S.F. Fashion Week Offers a Sampling of Burgeoning Designers
San Francisco’s design community pulled together to celebrate the city’s second annual fashion week Aug. 24–28 at the Palace of Fine Arts Theatre.
There were 18 runway shows during the fashion week, which also hosted a handful of parties at swank venues across the city. This year, a smattering of workshops for fashion, art and makeup artistry were added to the mix.
Unlike last year’s San Francisco Fashion Week, which featured designers from Los Angeles and New York, all the designers this year hailed from the Bay Area. Even Levi Strauss & Co., based in San Francisco, shared its support for the local design community by participating in the shows.
The event drew 1,000 people each day and was attended by media representatives from Harper’s Bazaar, Fashion Wire Daily, Cosmopolitan and Us Weekly, according to Erika Gessin, the organizer of the fashion week and an event producer for Mystery Girl Productions.
Several designers said they are hopeful that an official fashion week will increase the city’s profile as a fashion destination. Gessin and her supporters said they believe the shows will increase visibility for the designers by bringing products directly to the consumers. For that reason, the shows were open to the public.
Gessin, a 28-year-old fashionista, is no stranger to fashion promotion. Her production company has produced numerous runway shows in the city to draw attention to Bay Area fashion.
“It’s really important to have a fashion week here in San Francisco,” Gessin said. “There are plenty of talented designers in the city, and without this opportunity, they would not be known in the fashion industry. Our goal is to create an environment where designers can work in a place that they love without being forced to move to another city to pursue their career.”
Over the past decade, however, a steady decrease in San Francisco’s apparel manufacturing operations has left designers with fewer resources.
Many designers maintain a pragmatic approach to their designs, while others push their creativity to the limit. The fashion week events offered both ends of the spectrum, with shows that encompassed womenswear, couture, eveningwear, childrenswear and menswear.
