Feature: Lisbon Fashion Week reaches stylish conclusion

By Jethro Soutar

LISBON, March 11 (Xinhua) -- The 50th edition of Lisbon Fashion Week came to a close on Sunday with catwalk shows in two venues located inside the Eduardo VII central park.

Designer Olga Noronha launched the final day's shows with a presentation in the Estufa Fria giant greenhouse.

"I didn't come to the greenhouse, the greenhouse came to me," she joked when asked about the challenges of tailoring her designs to suit the location.

"The organizers asked me if I'd be interested in doing a show in the Estufa Fria and I realized that what I was working on would be a good fit," she said. "I'd been experimenting with substances that don't combine, having them explode or spoil, so there was a link to plant life, decomposition, mutation."

The show featured models wearing items made from bobbled plastics and warped rubber.

"I like to work with different materials and I was trying not to fuse them, but to produce bad reactions," she said. "I call them chemical errors."

Her show was certainly among the most original of the weekend. "It's fashion, it's design, it's performance, it's weird," she said. "I'm forever having a professional existential crisis deciding what I am, but I'm happy with that," she concluded with a laugh.

Lisbon Fashion Week, or ModaLisboa as it's known in Portuguese, is the premier showcase for Portuguese fashion designers, as well as local fashion photographers and photo-shoot set designers.

The event takes place twice a year, every spring and fall. This week's jamboree was an opportunity for designers to present their Fall/Winter 2018/19 collections.

Catwalk proceedings got underway on Friday with collections in the Carlos Lopes Pavilion from up-and-coming designers competing in the New Blood strand of the festival.

Filipe Augusto, a 25-year-old designer from the north of Portugal, was crowned king of the newcomers with a collection called "Harvest." His designs were inspired by outfits worn by grape-pickers at harvest time in the Duoro wine-producing region he hails from.

The marquee names filled the later runway slots, with Ricardo Preto, Luis Carvalho and Nuno Gama topping the bill on Saturday.

Preto, exhibiting at Lisbon Fashion Week for the twelfth year running, drew the most plaudits backstage. A womenswear show, Preto trailed the collection as being a celebration of "strong, determined, but at the same time romantic women".

Having broken into the Asian market two years ago, he said he'd taken inspiration from his new clients. Critics praised the simple, wearable designs, describing them as stylish without being groundbreaking.

To commemorate ModaLisboa's 50th edition and his own label's 25th anniversary, Gama offered a retrospective of his own participation in the event with favorite pieces from 42 collections dating back to 1987.

Carvalho, meanwhile, had his models wear mop-top wigs for a 1960s-inspired collection.

Filipe Faisca also took inspiration from the 60s for his show on Sunday. His collection had a free-love, hippie vibe and was notable for all the models sporting three-eyed sunglasses.

Besides the shows, the week is a chance for sector professionals to network. Daniel Pato was among them, a young designer with his own label called WAVV Clothing.

"It's great to see the whole industry come together, the different ideas, the depth and range," said Pato.

"It's a good atmosphere. We younger designers are from a different generation so people are keen to keep an eye on what we're doing," he said. "But we're not seen as competition, so people tend to be friendly and supportive."

In all there were 21 shows in the Estufa Fria and on the Carlos Lopes runway, a venue with a 1,300 capacity. Shows were almost all full, despite the heavy rain outside.

Events were invited only with no catwalk shows open to the public. In last October's edition, 7 of the 23 runway shows were open to the public, but organizers said it wasn't possible this time for logistical and security reasons.

ModaLisboa is part-funded by Lisbon Town Hall and a condition of that funding is that the event be as accessible as possible.

To satisfy this requirement, ModaLisboa kicked off on Thursday with a number of panel discussions called "Fast Talks", open to the general public.

Punters could also enter the Wonder Room pop-up store, showcasing the latest in Portuguese-made handicrafts, textiles, jewellery and accessories, the "Work Station" photo gallery and an exhibition space focused on Portuguese footwear. Enditem