As fashion is a year-around business, it only makes sense to break it up into different sections of the year, making it more manageable and concise. A year in fashion is generally broken up into two different seasons, Autumn/Winter and Spring/Summer. When a designer designs their collection, they often reflect the season's weather conditions, such as coats for A/W and shorts for S/S. Each of these seasons will have the opportunity to be shown at fashion weeks around the world. Showing twice a year is also one of three guidelines to be considered a couturier. These fashion weeks are vastly important to the industry, because they act as the showcase for the coming six months. People who attend the shows include buyers at retailers, editors at magazines, stylists, and many other fashion industry professionals. The fashion week circuit is like a web of decisive people who look for things to buy to sell in stores, editors who scout different trends to feature in their magazines, and stylists who eye garments that will make celebrities look great on the red carpet. But these three very different jobs all reflect back to... making people want to buy the clothes. Fashion shows are a monumental to a designers career, because without people buying the pieces of the collection, they're nothing. It seems a bit complicated, and many get confused about the details of the collections, along with the sneaky mini-seasons that pop up occasionally among designers, but it's really not that hard. Just read below.
Spring & Summer
Michael Bastian Spring 2012
Autumn (Fall) & Winter
Balmain Fall 2011
This time of year, in terms of buying power is through the months of July and December, and are presented in February. The collections usually reflect wintery weather, making the clothes heavy, dark, and rich. A lot of outerwear is also presented. From a numbers perspective, the A/W collections tend to bring in more revenue for the designers, and they also tend to be pieces that have more staying power in peoples' closets.
Resort (Cruise) Line
Burberry Prorsum Resort 2012
And this is where is gets a little tricky. Way back when, designers would make a minor collection usually within the A/W season for their customers who were looking to go on vacation, and needed clothes suitable for a Caribbean island or a cruise around the Mediterranean, hence the term Cruise Line. These collections almost never get shown in an actual show, they are usually by showroom appointments for editors and buyers. It's also a little known secret that most designers don't design these collection, their design assistants do.
Photos courtesy of style.com
