THURS @ ELLE RISING STAR DESIGN AWARD AND A ROADTRIP TO CT

 As you might have noticed from the last couple of posts, I spent last week in Johannesburg. Now besides all the other drunken mischief I got up up to, the main reason for my visit was to attend Mr Price & Elle’s Rising Star Design Award show. And it really was a fantastic way to end my week there. As a fashion school graduate, I am really passionate about young designers and the work they put out. It truly is not the easiest of careers, fashion schools all around the country are pumping out thousands of graduates, most of whom will never show another fashion range after their graduate show. Yes I am one of those; to be honest I never really had the required patience, discipline and business acumen. So I’m always happy when competitions like this come around to encourage young designers, and I was also happy the judging was not done on creativity  alone but also on a certain level of potential to turn design ability into a viable business, because sweet skat designers also have to make a living, plus we’ve seen too many designers win competitions and then not be able to sustain careers. Of course it’s not all as simple as I might be making it out to be, there are a variety of factors at play, but that’s another discussion for another night. So without further rambling, here be the pics:

ELLE RISING STAR 2011 WINNER, KELLY ESTERHUYSE  

ELLE RISING STAR 2012 WINNER, JANE ELIZABETH KOTZE

SHEENA ANN UNWIN

RUAN JOOSTE

ELLI-NICOLE SAZEIDES

GABRIELLE DARNE

TAMARA CHERIE DYSON

ANMARI HONIBALL

SINDISO KHUMALO

 AND LATER AT THE AFTERPARTY

AND EVEN LATER AT KITCHENERS

 A couple of days before the show, my friend Fumi and I decided to cancel our flights and do a slow roadtrip back home to Cape Town. So after hooking up a car, we thought we’d try out the N14 and the N7 through the Kalahari, neither of us had ever taken that route so we decided it was about damn time. It was fun. We checked out cool countryside houses (cool to us anyway)

We amused ourselves with the mundane

  We saw gay unicorns (gunicorns, ngunicorns if they’re gay and xhosa), we were tempted to ride them hard but we didn’t.

The Joburg traffic and rush now a distant memory, we chilled into a more Capetonian temperament and enjoyed a boozy Sunday afternoon in the sun, and contemplated tweeting Helen about the shortage of cycling lanes in Sea Point.

 Then I got home and told my cats all about it, they’re big Elle fans so they were so mad they swore never to let me enter them in competitions again. Dammit, and the Nationals are just around the corner and that Grand Supreme prize is so close. Oh well, there goes my dream of owning the best pussy in the country.