Ancient silk heritage, young Kiwi fashion designers and Resene paint colours meet on the runway at New Zealand Fashion Week 2014

Smitten pink, Daredevil orange, Sublime green and a spectrum of jewel-like colour woven into silk paint the town Roadster red at New Zealand Fashion Week 2014, in an education project that spans hemispheres and is supported at the highest level in two countries.

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In a first for fashion education, the lustrous colours and vibrant patterns of hand-woven silk saris from the ancient looms of a Southern-India village, re-created as high fashion, come together at NZ Fashion Week.

Ten looks from the Resene NZ Fashion Tech Colour of Fashion collection 2014 nudge New Zealand’s default-setting colour – black – opening five Resene Designer Selection shows at New Zealand Fashion Week.

The project began when Kevin Smith and Val Marshall-Smith, founders and owners of award-winning New Zealand fashion institute, NZ Fashion Tech, teamed up with educators Giles Brooker and Prabha Govindasamy. Together they shaped a unique New Zealand-India fashion education collaboration. And next Resene, who likes to support initiatives celebrating colour, stepped up to amplify the project.

50 silk saris inspired by paint colours from Resene were selected. Then 45 students from NZ Fashion Tech’s Diploma classes in Auckland and Wellington were briefed to design and make a contemporary-chic fashion look from the delicate hand-woven silks, responding to the Resene paint colour they had been given.

Paint colours have for many years been inspired by colours seen on catwalks and in the latest fashion trends. It’s a nice twist to reverse the order and have paint colours used as inspiration for the catwalk.

Val Marshall-Smith, Academic Director at NZ Fashion Tech says: “Colour in fashion is about having confidence in our choices; being able to express ourselves creatively in a truly individual way and not being afraid to show who we really are. We’re delighted that this project boldly brings colour back onto fashion’s centre-stage.”

To complete the project, 15 of the talented Kiwi fashion students from NZ Fashion Tech who have taken part in the project will travel to India for five weeks near the end of their academic year, as recipients of Prime Minister’s Scholarships for Asia.

They will re-create their fashion looks, first seen on pages of fashion magazines and fashion runways in New Zealand, and bring a unique education collaboration between NZ Fashion Tech and Bannari Amman Institute of Technology to life in India.

Kevin Smith Managing Director of NZ Fashion Tech says: “The students responded well to the brief. Armed with their Resene testpot and sari, they were asked (hypothetically) to dress Cate Blanchett for a summer luncheon in Monte Carlo. Technical excellence was paramount, the timeline was tight, and the stakes were high: Who would show at Fashion Week? Who would catch the eye of editors? And ultimately: Who would travel to India?”

“We’re thrilled with the results. This project is taking them beyond the classroom and giving them real international and commercial perspective. It’s a hugely valuable teaching and learning experience.”

Home of the silks

Doddampalayam is the village just outside of Sathyamangalam in Southern India where the silk saris being used in this project were hand-woven (70kms from the city of Coimbatore.)

Giles Brooker says: “It feels like the whole village is the factory. Houses left, right and centre have a room with a central loom or a showroom for their finished work. It’s a very communal activity for the families - men and women, young and old - all weaving or contributing in one way or another to the enterprise.”

Giles Brooker says the people of Doddampalayam and Bannari Amman Institute of Technology are excited by the creative release this project brings.

“The challenge for the students is to take the traditional sari with its traditional values, shapes, patterns and draping, and throw that all up into the air, release their creativity, and come up with a new design idea,” says Mr Brooker.

“India has centuries of history of being creative with colour. Within this project young New Zealanders might give that creativity a fresh new design spark.”

“I think this collaboration is going to succeed on so many levels for both New Zealand and India. I believe there will be benefits across tourism awareness, community engagement, design, manufacturing, trade and education. The Resene NZ Fashion Tech Colour of Fashion collection will showcase how bold the Indians are with their colour and pattern combinations and it will present New Zealand as an exciting, creative, innovative place for fashion and design.”

“You can’t succeed in any Asian country by sitting in New Zealand. You need to become part of it and engage at multiple levels to build up the recognition of integrity. I think this project has been set up to achieve those ideals beautifully,” he says.

Fashion meets the walls with these garments created by NZ Fashion Tech students inspired by Resene colours. Styling and images courtesy of NEXT magazine.