Yesterday I had the pleasure of being invited to the exhibit for Chantal Gibbs-Jones’ All About the Cupcake line of outfits at the London Alternative Fashion Week. After navigating the London Underground without any difficulty I found myself faced with my greatest enemy… the London A-Z. I thought I was being paranoid for leaving myself a couple of hours to explore, but it turned out I would need most of that. I managed to find Brick Lane twice (It’s quite nice.) before I finally found Spitalfields Market where the event was being held.
I had waltzed down backstage and found Chantal amidst the frantic preparations for the show. It turns out the Fashion business consists of a lot of shuffling around a crowded dressing room and making sure the models are all appropriately kitted out, a task that more resembled herding cats than anything else. With the deadline looming and amidst all of this chaos of preparation and pre-performance nerves Chantal stood there working with an unstoppable sense of serenity, like every minor hiccup or problem was all somehow part of the plan. In fact she was even happy to let me ask her some questions while she worked.
What was your inspiration to make these outfits?
Funnily enough, it was the fabric itself. I found the white material with the cupcake patterns and started looking for other ones on Ebay and drawing whatever came to my head, it ended up like this.
So did you have the whole fifties style in mind when you started?
No actually, I only noticed it once I had finished designing them. Ironically, the fabric itself all comes from the fifties in America. I have it imported because it costs almost three times as much to get it in England. I didn’t realise that until I’d already finished the designs.
Do you have any ideas for your next selection?
I have a few ideas for what I’m going to do next. It’s going to be moody and dark with lots of Velvet, Pheasant feathers and chainmail.
Wow… Are you coming out to watch the show?
No, I’m staying behind the scenes to make sure the girls all go out in the right order and at the right time. Designers never watch their own shows.
Like a funeral!
Sure…
The show itself was fascinating and I heartily recommend that you check it out if you’re in the area this week or next time it rolls around. It was like a combination of fashion and art, the models being the canvas? There was a selection of Knitwear inspired by Samurai, a selection of ‘Urban Kilts’ (one of the male-models for them had the most amazing moustache I had ever seen), and a selection dedicated to the Theory of Evolution. It was great fun and it was good to see somebody mixing comedy and catwalk fashion. And then Chantal’s girls rolled out. Sashaying their model walk and pulling their pose for the cameras that Chantal had chosen to be like 50s pin-ups. There are people that think being a model is easy, but photos of them frequently tend to result in either a Goonish grin or Duck-face. Chantal had trained these girls well, and I’d be interested to see how many of them carry on with a modelling career.
Last time I wrote about her work, I said I would be following Ms Gibbs-Jones’ career with interest, and that sentiment certainly hasn’t changed. She shows flair, style and creativity with her designs and it almost makes me sad that I don’t feel any particular desire to cross-dress. Because if I did, I know who I’d call!
Oh, and it was much easier to find my way back to the station because I was given directions by a tramp.
Chantal Gibbs-Jones’ work can be seen here.
.
.
