‘It makes no sense’: The young designers pushed off the runway

On the television show Project Runway, former host Heidi Klum summed up the challenges of being a fashion designer with the catchphrase: “One day you are in, the next day you are out.”

For the first time in 26 years, the Fashion Design Studio is out of Australian Fashion Week, which begins today.

The new operators of AFW, the Australian Fashion Council, delivered the verdict in March, denying the application from TAFE FDS in Sydney, which helped launch homegrown labels Zimmermann, Akira Isogawa and Christopher Esber.

The work of emerging designers Emily Misaki Hon, Daisy-Rose Cooper, Shiva Yousefpour and Eidan Ceilidh will be featured in a rogue runway show before Australian Fashion Week. Models (from left to right) Jayden Hunter, Ava Rose Peterson, Scarlett Mandic, and Francesca Scott.Credit: Max Mason-Hubers

“The AFC made an early decision to do fewer showrooms and focus on a wholesale showcase, meaning student showcases were paused for 2025,” says AFW chief executive Kellie Hush, who added a book launch for Ksubi co-founder Dan Single, a dinner party for Vogue and a closing party for Ksubi to the schedule.

“The industry values the work we do, so the decision was surprising,” says Andrea Cainero, co-head of the FDS. “This has always been a platform for the next guard of designers.”

Rather than accept the “out” verdict, four designers from the FDS program are staging a rogue runway show, hours before the main event launches with the latest Carla Zampatti collection.

“We had to pivot and make sure that the designers are put first,” says co-head Laura Washington.

Cainero and Washington called on supporters to organise the last-minute showcase at the Overseas Passenger Terminal at Circular Quay. Turning the other cheek for an air kiss, invitations were extended to Hush and AFC staff to see the work of Eidan Ceilidh, Emily Misaki Hon, Daisy-Rose Cooper and Shiva Yousefpour.

“This should be on the official schedule,” says FDS alumni Gary Bigeni, who is showing his coming collection on Wednesday. “FDS gave us Zimmermann, Dion Lee, Romance Was Born and Michael Lo Sordo, who all became AFW mainstays. It makes no sense.”

Zimmermann left the AFW schedule for Paris Fashion Week years ago, but creative director Nicky Zimmermann will be front row at the FDS show today.

“Whether it’s within the AFW schedule or otherwise, young designers need a platform to present their collections to a wider industry audience,” Zimmermann says. “It’s really important that we are nurturing creative talent and getting behind students in fashion in tangible ways, particularly those who demonstrate potential and have that desire to put themselves out there.”

Having endured the stress of whether the show would proceed, the emerging designers are still processing their transition from the schoolroom.

The FDS fashion Innovators: Emily Hon, Daisy-Rose Cooper, Shiva Yousefpour and Eidan Monks.Credit: Max Mason-Hubers

“This marks the moment when we stop being students and start being designers,” says Cooper, who uses leaves foraged from the Blue Mountains to create ethereal prints. “We will always be learning, but this is an important step.”

AFW may also have learned from the experience, with Hush keeping open the possibility of FDS returning to the schedule next year. To borrow Klum’s other catchphrase, it might be auf wiedersehen instead of goodbye.

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