Akira Isogawa Fashion Talk at Fremantle Town Hall

It was unseasonably cold and rainy today! Although it a bit of pain to get to Fremantle Town Hall due to some crazy wind I'm all star struck tonight after having met Megan Salmon and, of course, the fashion talk with none other than Akira Isogawa. We proudly call him our own Australian designer just like I call myself Australian.. well he was born in Japan and only came here when he was 21. So that's how the story goes (which you will find out no doubt in Wikipedia or places like that). Great thing about tonight was I got to hear that from Akira himself.

Apparently, he came to Australia to get away from his family as part the good ol' Australian working holiday scheme. He then studied at a TAFE college in Sydney then on to having a boutique. Wee bit later we started seeing him in Paris Fashion Week in the late 90s.

The Fremantle Town Hall was packed with the audience. Only to be expected when such a big name in fashion is coming to town. We got to hear an interesting story surrounding his mother's kimono and Akira's curiosity. He had this thing about how his mothers kimono could look different under the harsh Australian sun with blue sky comparing with the relatively grey sky in Japan (I can related to that as Seoul was usually grey from my memory). His mother allowed him to take one of her Kimono back to Australia and he realised how different it looked here for the vibrance and the texture. Not just because of this story but he seems to draw inspiration from all kinds of things. He is such an endearing and gentle soul.

It was also quite intriguing to hear that even a big name like Akira still worries about commercial aspect of his work as he put it 'Worrying about numbers not as in centimetres or inches but rather in dollars'. It's too bad that I never got to capture his red leather ankle boots. Apart from all the insightful and interesting stories about his creative process and the industry I was more drawn to his Red specially the red he was wearing.

Akira's SS 2010 collection

To be totally honest, I cannot think of anything intelligent thing to say about tonight other than to say that I'm star struck and I need to get something red to wear tomorrow even if all I could dig out is just a red lipstick.