Roll on 2023
It’s been an epic year for fashion brands. All that stress and pivoting, all that pragmatic adapting so diligently done in 2020 and 2021 appears finally to be paying off. Dozens of the small-fry and medium sized local brands we canvassed in recent weeks agree they’ve crashed out of Covid, success feels real again, hope is on the horizon and they’ll be damned if they’ll let the momentum fizzle now.
“We’re making 2023 just as epic as this year,” says designer Erik Yvon. He’s one of four Victorian fashionistocrats invited to list their “Best of 2022” for this special issue of Creative Victoria Fashion News and share how they’ll spend summer’s traditional lull now the worst of Covid is over and their dream business is within reach.
(This story was first published in Creative Victoria Fashionews, your regular drop of local fashion yarns, best events, grants news, business info and lots more. Subscribe here for free.)
The designer behind one of Melbourne’s coolest and most beloved micro brands is consolidating her relatively new retail business and, after 30 years, still custom-fitting her quirky-fresh and timeless designs for a market that spans teens to octogenarians.
“I like to work in the season, get inspired by the season we’re feeling now. It’s really enjoyable and satisfying that I can have an idea and get it straight out within a few days; virtually stick it in the (shop) window and get orders from that.”
“I’m in my second year of trading as a retail fashion design and custom business now and ready to sign a new lease…I can listen to my customers in the shop. Like, there are these T-shirt tops I was doing for winter and people have been asking for them for summer so I’m making the same design, adapted with a racer back….You’re constantly getting feedback like that from the source.”
“I’m still making summer, but I’m also making a series of outfits for the Hotham Street Ladies (artist group) for late December, and I’ve got some exciting things coming up in March. I’m doing something for the Melbourne Fashion Festival, not sure what yet; an installation or something? And I’m in the Melbourne Now exhibition.”
“Christmas day we’re going to my brother’s house..I can only think, there’ll be lots of little kids..I love the idea of them getting excited by Christmas…then I’ll be trading right up to New Year because people often want new New Year’s outfits.
“For summer I’ll shut down for a couple of weeks and won’t actually open the shop again until February. I have a lot of deadstock fabrics I’ve collected that I can draw on. I also can always find fabrics through summer, even from retail stores because I don’t use that much..”
“I love the idea that my designs are youthful, but I also love the idea that all ages like wearing them. They transcend age. Someone like Shona (fashion doyenne Shona Grant) looks great but so do the 16 year olds.”
Erik Yvon (Photos above and main by Stefan Gosatti/Getty Images)
The Mauritian-Melbournian’s first solo show at Australian Fashion Week 2022 was genuinely epic, blasting across social media and consolidating his cachet as one of the country’s most original, independent designer brands.
“That was definitely our highlight; Sydney Fashion Week (sic). All the hard work, I mean the really really hard work to get us there, paid off and the outcome was amazing.
“For 2023 we’re going ahead again (showing at Australian Fashion Week) – an amazing milestone for the label. We’re also really excited because we’re doing two looks to be in the Melbourne Now exhibition and, nothing’s locked in yet, but we’re always so happy to be a part of Melbourne Fashion Week. They were the first to embrace (the label, Erik Yvon) and give us a platform to showcase on their runways.”
“I work from home (in Fitzroy). I turned my garage into a studio but I’ll be looking for a bigger space next year. Summer doesn’t mean the work stops. I’ll be working all the way through, getting ready for 2023. But I’ll have Christmas and Boxing Day off, that’s for sure; no work or emails. It’s always an “orphan’s Christmas” for me with my friends. I met them studying fashion at RMIT. They’re my family now. We do a Kris Kringle and bring a plate of food; lots of seafood, lots of prawns! And a video call at some stage to my mum and dad. Then I’m back to work.”
“I’ve already sourced fabrics and started making samples for next year. As a small label I have the luxury of just setting my own seasons and timelines so I only do one collection a year. In summer I’ll be working in my studio in Fitzroy, a machinist coming in twice a week but the rest of the time, only me. I like being in a little bubble, having a space that’s just your own. I don’t have music blasting or anything like that, just quiet and calm. That’s the environment where I thrive.
“We’re working on the silhouettes and shapes and for this collection, also collaborating with a ceramicist in Melbourne. His work is beautiful. We’ve taken pictures of some of his ceramics and worked with them on Photoshop, turned them into a print. So beautiful! The colours and textures.
“My current season colours were so bright it would have been hard to go even harder with colour so we’ve gone another way with this (collection, launching at AFW) but it’s still very Erik Yvon.”
This year the RMIT-trained tailor set up his bespoke menswear brand Mr. Cuff with husband and business partner Michael Anderson in its first retail studio at 6-8 Howey Place under the City of Melbourne’s Shopfront Activation Program.
“We used that program as an incubator; you can do the pop up, or you can really throw yourself into it and commit…that’s what we did and it’s been huge. When you walk into the shop, half of it’s shopfront and the other half is workshop, so you basically see where your clothes are made, and can understand the craft and how they’re made, see the tailors at work. People actually stop to watch like it’s the Myer Christmas windows.”
“It took a good two to three months for people to get to know us; we had to work out exactly who our customer is. We sit between the realms of men’s tailoring and men’s fashion and we’re trying to close that gap, get guys to rethink the ways they think about clothing. We’ll tailor that suit, but we’ll also do everything else to the same measurements. We’ve had a lot of walk-ins for shorts, chinos, short sleeved shirts..It’s been getting busier and busier. We’ll be signing our first lease for two to three years soon.”
“Christmas we spend with my husband’s family, always very traditional. Then we’re getting the old camping kit out – we actually sewed our own tent – and going camping for two weeks around the Moe-Traralgon area. If I’ve got my dressing gown, my chair, my bear rug, my fire and my book, I’m happy.”
“Then it’s back to work, a minimum of 60 hours a week and it doesn’t change over summer…We want to build a Melbourne institution eventually, continue growing, employing more tailor”
The legendary Melbourne womenswear designer will mark 40 years in fashion in 2023, a perfect complement to her Order of Australia Medal (OAM) awarded for her services to fashion in this year’s Australia Day honors list.
“There’s excitement around now about women being back out there and dressing up. So many events! If I hear anyone else saying, “It’s so sad, no-one dresses up anymore”, I’m saying; “Can you just spend a day in my shop?”
“I feel relieved now (after surviving Covid) that there’s enough money coming through the business and I can finally feel again that I can relax and rest when I need to. I’m excited because I can be more true to the designer I am now and just make beautiful things and not have to try and compensate for the world’s issues. That’s (one) idea of success to me.”
“My concept of success is probably different to someone else’s. I don’t need 30 shops, I don’t need 400 staff. I love what I do, I love the corporate women, my clients, they inspire me. I don’t really give a damn what’s happening overseas or with trends or whatever, I just design for their needs.”
“Yes, I always celebrate Christmas. I love the wonderful Australian family traditions, so different from Europe but with a flavour and sense of their own. This Christmas I’m going back to Perth to be with my mum and my brother and hopefully celebrating on the back of his boat on the Swan River with literally, shrimps on the barbie and swimming in the river!”
“I come back Boxing Day. Winter is in production, so I’ll be working on Summer (2023/24) and on my own for most of January. It’s a really quiet, creative time, not a chore at all…It’s time that I can get into all my fabrics stores and my trims and my cupboards and just play…I actually love it…”
