Fashion students show off but subtle designs steal 1st prize

By Dini S. Djalal

JAKARTA (JP): At the annual Indonesian Designers Contest last week, sponsored by the Femina group of magazines, technicolor fashions of dizzying proportions came strutting down the runways.

But even the velour helmets and 5-inch spikes nestling on the models' heads, not to mention the sequined brassieres, trailing tuxedos and dalmatian-spotted gowns, could not prise eyes off the models' feet. Teetering atop 10-inch platforms or elaborate mules, their wobbly walk made clear that the real show was not the clothes, but the shoes.

As only a shopaholic can admit: In shoe designers we trust. Prada pumps are fashion icons, and Gucci sandals set more tongues wagging than a pair of their hipsters. Today, style is judged not from head to toe, but from toe to head.

What, then, does this say about the picture-perfect universe of fashion? Being hip is everything, darling, and you're only as good as the next cobble-envy you inspire.

Yet with seasonal shows held six months before the clothes reach the stores, pinning down the Zeitgeist of the future is a trick even magicians cannot master.

It's even trickier for budding designers. Established fashion houses can count on loyal clientele, but fashion students have to scream for attention. It's no wonder, then, that student collections, from toe to head, are often louder than a lion's roar.

Yet just as lions love to show off but loathe to work, so a student's strut may be more sass than substance. What looks good on the catwalk, for example, may unravel in the closet. A successful designer must wow the audience and produce the goods in a professional fashion.

It's this ability to merge trendiness with professionalism that earned 24-year-old Theodora Primawati the competition's top prize: Rp 7.5 million (US$3,125) and a return ticket to Paris.

"She knows that a collection should not be overpowering," said designer and jury Taruna Kusmayadi. "What she took from her concept, Chinese dress, was not too heavy, and that shows her maturity," he said.

"She has a very solid knowledge of what she's doing," said Pia Alisjahbana, owner of the Femina group. Considering her education at famed Parisian fashion school ESMOD, her assistant teacher job at the newly-opened ESMOD branch in Jakarta and her dabbling in retail (under the label Usagani), Theodora has better credentials than many of her peers.

Indeed, by the time Theodora's designs came on, the audience wanted more than the strolls down memory lane offered by other contestants. She did not disappoint.

Inspired by Chen Kaige's film Farewell My Concubine, she sent models down in cropped satin shirts with Chinese collars, and full gowns in embroidered raw silk. While some outfits could have been more flattering -- the trousers, for example, were ill- fitting -- the rest shone in glorious color.

Taruna added that other fashion students are often less prudent. "They're all still young, so their creativity is very explosive. Sometimes they express their ideas too literally," said Taruna.

The jury's academic vote, however, was not echoed by the audience. The Audience Favorite prize was given to 23-year-old Priyo Oktaviano, whose dalmation-inspired designs left little to the imagination. Spots, spots, and more spots peppered his mini- dresses and evening gowns, as well as his top-hats, earrings, beads, and dog-ear headbands. It may be novel to go to work dolled up like a mutt, but carnival dressing rarely helps anyone climb the corporate ladder.

Frivolity was a favorite theme with other contestants. Twenty- four-year-old Disman Hartono offered aerobics outfits in blinding citrus colors, miraculously topped with fuzzy helmets. Technicolor cosmonauts or just pointless? For the evening, short skirts were slit high to reveal matching underwear -- it was as gaudy on the Jakarta runway as it was on the Chanel catwalks a few seasons ago.

Christanto, 24, also offered some bizarre designs. Tailored long coats, stiff shirts, ties, and waistcoats, were great individually, but lost their appeal when matched with dangerously high platforms and white socks. Whatever happened to nineties minimalism?

There was certainly none in the collections of Marseline Romario or Ina Indianasary. While established designers were busy shedding details, Marseline and Ina piled them on and matched them up. Everything about the seventies clothes (bell-bottoms and all) was color coordinated -- sunglasses, headbands, shoes, bags, earrings, contradicting that era's "mismatched" sensibility.

A more haphazard seventies style, meanwhile, walked off with second prize. Buyung Ego Gunanda, also second-place winner at last year's show, called his collection Cybercity and used colorful stripes and knitted bands to symbolize computer cables. He also incorporated Japanese Kanji letters proclaiming "love and peace". All the designs were different -- some may interpret this as expressing individuality, others may judge it as incoherent.

In contrast, third-place Yunita Harun had a razor-sharp focus. And at 20, her ideas were very impressive. Yunita called her ensembles New Romantics and she was not exaggerating. Using a brilliant mixture of knits, pleats, tiers, and bold black-and- white contrasts, Yunita assembled silhouettes which were at once structural and soft, monastic and sexy. Asymmetry, whether as one-shouldered bodices, cutaway gowns or wedge shoes, helped her express her grand ideas on propriety and bohemianism, the latter symbolized by cloth spikes sticking out of the models' hair. Some of the clothes may be unwearable, but in terms of individuality, they were genius.

Pia described Yunita's collection as a "challenge". "But that's okay, you know, it's something new," she said.

Pia added that competitions, however many, are good training grounds for fashion students, even if they may not offer great returns. "It gives them an opportunity to show their clothes. And it's good for their resume."