Stolen Girlfriends? Stolen hearts!
You may have already read about the rain, the skanky pub, the jam jars for glasses, the wait but forget all that now, it truly was ALL about the clothes.
Welcome to nowhere was a motif of the show and Stolen Girlfriends really did create an alternative nowhere place where cool country bumpkins roam and longjohns (with back fringing) are the new leggings.
So: long knit dresses with clever and unexpected cutaways at the back strong in charcoal and pretty in pink. A fine wool shirting in pale grey with a ruffled yoke a pink cable cardi or grey legwarmers for a boy.
The ruffle treatment that was edgy in grey shirting becomes plain pretty in pale pink; then later the pink shirt morphs into a very pretty dress.
Theres a cowboy-yoked shirt worn with twine braces, then theres a rockabilly with black tux jacket and white pintucked shirt a beautiful white shirt for girls later in the show makes me suspect that SGC could even be a go-to label for fantastic item pieces next winter, too.
Other straw-chewingly seductive details and garments: crisscross front bodice lacing; an oatmeal knit courier bag and fringed shawl; the cutest red lobster motif; a tucked prairie dress in an in-theme calico colour or an unexpected bright blue; distressed velvet cutoff jeans for boys. Oh and add fur trimmed booties to it all
The minute the final jumbo dreamcatcher-sporting, nude torsoed, bespectacled boy walked off, I wanted to see it ALL again.
In the words of Bridget Saunders (who has been energetically tweating for Fashion Week itself): the right people got $30K at Fashion Week. I never thought I would find myself wanting a striped bodysuit with fringed epaulettes but Stolen you made me do it.
– Julie Roulston
Photography c/- Hilary Johnston