Online giant parties offline

NATIONAL: The fashion division of online social networking phenomenon MySpace has a mission.  MySpace Fashion Australia aims to unite the Australian fashion industry through its first 'offline' event on April 17.

According to Rebekah Horne, vice president of MySpace Australia and New Zealand, the event would capitalise on the current online social networking boom. In February MySpace Fashion received a record 46,000 page views, she said.
"Clearly there is a huge advantage for fashion designers to be part of the vibrant MySpace community."

MySpace offered "great tools" for designers to create their own 'digital look book' and promote themselves locally and internationally to consumers and industry players, she said.

It was hoped the launch, falling on the eve of Rosemount Australian Fashion Week (April 28 to May 2) would attract 400 to 500 guests.

The guest list was expected to include jeans label Ksubi, womenswear label Alice McCall and emerging designer Kate Hirst, all of whom had a presence on MySpace Fashion. Meanwhile Sydney fashion boutiques including Capital L and Incu had expressed an interest in participating.

Taking place at Pages Studio in Sydney's Surry Hills, the event would also usher a number of new content provider partnerships for MySpace, including Oyster magazine, online fashion and lifestyle title Pagesonline and online street fashion portal Trender Bender.

Other highlights of the evening would include specially designed signage by fashion illustrator Fontaine and T-shirts by Sydney artist and designer Jonathan Zawada.

Horne said MySpace Fashion's interest in promotional partnerships was growing, with recent examples including sponsorship of fashion label Illionaire's party and support for the launch of jeans label Ksubi's 'coffee table book'  Sign of the Times.

With MySpace Australia boasting three million users and fashion emerging as a major component of its online community, Horne said she hoped the upcoming April 17 event would "open up ongoing discussion in the fashion industry".

MySpace Fashion would also roll out a number of designer showcase and fashion catwalk events over the next three to four months, she said.

"The point that I'd really like to make is that what we need for events like this to be successful is the enthusiastic participation of the whole fashion industry."

By Belinda Smart