Berlin Fashion Week Reboots With Physical Events, Minus Trade Shows

BERLIN The physical reboot of Berlin Fashion Weeks takes attendees from an abandoned building resembling Chupa Chups in the southernmost part of the city to a newly launched creative hub in the industrial era in the north. And it shows that the German capital is finding its way forward without a trade show.

The pandemic wasn’t the only chaos that hit the German fashion industry last year. When several major trade shows including Premium, Seek, and Neonyt announced they were leaving Berlin to launch a new fashion week in Germany’s financial hub Frankfurt last summer, several fashion players saw havoc for Berlin Fashion Week.

More from WWD

But the first physical edition during the pandemic allowed Berlin to play its creative power. Previous trade shows have dictated the inconvenient scheduling of January and July, often overlapping with Parisian men’s and couture shows, preventing the international public from attending.

Free from exhibitions, Berlin Fashion Week is scheduled from September 6 to 12, between Berlin Photo Week, an international literary festival and Berlin Art Week, to potentially benefit from new audiences and convergence with other disciplines. Around 13 different formats center on business-to-consumer dialogue. This time, the usually difficult to navigate and convoluted schedule turned out to be the ideal setting for various niche proposals.

There is more room to develop new things and become an exciting new hub. Throughout the week, there are 13 formats, many of which are new, so there’s a chance to have something interesting. In the past, we didn’t have the right profile in the city, but now that neither date nor content collide, Berlin can truly become a hub for new talent, said Marcus Kurz, board member of the German Fashion Council and co-initiator of the Berliner Salon. , along with former Vogue editor-in-chief Christiane Arp, who kicked off the week at the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Weeks Kraftwerk Berlin venue.

Story continues

Getty Images for MBFW

The salon established itself as the go-to show for German design over the past season and features 35 designers dedicated to sustainable behavior, transparency and circularity, including brands such as artisanal jewelery Anna Auras, handbag label Lutz Morris and Rianna + Nina, a clothing brand. which transforms vintage luxury materials.

I have made important contacts to media outlets and retailers through the Berliner Salon, and it feels great to be here after a period of isolation. For me, this is the most important platform for German designers, says Gisa Golpira, who launched the Düsseldorf and Berlin-based sustainable jewelry label Golpira at the 2014 show and is available in stores in Paris, Tokyo and New York, including Bergdorf Goodman.

Simultaneously, the German Fashion Council launched the Senate-sponsored Studio2Retail retail pop-up at the soon-to-be-open Alhambra department store with 29 local designers. Since I started just before the pandemic and operating mostly online until now, it’s been a great experience to be in direct contact with customers and exchange ideas with others from the industry, said participant Janina Waschkowski of Nove, a premium label with an independently designed collection. Elegant for women during and after pregnancy.

In addition to gear like Danny Reinke, Kilian Kerner and Marc Cain, Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week sees Austrian designer Florentina Leitner’s debut collection, the runway premiere of the Hamburg-based label Fassbender and LML Studio in the spotlight this week.

Lucas Meyer-Leclre of LML Studio presents a collection of 33 unique reconstructed looks Berluti, Dior for men, Herms and the vintage garments he dubbed were re-adjusted with luxury. The look has an aesthetic of bourgeois fabric that opens to reveal the bones of the seams, ending with a few paintings on it. NS Central Saint Martins graduates are creative assistants for Trackhead of textiles and textile designer at ISA in Milan and London before moving to Berlin to work with artists. There, she began to make clothes for herself again.

I have all the fancy clothes that don’t fit in this city anymore and cut them and flip them, too, because it makes absolutely no sense for me to have the same anywhere in the world, no matter if you’re in Tokyo or Paris, she says. The label quickly caught the attention of the late Stella Tennant was the first to wear an LML Studio jacket after she spotted Meyer-Leclre at a Track fashion show. The young designer has worked with a variety of collaborators including Berlin antiques shop Halleluja, London-based bespoke shirt maker Budd, and designers such as Stefano Pilati and Dumitrascu.

However, he does not intend to produce conventional collections, but rather wants to share expertise: Skills are meant to be shared and ideas are meant to be stolen and perverted. Not everyone can afford fancy clothes, but everyone can pick up scissors. I want to show others how to do it with my shows and presentations, he told WWD.

Julian Wiesemes

William FanThe show was staged at Wilhelm Hallen, a new creative center initiated by German-Canadian design producer Bocci in the northern suburbs of Berlin. Between the bones of 19th-century cast iron and artwork by Sylvie Fleury and Julius von Bismarck set up for Berlin Art Week, Fan presents a delightful collection of sharply designed classic suits, coats and dresses in shades of blue and beige, paired with evening wear with rich sequins, floral brocade and psychedelic prints strike a balance between what we need and what we want, according to the designer.

Another spark from the outskirts comes from the Festival of References occupying a derelict pop-architect building called Bierpinsel from the 1970s. The two-day festival, which is open to the public, is co-curated by DJ Bill Kouligas and his record label PAN and art space Schinkel Pavillon. The main program features musical and artistic installations, runway shows by Richert Beil and contributions by labels Rudi Gernreich, Phipps and Carhartt WIP.

Highsnobiety launches Berlin, the Berlin Prize, awarded to Kasia Kucharska, a graduate of the city’s University of the Arts.

Laura Schaeffer

Closing the week, Fashion Positions at the former site of the Bread & Butter Tempelhof trade show bridges Fashion Week and Art Week. Initiated by Position Art Fairs director Kristian Jarmuschek and designers Mira von der Osten from Cruba and Olaf Kranz from Brachmann, the fashion group’s presentation at art fairs combines art and fashion to attract art audiences and sell designer collections at art fairs. In addition to well-known German names such as Esther Perbandt, Lou de Btoly and Uncommon Matters, Fashion Positions also highlights newcomers with its own accolades. Last year’s winner Laura Gerte, a graduate of the Kunsthochschule Weiensee, presents an important collection designed in collaboration with Berlin-based party collective Multisex made with manipulated vintage interior fabrics and printed jerseys to reflect the aesthetics of the local underground party scene.

Laura plant

Best of WWD

Sign up for WWD Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Indonesia, Facebook, and Instagram.