Fashion weak

It was a night of wardrobe malfunctions and a general lack of restraint, not only from newbie designers, but from the veterans as well.

In a nutshell, the Design Fusion Collection of Philippine Fashion Week felt more like a student show than a showcase of professional work.

To be fair, the staging of local fashion shows has improved much over the years. This one was polished, concise and fast-paced with catchy music.

Director Joey Espino chose to stage a group show using purely Filipino songs, including the campy Big Brother theme by Orange and Lemons.

Now it’s the designers who have to catch up with the rest of the world.

In the spirit of keeping things brief and concise, here’s a quick rundown on what we witnessed Monday night at the Rockwell Tent.

Aries Lagat seems to favor complicated twists and turns in clothing and had some great things to show and some not so great, while Benjie Panizales showed what I thought looked like bad office wear.

Dimple Lim showed some very interesting shapes and finishings with the bright pipings and top-stitching. Although her capsule collection was a hit-and-miss thing, I think she’s one of the more creative young designers worth watching out for.

Emi Alexander-Englis showed flowy white or off-white resort wear and practiced some restraint, which is cool but a bit on the blah side.

Eric Sapaula showed that fashion need not be too complicated or thought-out with his colorful long-sleeve statement tees worn with modern-indigenous bubble shorts and skirts.

Eric’s coloring and shapes definitely worked and were ruined only by hideous footwear.

The statement tee idea is by no means original, but I liked it. This was my favorite collection, even though I found the environmental messages a bit too cliché.

We weren’t too ecstatic over Happy Andrada’s bad tailoring and over-accessorized outfits. No minimalist, this Happy, I temporarily had an out-of-body experience when her carnival costumes came out. It was simply too much information for me.

It’s a shame Jasmine Castelo went a little bit over the top with the coconut suwak attached to the clothes, because it tended to hide some very nice fabrication and interesting shapes.

It’s also a shame that she chose to hide Jon Mullally’s face under a red mask. But then I had to laugh when Jasmine explained, "That’s to add some mystery, my dear."

John Paras’ light-colored suits and dresses with the complicated ruffled details reminded me of American prom rentals.

Johntie Martinez showed leopard-printed cutout swimsuits and resort wear or jungle costumes, if you will. Jane would love them. Tarzan and Jane.

Perhaps Lito Perez reminisced over his fashion school days when he showed student-grade muslin pieces. And I seriously cannot think of a living guy who would wear the menswear.

Not bad, considering Mich Dulce had less than one week to whip up a 10-piece collection, in between tapings for her TV sitcom, John en Shirley. Although fit and finishing suffered a bit, we appreciate this "mature" collection, which included her signature hats and bags.

I wish that Mich would realize that most of her patterns are high-waisted and would do something about the ill-proportions.

Odelon Simpao’s black and white menswear with the piping details was neither bad nor earth-shattering, but at least better than all the menswear we saw that night.

Pier Lim attempted to achieve too much with his all-white collection that was reminiscent of wedding cakes.

He has a lot to learn in terms of restraint and construction. The audience gasped when an ill-fitted bustier collapsed and completely exposed a model’s breasts.

He had a brilliant idea going when model 2tay Maristela carried a battery pack/bag to power the Christmas lights under her dress, but then who would actually wear such a thing?

Perhaps Ramon Favila wanted to make his mark in the very lucrative uniform industry, when he showed what was essentially blah office wear. And OMG, the fabric — what was that?

Maybe Rholand Roxas had local tourism in mind when he made native costumes with matching salakot.

Again, I can’t think of anyone who would wear this, except for maybe some Bayanihan dancers.

Simon Ariel Vasquez had some nice Cleopatric bias dresses going until the models’ backs revealed the Land of the Thongs.

The menswear was quite another story with the too sheer, too tight, too gay theme going with the SAV monogram belt branding.

And then Jon Mullally passed by in swimming trunks and I became completely dizzy.

Zxander Tan showed menswear in sheer — again! This was all about bad shoulders. Zxander should go back to Pattern I and just study shoulders.