Just imagine: walking on the longest fashion runway in the entire world–in Tobago.
On Friday, May 15, you can do just that, on a whopping 2.5-mile fashion runway made entirely of denim, extending from Rituals in Crown Point all the way to Pigeon Point Heritage Park. An adjudicator from the Guinness World Book of records will be on site to keep a keen eye on the proceedings, which will be a $500-a-head fund-raising event called Beautiful People Break Records.
This river of denim in Tobago is all part of Tobago Fashion Weekend, now rebranded as T&T Fashion Week (2TFW), to be held from May 8-17, with the highlight events on May 16 and 17 at the Pavilion in Pigeon Point Heritage Park, Tobago.
The event is now spreading its wings for a whole week instead of just a few days, with events both in Trinidad and in Tobago. Billed as a week of fashion, business and entertainment, 2TFW this year celebrates denim with its theme of Saga Pinto in Dungarees, and includes workshops, industry talk sessions, fashion on the beach and an online contest where people are invited to upload a photo of their own decorated, reinterpreted denim outfits; the winner will receive US$1,500 and a trip to attend 2TFW 2015.
The T&T Guardian caught up with Ashley Christmas, producer of the event since 2011, at the La Cantina gourmet Italian pizzeria on Victoria Avenue, Port-of-Spain last Friday, to hear more about the event, the T&T fashion scene, and Christmas himself.
"Technology is breaking geographical barriers," said Christmas, who is director and founder of the organisation called Designer United Stores (DUS) which manages all the 2TFW events and shows.
He was making the point that even small islands can make fashion statements now that the online world (plus smartphones) has radically democratised marketing, and now that methods of producing fashion don't necessarily have to rely on large, labour-intensive traditional methods of textile design.
A self-madedesigner-businessman
So who, exactly, is Ashley Christmas?
He's a self-made fashion designer and fashion events producer who grew up in the village of Canaan-Bon Accord, in southwest Tobago. After migrating to the US at age 16, he said he worked in business management and real estate (including property appraisals) for years before entering the fashion sector.
"One day I got up and decided I'd get rid of some of my properties and get into fashion because I'd always had an eye for it.
"I don't know if it came from being raised by my mother and my grandmother, and always being involved in the house at Christmas, doing the whole curtain thing and painting the house...Colours always came together for me. You travel and see different textures...and designing is fun."
He confessed he'd always wanted to explore his creative side, and so decided to enter the fashion sector in 2008. He taught himself by extensively exploring and researching the garment districts of New York, Los Angeles and London.
"One day I found this one New York company headed by two young men–Raymond Wong and Joseph Mbeh. They kinda pulled me in and said: We know what you're trying to accomplish. Let's teach you what you really need to know.
"They did everything from production to retail to graphic design to showrooms. They knew it from soup to nuts, because they'd worked with all the major brands, from Calvin Klein to Sean John to Rocawear.
"They worked with factories in both New York and China. They also had a line called Fourfront–a street contemporary couture brand."
Christmas learned directly from them from 2008 to 2010, everything from understanding fashion production to understanding how to finance a line, and today he still has a relationship with them.
In 2009, with business partner Kenneth Steimle, Christmas brought out his own fashion line called Earth Member for Life–a leisure clothing line that was "modern with a splash of urban." That same year he was invited to show his fashion designs (denim, t-shirts, polos and hats) at Fashion Week of T&T (FWTT). The FWTT was a successful fashion showcase event held from 2008-2010, founded by Dianne Hunt.
Christmas returned to Trinidad in 2010 to again be a part of FWTT, this time at one of its events in Tobago.
By 2011, he decided to launch his own unique Tobago event, Tobago Fashion Weekend.
2TFW expands
Christmas is proud of the event's development. In this, its fifth year, 2TFW will add new segments to the program including retail, distribution and online commerce opportunities for designers, training for models and education through workshops and school tours. There will be fashion from 25 designers, with 70 per cent of designers coming from the Caribbean and 30 per cent from foreign countries, including diaspora designers.
Christmas cautions against any fashion designer becoming a "one-man show" and says it's important for the fashion sector here to share information for growth.
"I like bringing people together... The downstream industries that spin off from the fashion industry are so many. I've met graphic designers, metal fabricators, electricians, people in the electronics industry, sound, lights. You need all that to make it work. There are people into textiles, fabric dying; fashion is such a wide field... But we focus too much here just on who is the high-fashion brand.
"I've always seen fashion as: you get into the products that can move; which are the consumables? The daily consumables, at that? And then you specialise. You don't specialise first and then get into the consumables."
He himself said he defines fashion not necessarily as high or low-end segments, but as aiming at the middle ground, especially in terms of the price point. And he freely admits he loves denim, which is a fashion sector worth billions.
His business background is evident from the questions he asks:
"What good is a fashion facade, if no business comes out of it? We need to know how to do several things at the same time, and do these to a consistent, professional standard: design, produce, showcase and retail. We also need to put our money where our mouth is."
That last point relates to having a consistent State-sponsored fixed budget to develop the fashion sector here, for a specific initial incubation period, something Christmas feels is necessary.
Meanwhile, get set for the colourful fashion splash of 2TFW in May.