It is no secret to anyone that I love everything to do with fashion especially alternative, so when I had the opportunity to go to an underground fashion show in London hosted by my close friend & mentor Paulina Palian, I was ecstatic. Paulina Palian is a fashion designer and stylist based in London and has created dozens of collections over the years. In the spirit of Halloween, Paulina revealed her newest collection “Dark Side” which was all about releasing the fire inside of you that everyone tries to conceal. The fashion show was held at Question Mark Bar in Stroke Newington and was a whole event filled with dancers, performers, artists, and of course models. The fashion show is considered unorthodox due to the fact that it’s held during an active club night. The narrow underground bar had a small runway roped off and a stage where the models and artist could walk and perform. The entertainment of the night consisted of magic tricks, dangerous pyrotechnics and heavy metal musicians. Everyone was dressed up in costumes celebrating Halloween. When it came time for the actually fashion show I was over whelmed by the creative talent of the entertainment. Before Paulina’s line there was an introductory line by designer Charlotte Appleby. Charlotte is a new designer who specializes in costume design. Her line incorporates lighting devices attached to or inside of her garments. Personally I felt that her designs lacked creativity and she was relying on the lighting to capture the audience’s attention. Only one of Charlotte’s stood out and that was mainly because she chose a model who had great cat walk abilities, she knew how to work the garment not let the garment work her. After the finally of Charlotte’s line there was a brief intermission and then it was time for the main event. The first model for the “Dark Side” line came out with a white draped dress, stained with blood, her face was washed out with dark black eyes make up, pale lips and black and orange floral head piece.
This catwalk was very slow and each model took their time walking down the runway, engaging with the crowd and photographers. The next model wore a bright pink rubber high necked dress with an oval cut out back. The model that wore this dress is well known in the UK and is a contestant for Top Model of Colour, Cynthia Chisom. One by one the models walked down the runway.
The finale piece was breathtaking. The model wore shredded gauze and pasties as her top with a long cascading skirt. She had freestanding shoulder pads that were draped with gold chains and sliver and gold pendants and her hair was blown up into almost a Frankenstein style with a huge skull strapped inside. The surprise happened at the end of the models walk when an actress came out and did a phenomenal silent skit expressing her heartache through her body language and connection to the crowd. The actress was draped in a veil with a mask covering half her face, when she removes the veil and removes the mask you see that half of her face is bloody and disfigured. She smashes her mask on the floor and then crawls through the runway until she collapses at the end. Overall this entire event was fascinating.
All of the models did a fabulous job wearing this very difficult line to model and the whole design teams, make up artist, and hairstylist did a great job embodying the Dark Side. I wish I had told more people about these fashion shows because they are quite an experience to be had.
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