Like an elegant if slightly stuffy grandmother slipping into a tailored leather jacket, Brisbane’s City Hall last night underwent a stylish identity swap as the 2009 mercedes-benz fashion festival launched.

A sold-out crowd of local and international style watchers – with a front row studded with fashion industry heavyweights such as Vogue Australia editor Kirstie Clements and makeup artist napolen perdis – filled the cavernous main auditorium of the soon-to-be renovated City Hall.

Sydney-based designer akira losgawa who this year opened his first Brisbane boutique in Fortitude Valley, further cemented his commitment to the Queensland capital by choosing to launch his latest collection at the festival’s opening show.

Eschewing the usual pop/rock fashion-show mix, Isogawa sent models quietly down the runway to the soothing sounds of a rainforest, draping them in burnt orange, cream and black accessoried by heavy beaded necklaces and barely-there scarves.

Iconic local designers Easton Pearson, fresh from the launch of their 20-year retospective exhibition at GoMA on Saturday night, showed a colourful summer collection featuring hand-painting and metallic embellishment, while established Brisbane boutique Carmague offered a selection from their avant-garde European labels including Dries Van Noten and Martin Margeila.

Earlier in the day, right on the water’s edge and brimming with big-name designers, the swim parade had been a bright – and hot – start to the festival.

From the media scrums surrounding VIP guests to the bronzed, near-nude bodies themselves, the first show of the festival did not disappoint.

Barefoot models streamed from the gangplank of luxury cruise ship MV Fantasea Ammari and onto the baking concrete of Portside Wharf, parading in front of a sell out crowd assembled on white deckchairs.
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