!

First up was Andrea Vence, MFA Textile and Fashion Design. Her silhouettes are based on traditional Japanese kites, consisting of a bamboo or wooden frame with paper painted in bold motifs from legendary war heroes to geometric patterns. Most of Andreas designs were black and bold yellow, two worn with box-like hats decorated with sparkling champagne bottles.

Tara Shannahan, MFA Fashion Design Tara created a stark, white, linen collection based on the fracture and instability that the 1906 San Francisco earthquake caused. and applying these elements to her artfully wrapped, designs.

Kathryn Scully, MFA Knitwear Design Kathryn created a collection of beachwear with bikinis, cover-ups and sweaters based on her family vacations to the Atlantic Coast. The cut outs made for sexy cover-ups that would look cute layered with tank tops and T-shirts, too. The "Borg like" floral creations covering the models' ears, were a bit strange, but the collection was fun and wearable, mostly in tones of pink and grey.

Pittsburg PA native James Yoest, MFA Fashion Design and Taipei, Taiwan native Chia-yu 'Sharon' Yeh, MFA Textile Design were inspired by the rhythm of San Francisco and used a collection of conventional, reused and organic fabrics, including a parachute. The modern, oversized sweater dresses were cute and casual but the orchid sprays used as "hats" were a bit disconcerting!

For some reason, I can't identify any of my photos from Jiyoon 'Lydia' Yeom, MFA Knitwear Design. Jiyoon looked at our busy lives and felt we should search our souls and return to nature. Her designs were comfy, casual and wearable. Her soft-looking, oversized hoodie would be welcome in anyone's wardrobe!

Chinese Born Kenneth Ning, BFA Menswear Design Kenneth, actually premiered his first menswear collection at the April '07 San Francisco show, but he produced additional looks for this New York show. Inspired by the Champion Italian Soccer Team, Forza Azzurri, there was a lot of patent leather and shiny fabrics on very cute young men. This navy coated linen jacket with ultra-marine blue patent leather trousers are typical of the designs, that I think will appeal mostly to very young, avant-garde, confident men, but a zippered, black patent jacket would look great on the girls, too.

One of my favorite designers of the evening was Yi-Ting 'Maxim' Lee, MFA Knitwear Design. Maxim was inspired by JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, a manga written and illustrated by Hirohiko Araki. The Japanese comic is famous for its original art style, over-the-top violence, intricate plot and rock music references. Her patchwork dress with super-shiny, metallic leggings seemed well balanced, and street-edgy, not crazy. The orange and pink sweater dress could be worn with less amusing legwear, which could be worn with less amusing sweaters to make these everyday elements in a chic woman's wardrobe. A favorite with the crowd was Haa Cheng Thai, MFA Fashion Design Kirigami, the Japanese art of paper folding and cutting, inspired Haa Cheng, shown through her shapes, folds, and laser-cut fabrics. Haa Cheng is from Petaling Jaya, Malaysia, a suburb of the capital Kuala Lumpur. Maxim is from Taipei, Taiwan. This brown, laser cut dress with pleated olive skirt was a showstopper. The cutting and folding technique the designer used was elegant and unique, not to mention extremely detailed and quite beautiful.

The bright patterns and easy, breezy, loose dresses by Kyung Min Kim, MFA Textiles and Fashion Design, reminded me so much of childhood, and Springtime. And, I guess that was the intent, since the simple shapes, which act like canvases for her textile work, were inspired by fairy tales from her childhood. Kyung Min premiered her textile designs during New York Fashion Week in September 2006 when she collaborated on a collection with MFA Fashion Designer Mari Matsumoto. This is her own collection, and it was quite adorable. I would call it "wearable fun/art."

MinSun Lee, MFA Knitwear and Fashion Design showed the most eye-catching and adorable collection of the evening, inspired by Russian Matryoshka dolls. The Matryoshka style was identifiable by its small dots. For me, the collection, with it's odd helmets, reminded me more of Japanese Anime than anything steeped in Russian culture, but the sweater dresses were simply adorable, and surprisingly wearable. I think this collection would be snapped up by women of all ages, sizes and shapes, perhaps worn with leggings or pants, or heavy, textured hose.

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