Fashion Democracy at REDONE II
Live fashion and live voting for a $1000 cash prize.
“No matter how much effort I put into my outfits, I always feel way under-dressed at these events,” my coworker John confided, over a drink at Luigi’s.
I like John. He dresses pretty sharp. But we definitely both looked like a couple of mid-40s dads next to the average guest at The Combine, the night of REDONE II— a fashion competition, presented by RCHIVE. Surprisingly, John and I were both essential parts of the contest that night. Thankfully, we were not the ones being judged.
Part design competition, part runway exhibition, part-party, the event wove together the cutting edge of Toronto’s indie fashion scene with the broader creative community like never before.
Okay— not “never”: this was the first sequel to last Fall’s wildly successful inaugural REDONE competition, where a live audience judged 12 fresh looks, each made of upcycled fabric from pre-existing Onemeth Goods apparel, with a $1000 cash prize going to the audience favorite. Revamping the series, a talented new batch of 6 local fashion designers came together for 48 hours onsite at RCHIVE to conceive, design and fabricate their looks. This year’s brief: the dichotomy of Yin-Yang.
The RCHIVE creative club launched a little over a year ago and, since then, has steadily gained an unmistakable presence in online and physical spaces, not least in their new shopfront on King West. Promiscuously collaborative, they’ve kept up a relentless showcase of music and art launches, fashion pop-ups, and runway exhibitions around the city, including one taking place on a packed subway platform during Toronto Fashion Week. Talk about an underground following.
This past October, as usual, the RE-DONE II event brought RCHIVE’s community out of the woodwork. The audience was excited, as clusters of event guests filtered in, filling the space to near-capacity. The back of the office had been closed off and repurposed as a dressing space for the designers and their models. At the border of the room, a path opened for a runway as the lights came down.
We watched the models come out, two-by-two, and climb the stairs to the catwalk, where the entire live audience of judges could glimpse each designer’s execution in motion. For voting integrity, applause would hold off until all the outfits were viewed, while a pounding industrial techno track set the tempo of the models strutting on and then off stage.
After the initial showing, Jai, who masterminds RCHIVE with his partner Sadaf, took the mic on the catwalk to make an announcement: “Now, you’ve seen all the looks. Who did it best? It’s time for you to judge our designers— but not too harshly.” Given the constraints, it’s unclear what Jai meant by that, since every creative concept was on point, and each piece was staggeringly well-executed. But, guaranteed, over the 48-hour sprint that brought the designs to life, the makers would have all faced a creative journey that we judges could only faintly imagine.
Soon, each pair of models reemerged to take up residence inside one of The Combine’s windowed breakout rooms, creating a living, breathing window display. Guests crowded in to get a closer look at the details of the work, read the artists’s statements, and make a decision. Meanwhile, a long, well-dressed snake of partygoers formed by the voting booths.
In most cases, the ensembles behind the plate glass defied or reinvented traditionally gendered silhouettes, using their reclaimed scraps of streetwear to dress their models in looks both otherworldly and yet threaded with familiar textures and shades. Hey! I thought at one point, I actually own the t-shirt that’s in that woman’s sleeve. After looking at all the outfits, their inventive stitching, and startling drapery, I found myself at the back of the line, genuinely torn about who to cast my vote for.
One guy I met in that line had already made his decision. “I think Michael Angelo killed the theme. Though,” he said, “I’m biased: Michael’s a friend.” Another attendee was also there to show support. Her boyfriend was modeling one of the looks designed by Fatalie, who had created a fresh, sustainable twist on Athleisure I could see myself wearing in the not-too-distant future (Maybe I’m not so dad-core after all?)
I even asked RCHIVE’s Jai if he secretly had a favorite look from the 6 amazing concepts (he wasn’t voting). He said “absolutely not”: Over the 2-day flurry of design in the workshop, he and the designers spent so much time as a close-knit group that it was impossible to stand apart from the process enough to make that kind of decision. Ultimately the winner was chosen by good old-fashioned democracy. By the way, congrats to the winner, Maya Ali (who got my vote)!
It’s obvious that for its founders and archivists, the RCHIVE club is about much more than competition-- or fashion, art, or music ("FAM") alone. Like The Combine, it’s a much-needed bold experiment in creative discovery and community-- one still being defined from within by the people making the stuff.
When I’d told John about how I’m writing about events like these at The Combine, to make them sound as cool as possible, he says, “That should be easy. If the events are as good as they look.” And he wasn’t (only) talking about the truly stunning looks on display on the runway. This was one of those fashion shows where you might mistake a member of the audience for one of the models.
But no matter how you came dressed, your voice mattered in the final result. Votes poured in, the booths closed, and the music went up. The night evolved from competition to collaboration, to a chance to eat, drink and mingle among judges, models, and designers alike. All said and done, REDONE II was another passionate gathering of people who, regardless of how “fashionable”, were actively working together to shape fashion.