Mercedes seeks out young, unknown designers
Syahmedi Dean, Contributor, Jakarta
Fashion contests are important for novices so that they can introduce their creations to the fashion community and thereby gain the attention of their seniors. Many established designers started their careers by participating in contests.
Many such contests have been held in Indonesia, but only a handful have shown good results, among others, Femina magazine group's Fashion Designers Contest (LPM), Dewi magazine group's Concours International de Jeunes Creature de Mode (CIDJCDM) and the Indonesian Young Designer Contest (IYDC). Each of these contests has contributed big names to today's fashion world in Indonesia, for example Denny Wirawan and Priyo Oktaviano (LPM), Abineri Ang and Rusly Tjohnardi (CIDJCDM) and Didi Budiardjo and Taruna Kusmayadi (IYDC).
Besides these three prestigious contests, there is now another one: the Mercedes-Benz Asia Fashion Award-Indonesia (MBAFA- Indonesia), which seeks to select novice designers to be sent to a higher-level venue in Singapore. The requirements set by the organizing committee are very tight. The participants, who must have a minimum two years and a maximum four years experience working in the fashion business, are required not only to be able to design but also to have a good grasp of fashion presentation, pricing strategies, fashion trends and production systems. MBAFA, which is in search of designers with "hidden" potential, offers good opportunities to these novices to openly compete with established professional designers.
Owing to these tight requirements, many candidates could not make it at the administrative inspection stage. Only 15 candidates got to the semifinal and met the professional judges on Thursday, Aug. 11, at Blowfish Resto & Lounge. They presented their ideas to four internal judges, namely Sebastian Gunawan, Didi Budiardjo and Tri Handoko, all representing Indonesia's designers, and Muara Bagdja, a fashion observer.
As the contest focused on ready-to-wear dresses, the judges also focused their judgment on dresses that were really ready to wear. At this stage, seven semi-finalists could not go on because, more than anything else, the dresses they had designed were not ready-to-wear. They also failed because of a lack of neatness in their workmanship and because of the great discrepancy between their ideas and their designs.
"Many of the participants were too fantastic in their ideas; they were not realistic. Their drawings were fantastic but the realization of these ideas was shocking to us. Several participants were good enough and showed strong concepts," said Tri Handoko, one of the judges.
"In general, they have not yet got a good grasp of the character of the materials they have chosen. Many of these materials do not suit the character of their designs. We have asked them to find better materials. Still, I'm optimistic about this year's participants, particularly those sending in their men's collection," said Didi Budiardjo, who shared this idea with the other judges.
The MBAFA final will be held on Sept. 23, 2005 as the top event in the Mercedes-Benz Jakarta Fashion Week. The finalists are Ari Yandhi, Billy Cong, Maya Ekasinta, Padmo Gardjito, Puspa Yenty, Tex Saverio Gunawan, Vindy Vandana and Yudhi Mulyawan.
"I don't know how I can find time to translate these designs into reality later," said Tex Saverio, one of the finalists, shaking his head. Tex has sent in his design called Dualism and is somewhat worried about how to allocate his time because in September he will also have to compete in the final of LPM 2005, a fashion contest held by the Femina Group.