NZFW Day 3 // So is it all that glamorous?

Delegate passes and DSLRs aside, Fashion Week is not as glamorous as it seems. Each year, I set out with a series of expectations, and leave having satisfied few of them. Fortunately, I’ve always been more stimulated by spontaneity. If things only ever amounted to the level of our expectations, life would be boring.

On day three of Fashion Week, I found myself dressed in clothes worth more than my bank account. I was sitting front row in the 7th of 16 shows I’d attend. All lights faded to announce the start, except for one. It was my phone, illuminating with my Mum’s number. Such would flash five more times throughout the duration of the show. I’d later learn that this was because I’d left the dishes out. According to Mum, I’d found the time to pack away only my maturity.

I took it out again at Lucilla Gray. There was this print that ran throughout her entire collection, and in it, I saw the Californian climate map I’d spent so long studying in Y13 Geography. Those soft greens and yellows seemed to lift the issue. They assured us that we’d see ourselves out of more threatening times. The future – as well as Gray’s collection – appeared earth-based and calm.

She was right, too – even the distant future involved a state of serenity. While well-earning designers dined at Fish, I found myself again (and quite contently) participating in #wellyonaplate from up in Auckland. You know how they say Paris is always a good idea? Well, somewhere amongst hungry thoughts, I must have mistaken ‘Paris’ for ‘a burger’, and run (or slow-walked, rather) with the choice of synonym. If you’re wondering why each burger hasn’t made it to the gram, it’s because there’s a point at which something so habitual exceeds the state of being noteworthy; it just becomes embarrassing.

I’m not going to lie, it felt pretty good to be me for about three days. I was carefree, and importantly, acquainted with more than just salad (salad in buns too). Then, I reached Wednesday and I had to sit and watch gorgeous people adorn gorgeous gowns at the New Zealand Weddings Magazine show. If there was any point where one would find themselves regretting all previous breakfast, lunch and dinner decisions, it was now.

And yet, much like the original frustration which stemmed from my Mum’s phone calls, this feeling of regret dwindled eventually too. For our lives are so changing, we’re not afraid of, in fact, we’re accustomed to living in states of extremities. This indeed is one of the best things about attending Fashion Week – further, about doing most things – as a young adult.

All that is divine and offered to us is a mere bonus. A hint at a fine lifestyle. For it is not mundane, we truly appreciate it. Nothing is taken for granted.

Glamour is described as an attractive or exciting quality that makes people or things seem appealing. Of all people involved in Fashion Week, it is those who embrace the finer and the not so, who can laugh at themselves in their high-end and absolutely low-end moments, whom to me appear the most glamorous of all.

Is luxury in it’s entirety still desirable? Well, sure – if it looks like Trish Peng’s 20m long train. But it must be characterised by nights ended at takeaway joints, answering family calls, and sometimes, doing the fucking dishes too.

Indeed, I may grow out of this stage whereby I am happy to rough it for the times we will bask in it. But if anything I have learnt from day three of Fashion Week, it’s that true glamour involves a lot more than just luxury. Luxury can only be, after all, on the condition it knows something else.

McKenzie xx