NY Fashion Week: Opening Ceremony's Zana Bayne 9/6/13

On Friday night, we attended Opening Ceremony's Fashion Week event on the Pier at West 16th Street and the Hudson River, highlighting a number of designers and products featured in the store. The weather was wonderfully balmy, with a lovely breeze off the river.

Zana Bayne was the featured designer, presenting her Spring/Summer 2014 collection in person that evening. An added treat for us was the fact that we know her mother, Lisa Bayne, who runs Artful Home.   (Remember our Artful Home adventure?)  We first met Patrick Orcutt when he worked at StyleLikeU. He's now a PR consultant and manager at Agency V. Here (like many other people we will see during the course of the evening) he wears one of Zana's beautifully made harnesses, showing that these are now trending as legitimate street wear, elevating them from S&M uniform status.  (Valerie would have liked a harness - no one is heralding surgical boots as the next great accessory.)

The models, wearing Zana's leather accessories, emerged from the river side of the space and snaked their way through the crowd of people to strut their stuff - and Zana's stuff. They wore matching harnesses, bracelets, headpieces and belts

Love the tiara effect of this headdress. Who knew harnesses had fashion seasons? Would one not wear a white harness after Labor Day?

The dresses were body-con and all were black -- all the better to show off the accessories.

This shot gives you an idea of how tightly packed the crowd was surrounding the runway area and the depth of the space.  Note the overhead shipping containers providing the roof for the space.

The amazing Lichtenstein-come to life -- Mss Vee -- and her friends made an appearance.

And here's a close-up of those gams and those shoes! Something tells us we're not in Kansas anymore.

Stephanie (c.) from Beacon's Closet and her friend joined Valerie after the show.

They were so cute together! The place was awash with shipping containers, some converted into boutiques, like the one behind this couple, and some (suspended from the ceiling) not. Are shipping containers the new black?

Another growing trend is white hair, so we fit right in!  (Another growing trend is formal shorts.  We're passing on that one.)

When we admired this woman's beautifully draped dress, she told us she'd bought it at H&M.  That's when we recognized it as one of the Margiela classics that had been re-produced at great prices.

A wonderful part of the evening's entertainment was provided by these voguers, who danced wearing harnesses made by the evening's star designer, Zana Bayne.  The dancers are reed thin, but Zana tells us she made a custom harness for a 52 inch waist.

Jean with two harnessed dancers.

How amazing is this woman's exterior spine on a chain? She told us it is by OS Accessories, but it seems to have disappeared from their website, alas.

Patrick and Jean.

She and her outfit looked even more fabulous in person.  Behind her, another converted shipping container turned into retail space.

Jean and Andre.  His jacket, with its huge painted white roundel, is marvelously bold.   Enlarge the picture and have a look at the subversive character in yellow at the center right margin.

Jean and Andre full frontal.

Additional revelers.

We really liked her look.

Another trendy look.

Not too long ago, people would duck into dark narrow alleys to discreetly smoke a cigarette, or smoke something else, or get a little personal with another person.  And look quite sexy doing it.  Now everyone ducks into dark narrow alleys to check their phones.  And they look quite sexy doing it.

We loved the tailoring of the suit of the woman on the right.  Shouldn't all gatekeepers look like these women?

How amazing are this woman's flaming tresses? Turns out she's a friend of Ari Seth Cohen's.  It was kismet when the gent on the left showed up just before we snapped the picture. Loved how the print on his floral slacks echoed shades of orange.

Here we are having fun.  And yes, it's true.  We were the oldest people there that night.  But we didn't let that stop us.

More partygoers enjoying the scene.

Here is a frontal shot of the spinal harness, along with two other friends.

Valerie and friends.

At the stroke of 10, we were all  rushed out the door, so there must be some places in New York that are still unionized.  As patient guards looked on behind the scenes, we took one last photo -- with a pastel blue shipping container as background.

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Shipping Container Bonus

Click here for an article on a trendy shipping container home in trendy Brooklyn.