Graduate designers to watch from Melbourne Fashion Festival 2024

Copy, Fold, Hold: What is inside the Suitcase? by Leanne Yansin Choi

Bound to be instantly recognizable wherever it is shown, this collection is more wearable art than fashion that you can grace the streets with. The work of Leanne Yansin Choi embedded diaspora storytelling, sisterhood and some lighthearted cheekiness into her National Graduate Showcase.

Each piece speaks to travel and migration, with different physical components of cut-out suitcases attached to flowing garments of delicate silk and lace. In one instance, a pulley handle was attached to the side of the skirt, which the model carried and interacted with in graceful gestural movements. She was joined by another, who held the skeleton of a suitcase around her waist like a swimming ring, and the two performed a sweet duet on the runway.

Copy, Fold, Hold: What is inside the suitcase? Choi’s practice-based master’s research project was initiated from her honors degree in fashion design at RMIT. Here, nostalgia and belonging were literally unpacked. The collection was something that could be comfortably seen within a museum and gallery context, just as well as it was on the runway.

Designs by Jessica Virk at the Paypal Melbourne Fashion Festival 2024 National Graduate Showcase.  Photo: Lucas Dawson.  Four models standing under a spotlight on the runway with red lights illuminating the space.  They are wearing garments deconstructed from trench coats in gray and camel.
Designs by Jessica Virk at the Paypal Melbourne Fashion Festival 2024 National Graduate Showcase. Photo: Lucas Dawson.

Deconstructed trench coats and blazers were a somewhat common appearance at this year’s National Graduate Showcase. For this viewer, The Median by Melbourne-based Jessica Virk best exemplifies its sculptural potential, with smart silhouettes and elegant juxtaposition.

Virk graduated from the Whitehouse Institute of Design last year, majoring in fashion/apparel design. The Median‘s architectural resonance took inspiration from Zaha Hadid, whose architectural designs blended voluminous curves with clean-cut integrity. This was exemplified in Virk’s centerpiece for the National Graduate Showcase runway (shown above).

All of Virk’s pieces have a down-to-business presence, where even the strut of the models feels empowered – the charm of fashion at its best.

1608 by Abha Gupta

Designs by Abha Gupta at the Paypal Melbourne Fashion Festival 2024 National Graduate Showcase.  Photo: Lucas Dawson.  Two models are shown on the ruwnay.  The one on the left is dark skinned with short black hair, wearing an orange suit set and holding a chain of yellow flowers on his shoulder.  The one on the right is wearing a suit set with burgundy and white checkered patterns.  He is brown skinned and wearing a beaded necklace with a yellow flower.
Designs by Abha Gupta at the Paypal Melbourne Fashion Festival 2024 National Graduate Showcase. Photo: Lucas Dawson.

It was encouraging to see a sophisticated take on menswear in this year’s National Graduate Showcase. Looks by Abha Gupta presented deeply considered choices in terms of cut, pattern, color and layering, while paying tribute to the designer’s Indian heritage. They also feel ageless, and fluid between everyday and formal occasions.

The year 1608 was when the British first landed in India and Gupta signposted this throughout his collection in interrogating European influences on India’s fashion culture. Gupta has a BA in textile design for fashion and interiors from the Pearl Academy in India, and an MA in fashion from RMIT.

Memento Mori by Samuel de Raadt

Designs by Samuel de Raadt at the Paypal Melbourne Fashion Festival 2024 National Graduate Showcase.  Photo: Lucas Dawson.  Two models are shown on the runway.  On the left is a model wearing a skull mask completely covering their face, a black suit with spikes, a white shirt with a black tie and long black pants with frayed cutout holes.  On the right is a model also wearing a black skull mask with spikes on their head, a white shirt with black tie and a cropped black vest with spikes.  The pants are paneled with leather and small black embellishments.
Designs by Samuel de Raadt at the Paypal Melbourne Fashion Festival 2024 National Graduate Showcase. Photo: Lucas Dawson.

Enter the bad boys of the runway – skulls, spikes, pleated skirts, they had it all. But Samuel de Raadt’s collection went a bit deeper than that. As the name suggests, Memento Mori incorporated iconography around death to question the notion of life itself. Acceptance is both an attitude and a superpower.

Also a fashion design graduate from RMIT, Raadt played on the juxtaposition between expectation and reality. What appeared to be pointy spikes were constructed with a rugged softness. Raw hems and frayed edges were supplemented with just the right amount of structure. One look featured a dramatic wrap-around skirt with quilted patterns, adding a cartoonish quality towards the solemn skull mask.

Zero – Sum Game by Alex Enticknap

Designs by Alexander Enticknap at the Paypal Melbourne Fashion Festival 2024 National Graduate Showcase.  Photo: Lucas Dawson.  A view of the runway with three models taken from a high vantage point.  The models are wearing garments that feature exaggerated forms in black and red stripes.  A crowd is sitting on both sides of the runway.
Designs by Alexander Enticknap at the Paypal Melbourne Fashion Festival 2024 National Graduate Showcase. Photo: Lucas Dawson.

Speaking of medieval iconography, it was like seeing a merman from one of those etchings walking in front of you in Alex Enticknap’s Zero Sum Game. In parts it was also like ALPHA60 meeting Willy Wonka with the candy-cane colors and boisterous forms, but it worked well as the opening runway for the night.

Enticknap is a bachelor of fashion and textiles graduate from UTS (University of Technology Sydney) with a background in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics). Thus, his collection interweaves traditional textiles with AI-generated patterns, drapes and digital prints. It is due to this that the garments sometimes appear as distortions or manipulations, warped in a way that was neither quite organic nor digital.

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Also worth mentioning from the show was Yuxi Liu, whose focus on jewelery detailing in her looks was dazzling but difficult to fully appreciate on a runway, especially if you sat any further away than the front three rows. The garments themselves lean towards the ready-to-wear, so it is hoped that we may see some in street style soon.

Paypal Melbourne Fashion Festival National Graduate Showcase x Emporium was held on 5 March at the Royal Exhibition Building.