We hit 700 designers on the site this week and we think you are all Darling! Independent fashion is a niche market that is here to stay, and has nowhere to go but up. We want to help people find you both across the country, but also right in your own community. We want to feature your high quality, unique designs (and events) for shoppers to discover…there is such joy in discovery. Local, handmade fashion is worth much more than a flash sale in our reality. Are you onboard? If so, take the next week to let 5 people, shoppers or designers, in your world know that Smashing Darling is here!
We know some of you are in your studios full-time when you aren’t out on the road doing events. Others have full-time jobs and a studio you dive into when you get home. No matter where you land on the spectrum we would love to get a glimpse of your studio to share with the community. After all, Smashing Darling lives in a lovely sun-filled studio in CT; please show us where your designs are born! Who knows, your image could inspire another Darling to want to collaborate with you. Opportunities are endless darlings! Send your studio images to Trish (trish@smashingdarling.com), it will make her day guaranteed.
New darlings be sure to check out the Darling blogroll for a list of resources we are always adding to! This PR planning post may be handy for some of you…and we are thankful for Darlings like Megan Auman helping us all switch gears into our business brain at Crafting an MBA.
Total eye candy … today’s featured item is Andromeda Necklace. Take a peak at l’atelier des bijoux to see the rest of the particulars and find out how you can get yourself one of these.
Congratulations to MNFashion and the designers of the Pale Rider fashion show! We think this is awesome and can’t wait to see more fashion shows produced by MNFashion. Everyone involved is doing an amazing job putting local, independent fashion designers from the Twin City area on the map.
Since we started Smashing Darling we have been combing the internet looking for any and all signs of life in the independent fashion industry. It is so great to watch independent fashion districts all across the globe pop up and get more cohesive every season. It is our dream … and we can already see it becoming reality in the not too distant future … for local, handmade, independent fashion to be just as important as any major brand showing in any major city. The niche market of local, independent fashion has an exclusivity and quality that more and more people are going to crave as luxury brands create cheaper, less quality goods to satisfy such sites as Gilt.com.
On September 24th, 2010, MNfashion produced their first ever Fall MNFW show called Pale Rider. It featured designers Danielle Everine and Raul Osorio. Catch pics of the runway looks and hot crowd that attended this show, which was one of 24 events part of Fall MNfashion Week.
So let us throw this out to the community … Do you see local, handmade, independent fashion being as important of an industry as the branded fashion industry? Why yes? or Why no?
Over the past six months four eco-friendly designers – Darling Lara Miller, Bahar Shahpar, Samantha Pleet, and Anthony Lilore, Restore Clothing – have been working on a design challenge. Recruited by Yesterday’s News each designer was asked to create a garment out of recycled newspaper, with each unique creation to be auctioned off to a charity of the designer’s choice — ahh, excellent! The Green Catwalk event was this past Tuesday evening, and also included a few pieces of each designers’ collections. Check out some images below, and a bunch more over in our Flickr photostream. Lara’s convertible fashion seemed well-loved by the room (slideshow below) as the model re-arranged her outfit while strolling down the runway. This instantly reminded me of shoppers in Frock, happy to pull creations they love off the rack and onto their body as quickly as possible…in the middle of the room: throw caution to the wind. Happy Friday darlings!
We are totally excited to go play at Maker Faire this weekend in NYC. But if we weren’t, I’m pretty certain I would be down in Nashville already and heading to Imogene + Willie (click the link darlings, you’ll love the video) trying on some real deal denim, eating a few Mas Tacos and watch a Brando flick. Sounds good. On Wednesday the historic Belcourt Theater kicked off day one of a five day celebration of independent fashion, film, and music the nD Festival, a fundraiser for Nashville’s neighborhood theater.
If you are in Nashville, head to the Belcourt Sunday evening for a silent auction (look for some Darling SMASH UP tees to bid on), and a fashion show featuring Alabama Chanin, Imogene + Willie, and Billy Reid, with short documentaries about each designer. No matter where you are, take a few minutes and watch this Nowness short film on Alabama Chanin and be transported to the southern sense of place.
Twenty years ago, sustaining life was about food, clothing and shelter. This separation from being able to sustain our lives—whether by growing a vegetable or sewing a dress or building a house for ourselves—has had consequences on our sense of self-worth and value as human beings. Natalie Chanin,Read the full interview at Nowness
Are you a hat darling? Sometimes a hat is just the thing you need to get you through the day, to change your mood, or be the perfect finish for whatever smashing style you choose. I could try on hats all day… either play along if you are with me, or I’ll catch up with you later, darling. Trish and I missed this show last week at The Green Shows but are happy to see the Milliner’s Guild had a great venue to strut their stuff. Darling Anne De Pasquale (*great sale in her boutique right now) is one of the milliners involved in the guild, and we always love seeing designers come together to support each other. Follow what they are up to on their Facebook fan page …and don’t miss more great images and press from the show while you are there.
I almost missed MinnaK’s debut of her Little Silk Dress collection last week in Chelsea, it’s not unusual for me to be running late…but throw a quickie tornado in the mix and it really throws off your timing. I made it just in time, and found it hard to leave once the tunes circa 1993 kicked in. Her capsule is made up of six lovely silk dresses inspired by the sand dunes of the Sahara Desert, each with it’s own perfect little detail: ruffled back neckline, back cowl neckline, a shark bite hem. The dresses were donned with jewels by a DC independent designer, Lucia Hamilton of bLuGrn Design. Here are a few shots from the evening below… dresses coming soon to her Darling boutique. See more images on her Facebook page, or take a few minutes and watch the photoshoot video: Behind The Scenes.
Hey NYC darlings, just a heads up to go shop some independent designers tomorrow at Fashion Interaction (full details below), a free event hosted by Art For Progress. Here are some images of what you might miss if you don’t go. Did I mention bellinis, massages, live music, wine tasting – oh my…depending what time you get there of course, it’s all day 11am-9pm. See you there?
Thanks to Darling Joann Berman for fueling us with a bit of gypsy darling joy at The Green Shows at the start of the week. Happiness is dancing down the runway after showing your collection; watch the video in the Darling blog and see more images in Flickr.
Fashion week is just around the corner in a few other spots too, how about Portland and Houston in a few weeks? Not to mention Philly, oh and Boston too. Wait! Don’t forget Montreal. Fashion is everywhere.
Come play with us at World Maker Faire NY! Maker Faire comes to New York for the first time next weekend, September 25th and 26th. Thanks to our friends at BurdaStyle we’ll be kickin’ it in the BUST Craftacular zone. TrishDarling is whipping up some Mergirl goodness created from BurdaStyle patterns – ooohlala! Come see us in between gadget-gazing-fun to check out, maybe buy up, what she creates!
Sales – sales! There have been some-a-happenin’! Check them out featured in the blog, and you can always check from our Darling home page.
Did you watch the Emmy’s? Maybe you caught a glimpse of Darling designer Angela Johnson’s t-shirt ball gown hit the red carpet? Take a look and congrats Angela!
Don’t you love this Krelwear sweater below? Pop on over to the Kaight NYC blog and see it modeled by shop owner Kate, along with some snapshots of Krel2Go Fashion’s Night Out.
We are excited to announce our partnership with BurdaStyle at the Bust Craftacular at the first EVER MakerFaire NY. Trishdarling and Modarling will be on hand in the Burdastyle booth representing Smashing Darling and showing off and selling clothing designed by Trish using Burda patterns. Did you know Burda has open source patterns free for download? How awesome is that? We’ll also be sharing the Burda spot with designer Desira Pesta, she seems pretty darling if you ask us.
You will definitely want to find our booth/table as we will be handing out postcards with codes on the back of them. Some of the codes are jibberish but some will be codes to unlock e-gift cards to shop Smashing Darling. Of course there will be tons of other goodness in the BUST zone, think DJs – food – demos…so come play with us at MakerFaire NYC (!) and see all that is new, amazing and handmade.
