fashion show

Project Runway Season 9 Premiere

Posted on July 29, 2011October 26, 2011 by Ashley Laurel

Well the much talked about opener for Project Runway for Season 9 finally happened last night. And I have no shame in saying that I spent quite a few minutes watching old clips of Tim “Gunnisms” on YouTube today purely out of excitement.

Many of my friends were also excited, like Boston-based Brian Forte over at Please Welcome Your Judges, and Twitter friend Yuli Ziv of Style Coalition from New York City. In fact, in conjunction with HP, Style Coalition and hosted a special blogger event just for the occasion! While I wasn’t lucky enough to attend that event, and test out some fashion friendly HP products, I did watch the show from my couch in San Francisco (while doing some online window shopping on my iPad- hey, I can never get too much fashion and tech).

Now, onto the contestants. While David Chum, Becky Ross, and Olivier Green were my three favorites leading up to the show premiere, Bert really turned it out and deserved the win for the first challenge. He might be my new favorite? I’ll wait and see.

Already you can vote for your fan favorite on the Lifetime website, check out the official Project Runway blog, and blogs about this season from some former contestants (like Peach!). Also, you can view a real-time feed that shows what people are saying about each designer if you go to their bio pages.

Since the preview for the rest of the season looks particularly juicy, I can’t wait to watch the drama unfold both on TV and online.

In the meantime, happy birthday to Mr. Tim Gunn!!!

Haute Couture in 3D: Gaultier Brings Technology to the Runway

Posted on July 14, 2010April 1, 2012 by Ashley Laurel

You’d think seeing a live haute couture show would breathtaking enough, but how about one in 3D? Just recently, in Paris, one designer offered his audience a very unique collection, with just a touch of technology.

On the first day of Paris Fashion Week, Jean-Peaul Galtier’s Moroccan themed show of his 2011 Spring/Summer men’s collection had a very special twist- futurism. Not only did his models where the silly 3D glasses that I haven’t worn since I went to see Avatar (ok, only like four months ago), show invitations included 3D glasses so attendees could enjoy a very special fashion show experience.

How’s that for cool?

Technology on the Runway: A Look Back at the Technology of Project Runway Season 7

Posted on April 23, 2010April 1, 2012 by Ashley Laurel

Tonight marks the end end of Project Runway, Season 7. From Anthony’s charm to Emilio’s ego to Mila and Jay’s ongoing spat, I have to say this was a fun season to watch. But it wouldn’t have been the same without the stylish tech tools used throughout the season.

Like every other season, Tim Gunn continued to encourage this season’s designers to “use the Bluefly wall thoughtfully”. For anyone who’s not a Project Runway fan or social shopper out there, Bluefly.com is a top fashion and lifestyle e-commerce sites where shoppers can find luxury goods (think L.A.M.B., Prada and Zac Posen) at discounted prices. This season, like the others, the Bluefly wall served as the one stop shopping location for any accessories that the designers didn’t make themselves.

But the show’s technology went further than the usual collaboration with Bluefly and a fun Twitter account to follow: (@ProjectRunway, an account with more than 20,000 followers).

As announced back in January, the real showstopper of the season was the integration of Hewlett-Packard and Intel technology. Throughout this season of Project Runway, designers didn’t merely sketch on paper, they were instead each given an HP Touchsmart tm2 tablet PC to sketch on with digital pens.

And, for the first time in Project Runway history, contestants were given the opportunity to create garments based on patterns they’d created using HP TouchSmart PCs and Intel Core 2 Duo processors. Patterns were created using screens that read pinches, rotations, flips and drags by just the touch of a finger. Vivienne Tam (basically the fashion spokesperson for HP) even stopped by. But, as Jonathan proved, a smart color palette still counts, no matter how high tech fashion may get.

Fans could even get involved with the tech hype by entering the season’s HP Envy 15 contest by predicting the top three finalists of season 7.

Well congratulations to Seth Aaron (my favorite!) for winning Project Runway and a $50,000 prize package from Intel and HP!

For more details about the technology featured this season, buy skins based off of the designers’ work throughout the season, visit ProjectRunway.com/hp. And if you haven’t already, don’t forget to check out Tim Gunn’s blog. Project Runway may have just helped the a lot of the world realize how important technology will be to fashion in the future, but it’d never be the same without the show’s fashionable wordsmith and mentor.

Project Runway, if you really want to get tech-friendly, I hope you bring back more wearable tech artists, like Diana Eng, in the future! Now that would be fashion meeting technology.

UNIQLO Creates Interactive Virtual Fashion Show

Posted on October 7, 2009April 1, 2012 by Ashley Laurel

Ready for this? A virtual fashion show that’s not only visually stimulating, but also lets you choose outfits literally off the models to learn more information while the show continues on- no more waiting for details until after the show.

UNIQLO, a Japan-based casual wear clothing brand that’s been around since 1984 (the same year Steve Jobs debuted the first Apple Macintosh computer) has become super tech-friendly in its recent endeavor. New York Fashion Week may make more headlines where I live, but UNIQLO’s Tokyo 2009 Collection is the most unique show I’ve seen in months, in terms of technology anyway.

My only complaint is that you can’t check out what other show “attendees” are wearing- half the fun of attending a show.

Fashionistas to Turn Gamers?

Posted on September 2, 2009October 26, 2011 by Ashley Laurel

What do 505 Games, IMG and Pat McGrath have in common? Offering gamer fashionistas a chance to get inside the tents during Fashion Week. Virtually speaking that is.

2010 will mark the launch of multiple Fashion Week-based games that will showcase models, clothing designers and the runways of Paris, New York, LA, and Milan. McGrath and pal Noel Gordon came up with the original concept that will be playable on iPhone and Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony game consoles.

An online game will allow designers from around the world to create items online to be sold as virtual goods, and in some cases, as real goods, Adam Kline, president of 505 Games U.S. said during an interview a few months ago.

The games will be promoted by way of retail stores, such as Wal-Mart, Target and Best Buy, and social media sites, like Facebook and Twitter.

“By combining IMG Fashion’s experience, expertise and relationships in this space with 505 Games’ abilities, I’m sure we will all soon become video game fashionistas,” IMG fashion senior VP Fern Mallis said in a statement a few months ago.

Since the games are still in early development stages, there’s much speculation as to what the game series will entail. A virtual encounter with an Anna Wintour avatar? A virtual backstage pass to a Zac Posen show?

Hopefully the game series will be fun as well as give players a real taste of the madness that surrounds Fashion Week. At the very least, perhaps turning Fashion Week into a game will break a few stereotypes.