BTS: Mercedes Benz Fashion week
Yes, That's right! It's that time of the year where fashion bloggers, stylists, designers, public icons and whoever can score an invite! Get an all access pass to Mercedes Benz Fashion Week Australia. The world renowned show kicked off last sunday 14th May in Sydney with fashion designer Dion Lee opening the show at Australia's Sydney Opera House. Talk about a runway!
Following Dion Lee's Fashion show on Sunday a full week was planned, showcasing the best in Australian fashion designers. But enough about what's going on, on the runway. I'm going to give you and inside scoop of whats going on behind the scenes of Mercedes Benz Fashion Week Australia.
BACKSTAGE is where everything is done. Its stressful, fast paced and has high demands of each member working, but highly rewarding by putting on the show of a lifetime (according to the designers expectations.) You've got the hair, makeup, millions of clothes to be looked after (which ALL have to be steamed ironed btw), copious amounts of shoes, accessories, millions of stage team members, props, music and lighting and of course the models ( who have the easiest job) just to name a few. How do i know you ask? I've worked there! And I want to show you what really goes on behind the scenes!
HAIR
KMS hair Australia are the reason the models hair looked stunning each time they stepped foot on the runway. Each designer had specific hairstyles which needed to be adhered to, to ensure things ran smoothly and tied in with the collection. This means copious amounts of different hairstyles for every single model, in every single show for every single designer.
Can you imagine the stress!!! Models needed to be in and out under a strict time limit to ensure they could get the job done and be ready to step out on the runway.
Talk about a fast paced environment.
Round of Applause for KMS Hair Australia and associated hair stylists.
MAKEUP
Revlon is the reason the models look AH-MAZING. Copious amounts of professional makeup artists were needed to ensure each models makeup look was stunning. We all know makeup takes up a huge part of the morning because we need to make it "right". These makeup artists got the models in and out so quickly and each look was absolutely stunning to a T.
Claps for Revlon makeup artists!
DESIGNER CLOTHES
The designer clothes are the most important part of the show and need to be looked after as carefully as possible. Each and every single piece of clothing must be steam ironed and hung on a rack with the allocated models name on it. This is a crucial part of BTS work as each model has already been casted and put with a certain look prior to the show. When its show time the models get allocated "dressers" who dress the models the specific way according to the designer.. example: "Belt must be worn tied up above waist, not buckled."
There are always tiny little details which make all the difference to the finished look.
There's more to it then you thought huh!
SHOES
Shoes with all models and looks are generally the same because of the way it works. Generally designers will use windsor smith shoes and then send them back once they're done. This saves a lot of money and time. To ensure the shoes stay in squeaky clean condition, backstage staff will tape the bottom of each heel to ensure no marks or dirt will appear on the shoe.
Cheeky hey!
BACKSTAGE STAFF
Without backstage staff there really wouldn't be anyone to run the show or a show for that matter.Backstage staff take care of everything.
Volunteers! Yes thats right, You can volunteer to work at MBFWA and you can do a variety of roles such as dressing models, scanning and ticketing,seat allocation, and of course the setting up of runways and the making up of famous MBFWA gift bags. These gift bags aren't just ordinary gift bags btw.. for Toni Maticevski's show last year every guest received a touch screen tablet which had every persons name on it...I know right,and that's just one example.
It's safe to say without the backstage crew the show would definitely not run smoothly.
Round of applause for the BTS crew!
I hope you all learnt a few little tricks of the backstage life and hope you enjoyed this blog post and realise there is way more that goes on behind the scenes than meets the eye!
AND if you love fashion and want to gain some valuable recognised experience or want to see what backstage life is like and would like to volunteer for Mercedes Benz Fashion week Australia for 2018, contact me on the contact page and ill give you all the information you need to know and when & where to apply!
Thank you all so much for reading my new blog post! Don't forget to subscribe or contact me on the contact page for any enquiries or collaboration work.
ps: I did not take any of these photos!
Thanks! Cora x