The biggest conundrum in fashion is that clothes are created for a huge, hungry, female audience yet the designers, directors and CEOs are mainly men. Then, whether it’s couture or the fastest fashion, the people that actually create the clothes, piecing them together in ateliers or sweatshops, are women too. It doesn’t add up. Except, this season at London Fashion Week, some of the brightest new names to know are resetting the standard. London Fashion Week female designers, including Nensi Dojaka, Dilara Findikoglu and Sinead O’Dwyer are reclaiming the male gaze and creating clothes that are red hot and just what women want to wear. And they should know.
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At Nensi Dojaka, winner of GLAMOUR’s ‘Fashion Designer’ Women of the Year Award, the dresses comprised wispy slips of lace and tulle with delicately pleated bra-cups. Oversized blazers were slung over the top and straight leg jeans in the perfect washed blue jeans came spliced with chiffon. It was undoubtedly a revealing way to dress but seen through a woman’s eyes the play of what was on show… and what lay beneath… made it far more enticing. Nensi told GLAMOUR last year, "Fashion is still mostly run by men – but that's starting to change” and she is at the forefront of this shift.
The designer takes home GLAMOUR's ‘Fashion Designer’ Women of the Year Award, in partnership with Peroni Nastro Azzurro.
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In the personal notes from her show, Dilara Findikoglu pondered, “Why men have way too much control over our bodies? What should a woman wear? How much is too much? I’m confused. I have been trying to find answers, and I hid my own answer in my own collection. It’s not a man’s territory anymore, it’s ours. Our body is our territory. We are here to take it back.” Mixing the bra shapes that are so key at the moment with devastatingly sexy details - lace-up leather, corsets, latex stockings and unzipped dresses - the clothes could leave the wearers exposed by their very lack of coverage, but somehow the missing material didn't feel vulnerable. Instead the chains, straps, skin and plaited hair details looked strong and powerful, particularly considering the continuing hair-cutting protests in Iran. This collection took the fashion show concept beyond presenting mere garments and placed the clothes in an urgent social, politcial and feminist sphere.
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Di Petsa has become known for signature wet look draping that skims and highlights women’s bodies (spot the dresses on Bella Hadid and Megan Fox.) Founder Dimitra expanded this sensuality for autumn / winter 2023 with a collection rich with mosaic tiles of patchworked leather, ruched velvet pieces and an utterly goddess-worthy adulation of the pregnant bellies of the models that walked the show. It was sexy on its own terms.
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Feminist fashion might have found a poster girl in Sinead O’Dwyer who’s clothes are, quite simply, for everybody. The collection is created in such a natural way, from the glorious array of body shapes and sizes that O’Dwyer casts in her catwalk shows, to the inclusive stretch mesh that is becoming a signature. O’Dwyer doesn’t need to shout about bringing the focus away from the patriarchy, because it’s an obvious and necessary progression.
As more female designers take centre stage at London Fashion Week and usurp the traditional male gaze, we’re optimistic the pendulum will keep swinging towards women creating beautiful clothes, for women to love and to wear. Fashion, often derided for it's insignificance ('it's only clothes') and huge female fanbase, carries more might than we know. The collections from London Fashion Week female designers were a wake-call and reminder of the industry's potential power… within the right hands.
Read more from Glamour UK Fashion Director at large Alex Fullerton here or follow her on Instagram @alexandrafullerton
