Fashion for everyone

The original LBD, styled very creatively. Photo courtesy of Elisa Hyman.

This season, The Green Shows provided a welcome respite from New York Fashion Week's completely spread out and harried show schedule. While most of the other venues were loud, over-crowded, and often a complete hassle to get into (cough, Milk Studios), I genuinely commend all the people behind the scenes of the Green Shows, as they put together a gorgeous and welcoming venue. Among the designers presenting were two of my friends, Eliza Starbuck who designs the line Bright Young Things, and Lopeti Etu, who showed with the Milliners Guild.

For Spring 2011, Eliza is launching her first multi-piece collection to complement her original (and now very famous) little black dress, which she created for The Uniform Project a little over a year ago. The Bright Young Things collection will feature eight items that give new life to wardrobe basics. The garments can be worn forwards, backwards, and inside out, giving the wearer the opportunity to style it hundreds of different ways. As Eliza's LBD demonstrated, with a few key accessories and styling creativity, you can wear the same piece everyday and make it look completely different. The pieces really encourage you to shop your closet and embrace the versatility of one great item rather than buying twelve different versions of it (a truly green notion that I need to learn to live by). Another great aspect of the show? The gorgeous cast of models came in all ages, races, shapes, and sizes, really showing off how real women wear the clothes, and demonstrating how exciting diversity on the runway can be when it does happen.

Another way to style the same LBD with the pleat side in the front. Photo courtesy of Elisa Hyman.

Olive coat dress worn as a jacket. Photo courtesy of Elisa Hyman.

The mini skort worn as a button front skirt. Photo courtesy of Elisa Hyman.

Ivory LBD. Photo courtesy of Elisa Hyman.

And the most fashionable way to accessorize your LBD is with a stone and pearl encrusted space helmet, of course!

I met Lopeti Etu a little while back when he was still working as a designer for Selima. He's since gone on to launch his own eponymous line, and each new hat he makes is increasingly outrageous. He presented two gigantic hats at the Milliners Guild Show, and they were certainly the showstoppers of the presentation. The seaweed and raffia hat with a bee-keeper style veil was an outfit unto itself, and his canvas hat had a five-foot diameter and was trimmed with lamp parts sourced at Ikea. I tip my hat (har har) to Lopeti for bringing back all the drama and daring associated with millinery.

Raffia and seaweed straw hat.

Canvas hat with lace trim and Ikea lamp parts at the crown