Chosen Ones: Academy of Art Announces NYFW Lineup

Each February and September, San Francisco’s very own Academy of Art is the only school to show at New York Fashion Week. This week, the school announced the lineup for the upcoming Feb. 10 at the Lincoln Center. Read on to meet these new talents below (and don’t forget to watch the show via livestream next week).

Deanna Pei-Ju Lo

Deanna Pei-Ju Lo

Deanna's subtle tomboy feel is self-described as “a modern Teddy Boy.” Soft, luxurious fabrics such as lambskin, silk organza and cotton velvet add a subtle femininity to the collection.

Jade Juanyu Liu

Jade Juanyu Liu

Jade' s prior experience working as a pattern maker for gr.dano is easy to see through her innovative construction. Her collection was inspired by the French collage artist Damien Blottiere, known for a unique layering technique that creates shadows and empty space.

Donghyuk Dan Kim

Donghyuk Dan Kim

When designing his collection, Kim chose a color palette inspired by the military and employed themes from the American West. His prior experience as assistant pattern maker to Bay Area designer Bacca da Silva shines through with his innovative tailoring.

Xiang Zhang

Xiang Zhang

Zhang's collection utilizes delicate fabrics such as silk, mohair and cashmere. His designs are inspired by Plato's understanding that the highest form of beauty can be explained by the principles of mathematics.

Amy Bond

Amy Bond

Hailing from Pocatello, Idaho, Amy completed the MFA Fashion Design program online. Her collection was inspired by complex shapes in which she juxtaposes the use of lightweight and unique fabrics.

Jeanette Au

Jeanette Au

Jeanette incorporates mohair, wool, synthetic yarns and metallic threads into her knit fabrics. Her blend of color and texture was motivated by by Sergei Diagliav’s Ballet Russe and the paintings of Leon Bakst.

Wu Di

Wu Di

Wu's collection uses geometric shapes that are inspired by printmaker Aaron Coleman. She reinforces asymmetric silhouettes and bold patterns with her use of cashmere knits and double-faced wool.

Kate Y.K. Lee

Kate YKLee

Kate's Fall 2012 collection is inspired by the sculptural elements of architecture and features rounded silhouettes offset by defined lines and sharp, angled seams.

Farida Khan

While her collection has not yet been released, Farida completed the MFA program online while residing in Doha, Qatar. She honed her design skills working as an assistant designer at Ali Khan and as a technical designer at the Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar. Her highly anticipated womenswear collection is inspired by the idea of unconventional beauty. She constructed bold silhouettes using wool, cotton, coated denim, polyurethane and punched leather.

Since 2005, AAU has selected its best and brightest graduating M.F.A. students to showcase their collections on the catwalk. These students have gone on to win coveted C.F.D.A. scholarships and launch their own fashion lines. Watch the AAU fashion show live here on February 10 at 5 p.m.

Photography by Bob Toy

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Oh My Guinness: gr.dano Fall/Winter ’12

A brand new reason to look forward to the latter half of the year came this week when much-loved independent San Francisco fashion label gr.dano dropped shots of its latest collection on us. With the gr.dano Fall/Winter ’12 collection, prepare for the same sophisticated draping and architectural details designers Jill Giordano and Brian Scheyer are known for, but with a youthful edge and pops of color that provide a refreshing departure from their previous work. The inspiration? The iconic Daphne Guinness.

Pieces ranging from work-appropriate pants and skirts to edgier pieces with cut-out shoulders aim to channel the “unique boldness, agelessness, glamour and confidence” Guinness is known for, Giordano and Scheyer say, while sticking to the wearable, predominately neutral-hued roots of the brand. Among our favorite are a white, belted jacket with futuristic undertones, a long belted dress with long sleeves and a dramatic v-neck and an asymmetrical top with a drapey neckline.

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Runway Recap: Love Me, Love My Poncho

On a recent Sunday in Dolores Park, a small but stalwart group of local fashion fans gathered to celebrate their shared love of an oh-so-San Francisco garment: the poncho. Along with a D.I.Y. runway and socializing, the first Love Me, Love My Poncho event included a free clothing swap. You, too, can feel the poncho love by cruising through this photo recap of the event.

Love Me, Love My Poncho organizer Mirabelle Jones

A clothing swap was also part of the event

So many ponchos, so little time!

Photography by Aura O’Brien

Aura O’Brien is an award-winning photographer and Marin native who has shot for Seventeen magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, Curve magazine, Mediabistro and many others. In 2011, she showed her work in anotherPERSPECTIVE: 2011 Art Show in Mill Valley and frequently shoots commercial and individual projects ranging from high fashion and editorial to weddings and boudoir photography.

4 Reasons for Locals to Love New York Fashion Week

Once again Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week is fast approaching and come February 9, the usual slew of designers will showcase their fall collections in New York at the Lincoln Center’s Damrosch Park. Even if you’re not one of the many Bay Area-ites jet-setting over to New York, keep some champagne on hand, as several local companies are live-streaming fashion week events. Here are 4 reasons San Franciscans can start getting excited for the fury that is NYFW:

1. Independent Fashion Blogger Conference, February 8, 2012 at Milk Studios, NYC

IFB Conference 2012

IFB Con 2012 takes places on Feb. 8 in New York

For evidence that fashion bloggers have become a marketing force to be reckoned with, watch the IFB Conference live. You’ll spot some of the fashion industry’s best and brightest personalities come together to discuss issues, challenges and  trends facing fashion bloggers and the brands they work with, as well as the changing the landscape of fashion and social media today.

2. Polyvore LIVE presented by CoverGirl , February 13, 2012 at La. Venue, NYC

Polyvore LIVE

Polyvore LIVE is being billed as the world's first fashion show by an online fashion community.

Polyvore, an online community that promotes the “democracy of fashion,” is showcasing four alumni collections by graduates of the Fashion Institute of Technology. Instead of a flurry of fashion models strutting down the catwalk, the collections will be modeled by a select group of fashion bloggers, who will be announced one week prior to the show on polyvore.com.

3. Academy of Art MFA Fashion Show,  February 10, 2012 at The Lincoln Center.

AAU MFA fashion show

Models & Designers backstage at 2011 show.

On Feb. 10, San Francisco’s own Academy of Art showcases the collections of its best M.F.A. fashion design graduates. It is the only fashion school to show at NYFW, and, last year, three students took home Council of Fashion Designers of America scholarships. Make sure not to miss these talented up-and-coming designers: the Academy of Art Fashion Show livestream starts at 5 p.m. on Feb. 10.

4. BlacMéra by Yuliana Candra at Couture Fashion Week, February 17, 2012 at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. 

http://blacmera.com/

Designers displaying the highest level of American craftsmanship in apparel showcase at Couture Fashion Week, and we are absolutely thrilled that San Francisco based designer Yuliana Candra is showing her brand, BlacMéra. A sight to behold, Candra’s gowns impress with hand embroidery, beading and crystal work, while her silk tunics are hand-painted, layer by layer, with depictions of images Candra’s shot on her travels around the world. While this is the only event on our list that is not streamed live, couture fans can view images from the web that are sure to be uploaded by the fleet of smart phones in attendance.

Now you have something more to look forward to than the usual online blow out of models, celebs and socialites running from show to show in designer duds. Happy #NYFW, San Francisco!

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Sneak Peek: Can Shopilly End Daily Deal Email Inbox Madness?

A sneak peek at Shopilly, a promising new shopping tool from former eBay execs, left me doing what the welcome screen suggests: reserving my Shopilly ID…before it’s taken. While the allure of being the only “Lorraine” ID (no random numbers at the end! no weird underscores!) was, in and of itself, too good to pass up, I am looking forward to using soon-to-launch tool for other reasons. At the top of the list: if Shopilly works like it’s supposed to, it could mean I never have to look at another deal-related email again.

Of course, I could make that happen for myself next week, if I felt like unsubscribing from about 700,000 email lists. But here’s the thing: I like getting all those deal notifications, newsletters and emails. They save me money. I also write about them, tweet them, share them with readers. So for that, I like them. I just don’t like actually looking at them in my inbox. It’s the information, the discount codes, the dates of the in-store sales themselves that I want – not the actual communique getting them to me.

When it takes on its first members in the next month or so, the San Jose-based company will pull deals from the email accounts you give it access to, save them on Shopilly and even filter the emails from your inbox if you’d that to happen, Shopilly CEO Anirban Datta explained to me as he showed me screenshots of the forthcoming site. While the company wasn’t ready to release screenshots publicly just yet, I can tell you that it looks something like a cleaner, more streamlined version of Pinterest, with each deal or promotional email indicated by an image and saved in a nice scrollable grid format. It means being able to pull anything from the day’s Groupon deal to a sale at Bloomingdale’s into one place, get it out of your email and have access to it on a mobile device when you are shopping I.R.L.

In addition to just saving deals, Shopilly will also have a great many other bells and whistles, including the ability, should you choose to allow it, to alert stores of your presence via mobile device when you are shopping in person and offer you deals based on your purchasing history.

I thought it was an compelling enough idea on its own, but the team behind the project adds to the intrigue: the technical co-founder is eBay’s former chief engineer, Randy Shoup, and there are lots of other interesting folks involved, including people from places like Wharton, StumbleUpon and even a former prof of mine from Stanford.

The company is hoping to amass its beta tester pool from the people signing up to reserve IDs, so if getting in on something early and beta testing like only a shopping bandit can sounds like fun, it could be worth signing up.

For more news and updates about fashion and technology, keep your eyes on @InStyleandTech, a new project from SF Indie Fashion founder Lorraine Sanders. Online home coming soon…