I moved to Italy for love...

... and missed this years Australian Rosemount Fashion Week. I couldnt be there, but here are my favorites from the line up:

Romance Was Born 'Renaissance Dinosaur' show

Romance Was Born

Camilla and Marc displayed some gorgeous designs but the head wear really stood out for me. Here a model wears a floating feathers headpiece created by milner, Johnathan Howard. The feathers are hand-dyed turkey feathers and a similar piece can be ordered by contacting Johnathan via www.hatmaker.com.au

Kirrily Johnston 'Apocolypto' collection

Kirrily Johnston 'Apocolypto' collection. I love the double wrap belt. Florence is renowned for their amazing belt work. I had a couple made specially for me that triple wrap around my waist

Dion Lee. This is a gorgeous photo with the Sydney Harbour bridge reflected in the glass

Alice McCall designed the belts she used for her collection.

This year was no exception to the caliber, quality and design that is showcased year after year at the annual Australian Fashion Week. My twin sister and I have been fortunate enough to work at this event in the past, helping designers with the pre runway prep and as a result were photographed for Harpers Bazaar magazine.

Im proud to be part of the industry that is Australian Fashion.

The Man I Was Taught to Fear

There are people we grieve twice in a lifetime. Once for who they were. And once for who we were never allowed to know. My father is one of them. When I was a child, my mother told me he was a paedophile. She didn’t whisper it. She didn’t hesitate. She said it plainly, as fact. As warning. As control. When we misbehaved, she would drop us at the greyhound station and force us to spend sleepless weekends with him. I remember the noise of the station. The way my stomach would knot. The terror that would sit in my chest at night when the lights went out. I was absolutely terrified to sleep. He was a workaholic. Twelve-hour days. Long hours. Absence disguised as provision. He would leave cash on the bench, stockpiles of food in the fridge, and the television on - a wild luxury I couldn’t enjoy because fear had already moved in. At home with my mother, we weren’t allowed a TV at all. Looking back now, my father was unemotional, but never unkind. He didn’t ask questions. He didn’t offer hims...

Versions, and “Versions”

I’ve already written about The Wiiyaan as a journalist. That piece lives in the Tweed Weekly . It’s careful, respectful, measured. It honours Bundjalung origin story, place, and the quiet authority of listening. It was written for a broad audience, many of whom - like me - come from settler families, carrying our own histories alongside the land we now call home. But after filing that story, I knew I wasn’t done. Some stories ask something back from you. This one did. So this is the version that doesn’t fit in a newspaper column. This is the version that explains why that exhibition cracked something open in me - why listening to Kyle Slabb speak about holding one version of Country, with care and restraint, felt like a mirror I wasn’t expecting. Kyle spoke about perspective. About how this telling is not the story, but a story - shaped by lineage, responsibility and law. He was clear, careful, and deeply respectful of other versions held...

The Painter on the hill

I went to meet Scott McDougall deliberately underprepared. This is not how journalists are usually meant to begin. We are supposed to research, cross-check, read the biography, study the exhibition history, arrive with neat questions and enough knowledge to sound vaguely authoritative. But Scott had been recommended to me by artist Hobie Porter, who told me he was someone I might find interesting. That was enough. I did not want to arrive with the internet’s version of him already sitting between us. I wanted to meet the man, see the work, stand in the room where it happened and absorb it without the corruption of other people’s opinions. I am not an art writer. Not really. But I am an artist at heart. A fashion designer by training. A lover of light, texture, form, fabric, structure, composition and the controlled drama of a perfectly judged line. Becoming a journalist has opened a new lens. It has also made me realise how often I underestimate people. My general disappointment in hum...

Rada Priya

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