Little Black Dress Returns to L.A.
The fourth annual Little Black Dress charity event will return to Los Angeles at the W Hotel on June 7.
As the event, held in New York last year, returns to Los Angeles, so does the focus on West Coast fashion. Labels confirmed to donate little black dresses from their collections or specially design pieces include Babystyle, Billabong, Colleen Quen, Eduardo Lucero, Ella Moss, Grass Jeans, Jaime Lee, Juan Carlos Obando, Kevan Hall, MartinMartin, Monah Li, Nick Graham, Naqada by Octavio Carlin, Petro Zillia, Rachel Pally, Rami Kashou, Saja, Single, Suss Design, Sue Wong and Tinc.
Emmy Cortes founded the event in 2002 to highlight a diverse mix of Los Angeles design talent on a level playing field: the universally known concept of the little black dress. All of the proceeds from auctioning the dresses will be donated to the charity organization Stop Cancer.
Little Black Dress plans to expand to the United Kingdom, and as a preview, English designers Alice Temperly, Gorgeous Couture and Vicky Martin will be featured at the Los Angeles event. Cortes said she wants to expand to alternative fashion capitals such as Thailand; Sydney, Australia; Prague, Czech Republic; and St. Petersburg, Russia.
The show has traditionally been billed as an “art exhibit–meets–fashion” event where dresses are displayed on mannequins for casual perusal and to facilitate the auction.
This year’s show will add a live presentation choreographed by Jose Angel, the creator of the P. Ka Bu runway shows. In addition to the dresses displayed on mannequins, eight models in little black dresses by labels Jose Angel, A Friend of Mine, Aimisu, Maggie Barry, Szulika, Uriel Saenz, Daenamon and one other to be confirmed will periodically grace the venue.
To top off the artistic aspect of the event, 10 6-foot paintings created by Los Angeles artist Biagio Black and commissioned by Ford Models will be available for purchase with a portion of the proceeds going to Stop Cancer.
A limited number of tickets will be on sale to the public for $150 through www.ticketweb.com. For more information, visit www.lbdevents.com.
—Rhea Cortado
