Opening Doors at Milan Fashion Week
Emerging Moda – “A decade of helping ideas turn into brands”
Photographers: Jim Eisele & Flora Cuzi
Attending the shows during Milan Fashion Week was no simple feat. What I mean by that was TRYING to attend the shows was the challenge! But that wouldn’t stop our gang of four. Our rockstar team was a necessity weaved together in the fabric of the season. So put on your running shoes called heels and join us as we walk through the doors we opened one by one at the infamous Milano Fashion Week in Italy September 2018.
Spoiler Alert! We absolutely
conquered every hurdle that came our way.
Let’s back up to the beginning of July while sourcing leather for one of my top-performing designers, Judy Cummins with Elizabeth Grace Bags (@elizabethgracebags). Leather vendors began to send out last-minute invitations to LineaPelle leather trade show in New York City only two weeks away. Judy was a great sport and hopped on the bandwagon to meet up at the show to fine-tune her patterns and dig deep into the multitude of leather options. This is how Door #1 presented itself and we seized the opportunity. So here it was mid-July when Door #2 came along.
Winnie Harlow
I got to show off some of my Italian speaking skills by chatting with a guest speaker who happened to be the Milan Fashion Week runway scout! She realized I have produced over 90 different brands collections so she extended the offer to come to MFW. Well, one sign I should wear on my forehead is, “When I say I’ll do something wild, I will!” I don’t think she thought I’d take her up on her offer being that MFW was 2 months away and flights and hotels still needed to be booked. She was in for a surprise (literally written all over her face) when my 2 amazing photographers, Judy and myself met her in the hallway of Camera Moda on the morning of the first day of shows. She had a lot on her plate so she didn’t prepare our seating arrangements and left it up to her assistant to squeeze us into some last-minute openings. This is when it became apparent that just because you’ve made it through 1 Door doesn’t mean you’ve made it.
Thus, we needed to rack our brains to find a solution and fast. Meanwhile, the shows had started and important people were scurrying from one show to the next. My photographers were Jim from Florida and Flora from Milan. They’re both rockstars at the details in the photos, whether it be lighting, crowds of people in the background, clothing adjustments, and fresh angles of the runway, models, shoes, and smiles. Jim is great at handling stressful situations and cracking a joke to help remind us it’s not the end of the world in fashion. Another photographer said it best when he called him a 10 out of 10 in his work and skill.
www.fashionfl.com
He is incredibly good at making the model’s character come to life. Flora is a great product photographer for accessories such as shoes, bags, and jewelry. She also happens to be a lifesaver at knowing her hometown of Milan and how to travel more efficiently between the many locations on foot, metro, or even taxi.
www.fashionmilano.eu
Karl Lagerfeld
That leads us to Door #3
Between Jim’s fashion magazine connections and Flora’s registration knowledge, we beelined it to the grand office in Milano Centrale where all the largest TV networks and press relax to submit their content.
The best news of all was to simply hear that if we just pay the registration fee, we’ll have all the show contacts we need to get into the runway scenes. Door #4 was clear when I knew the only way to take us to the next level of show experience was to fork over the cash plus late registrations fees so I bit the bullet and turned a blind eye to the credit card receipt purchase. Soon to find out that a minor detail was missing. Yes, we got all the press contacts we need but needed to call them 6-12 months ago for confirmed seating arrangements. So we were right back to Jay-walking the outskirts of shows just like the locals.
Door #4 did get us into the one and only bougie lounge with our new additions of photography and press passes. Let me tell ya, I felt like I was walking on cloud 9 (except I was actually in painful heels) when flashing my badge past the Italian suited-up bodyguards of this lounge. We got to enjoy small hors d’oeuvres for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the next 6 days, not to mention the flowing champagne and wine served at any hour.
If Judy isn’t bold, I don’t know what she is! Once inside the lounge with a bunch of cool cats, Judy opened Door #5 and took the liberty to make friends across the room with a stud of a writer named Breck Graham, author, and founder of Black & Paper (www.blackandpaper.com). He mingles with all the top dogs and everyone knows and loves him!
See what I mean by checking out
our interview below filmed by none
other than the sweetheart and talented
“Baby Dior Cinematography Director Digital Video Assistant
TANIA CAPORASO
Boisterous Films
Milan Fashion Week Interview Part 1
Milan Fashion Week Interview Part 2
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Finishing off with Door #6
We spent more time with Breck at various shows and he connected us with the wonderful couple Walter DeSilva & his wife Emmanuela.
www.walterdesilva.com
Their shoes are incredibly beautiful and incredibly lightweight and comfortable with Walter’s background in car design but I’ll save this exciting news for a future article. So stay tuned! You can get a sneak peek at Jim & Flora’s creative work at @streetstyle__vision. When I went live on my Instagram Stories, I got to share my modeling experience with thousands of ladies that got a first-hand look at Walter DeSilva’s Milan Fashion Week Showroom!
Known Fact
A team that can travel together, stays together! Bound to come against the day-to-day issues while traveling in the realm of the unknown, and each person played a perfect role at the right place at the right time. I’m so thankful for the doors we opened together to make it work. The only way to go is forward!
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