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The sartorial mode designers adhered to for the 2023 iteration of Australian Fashion Week catered toward the upcoming Resort 2024 season.
However, as it is each year in May when AAFW arrives, the crisp Autumn air and legions of neutral trench coats sported by the style set to survive the elements between shows served as a deterrent to fully immersing yourself in the fantasies each designer is presenting on their respective runways.
At this year’s festivities alone, over 57 emerging and established designers scattered fashion editors, buyers, and stylists around Sydney in their efforts to sartorially interpret and present what the next season of style should entail.
Amongst these, a melange of key trends emerged from the week’s fabric, highlighting that despite the differences and unique signatures in each designer’s visual language, Resort ‘24 will create a range of stylistic modes.
From designers like Bianca Spender and Ngali who translated the beauty of the Australian landscape onto soft summer silhouettes, to the workwear redux spotted at Anna Quan and Blanca and even the hot and heavy, turbo-charged presentations of Bec + Bridge, Wynn Hamlyn and Caroline Reznik, this season proved that ‘Resort’ is a liberal season at its core.
“Everything has a much more effortless sensibility—everything is much more relaxed,” mused NET-A-PORTER’s Market Director Libby Page, who shared her runway insights exclusively with GRAZIA.
“We have seen the reinstatement of simplicity and minimalism, everyday dressing and wardrobe necessities in recent seasons. Australia has always been a market synonymous with this approach to dressing, so we expect to see a continuation of this from the brands that do this best.”
Below, and with assistance from Page, GRAZIA shares the significant trends transpiring from the runways at Afterpay Australian Fashion Week.
Night Owl
For the soirée set—the vampy and sensual dressers whose idea of evening wear includes midnight hued dresses that camouflage with the hour of debauchery and late night dancing—this year’s AAFW offered an array of slinky and skin-clad designs perfect for prowling through back alleys and darkened bars.
At Anna Quan and BEC + BRIDGE, this late-night uniform involves boudoir-appropriate slips and sets paired with night-luxe lace, while at Caroline Reznik and Yousef Akbar, these silhouettes involved dialling up the disco fever to the nth degree with high-shine sequin embellishments.
Angel Energy
The anthesis to the night owl aesthetic. Designers embraced the serene lightness that resort wear provides by catering to an angelic and ethereal kind of dressing. As Page noted, this year’s iteration of AAFW was marked by a “colour palette that has been very neutral…that’s been a consistency we’ve seen coming through” and these shades of warm whites “lighter, airier, and breezy”.
Whether designers created a new kind of bridal wear like Aje or were inspired by the puffed white clouds or whitewash of a wave on a bluebird day like Joslin or Maggie Marilyn, this angelic attire is certainly a blank canvas that’s good for the soul. One that’s also taken notes from the resort-approved Sgroppino, a palette cleansing cocktail that’s as refreshing and indulgent as these creamy hues.
Sheer Power
This season, designers did little to conceal our bodies, rather they embraced the sheer dressing movement that’s sweeping social media by presenting swaths of nearly-naked and barely-there garments designed to add a little sensuality to the upcoming season. Given resort wear is synonymous with spending time in the sun, it’s only natural that the fashion set wanted to explore stylish ways that enable us to show off our skin.
At Michael Lo Sordo, this came in the form of Parisian cabaret-approved glossy chiffon in vibrant colours. Later in the week, at Albus Lumen stylist-turned-designer Marina Afonina presented a melange of slinky pieces perfect for throwing over your bathers on a blistering hot day—yet still remain elegant enough to take you from the sandy beaches to the spritz-laden cocktail bars.
As Page noted, these sheer dresses—appropriate for both day and evening wear—take influence from our culture of layering. “Layering with resort-wear, whether that’s wide-leg pants over swimwear or long tunics over pants, designers are really thinking about being versatile because of the climate here,” she added.
Workwear Redux
Amongst the melange of floaty gossamer and shimmering crepes, this season also presented a new way of working by ushering in a workwear redux; an unconventional way of wearing corporate clichés. Tailoring staples were treated with new reverence. Page observed that this season saw tailoring become “about slouchy suiting and wide-leg oversized pants”.
This was seen in New Zealand favourites Maggie Marilyn and Wynn Hamlyn, who subverting the idea of what a wardrobe classic like a blazer should look like, playing with proportions and accenting the piece with woven and fringe details respectively.
Blanca and Anna Quan both offered up new ways of styling the boardroom-approved button down shirt, producing the silhouette in high-octane colours and prints and styling the piece either tied around your waist or layered under boxy-cut dresses.
Alix Higgins, a fashion week favourite, even revived the tie, proving that the life of this male-skewed accessory can exist outside of mundane 9-5 drab.
Sunrise, Sunset
While many designers subverted the idea of resort wear by demonstrating the seasonality can be left open to interpretation, those designers entrenched in the resort wear space, like Bondi Born and Joslin, proved why Australia has a lauded reputation for doing these designs so well. Both Bondi Born and Bianca Spender revealed that their collections were inspired by the natural landscape and sheer beauty of the Australian horizon, in turn offering up resort-ready and relaxing designs that uplift the spirt and immediately transport you to the coast.
Verner and BEC + BRIDGE took a more subversive approach to embodying Australiana in their collections. Verner sent a deflated beach ball has a handbag and screen-printed blue sky onto an asymmetrical wrap dress down the runway, while BEC + BRIDGE offered up seascape-inspired hardware, and crystal embellishments that sparkled like the sun hitting the sea.
Page also commented that the show’s locations aided in saturating the audience in these coastal-appropriate fantasies. “Australian designers are showing their collections on these amazing, picturesque settings, and because of that the clothes feel inspired by nature,” Page noted. “Even details like rope, waist bands, and sheer fabrications are all in the theme. Together with lots of linens and neutral colour palettes, they make it feel very relaxed.”
Turbo Charged
High-octane energy and turbo-charged collections that reached a new voltage were one of the most stand-out aesthetics amongst the sea of serene and effortless elegant silhouettes.
Designers including Alix Higgins, Jordon Gogos—who floored the industry with his collaboration with Akira Isogawa—Erik Yvon, Youkhana and Wynn Hamlyn threw caution to the wind and produced dynamic shows that felt light years away from the conventional presentation models. Colours were brilliant lurid and silhouettes were supersonic—heavy metal fanaticisms that drew influences from 90s rave-wear and Y2K debauchery.
Like a moth to a flame, these pieces are drawing us into an underworld of drum and bass where the only rule is that there are no rules. Anything goes in this hyper frenetic and fast-paced world of fashion.
This year, the GRAZIA Australia team travelled between AAFW shows in the refined style of Toyota’s new RAV4 GXL. With its modern and spacious interior, privacy glass, and fast charging portals for our phones, it was the perfect mode of travel for zipping across Sydney town. To find out more, visit toyota.com.au
