The story behind Carrie Bickmore’s stunning Paolo Sebastian Logies gown

CARRIE Bickmore has shown us how it’s done on the Logies red carpet. But it wasn’t the only look The Project host was tossing up.

Carrie Bickmore looks sleek and sexy in a halter-neck Paolo Sebastian gown.

CARRIE Bickmore has done it again on the red carpet at the 59th Annual TV Week Logie Awards.

Arriving at Melbourne’s Crown Casino for television’s night of nights, The Project host went bold in a burgundy halter-neck Paolo Sebastian gown.

The 36-year-old mum of two regularly leads the style stakes at the event, and while she made the glamourous look seem effortless, it was the result of months of planning, with the final design whittled down from 10 options.

“When we initially started talking I sketched 10 or so designs and then it was refining that down and taking bits from different sketches I had done and coming up with one final gown,” designer Paul Vasileff told news.com.au.

Carrie Bickmore stuns in Paolo Sebastian at the 2017 Logie Awards.

“And what we did this year was Carrie came down for her first fitting and, because I wanted to get it exactly right, I actually made three toiles (calico versions). I mocked up three different designs I had in mind and we picked from there. It was a hard choice.”

One of the final sketches of Carrie’s Paolo Sebastian gown. Credit: Paul Vasileff, Paolo Sebastian.

‘Sleek and very sexy’ ... Bickmore chose the colour for the gown last year.

It’s the fourth consecutive year The Project host has collaborated with Vasileff’s label Paolo Sebastian for her Logies gown. And while the Adelaide-based designer has been working on this year’s dress since January, he says Bickmore selected the colour while designing last year’s ink black number.

“We had kind of talked about using that colour last year but we knew we wanted to do something really detailed (for 2016),” he said. “Her dress last year had so much detail. (There was) Leather, raffia — that detail wouldn’t have worked with this colour.”

Carrie smoulders in black in 2016.

Carrie’s winning look in 2015.

For the past two years Bickmore has smouldered in high-necked, long-sleeved gowns with geometric cutouts and beading, but 2017 called for a completely different look.

Vasileff said they workshopped the design together to come to a final “sleeker, very sexy” look.

“There’s been a lot of back and forth between us in working out the design and cut and shape,” he said. “We haven’t done any embroidery or bead work or lace work which we normally do. It’s all about the cut. Clean lines.”

“Clean lines” ... Vasileff says he and Carrie chose the final stunner from 10 sketches.

From the sketch pad to the red carpet, Vasileff estimates the gown took about 100 hours to create, the designer tirelessly refining the cut to fit as close to Bickmore’s curves as possible. While he doesn’t know the final cost Bickmore's custom made gown would come to, other Paolo Sebastian couture gowns start at $8,000 and go up.

When it comes to picking his favourite gown the pair have worked on together, Vasileff says it’s hard to go past the ice blue gown Bickmore wore in 2015 when she won the Gold Logie and delivered her unforgettably candid speech about brain cancer.

“ ... The memories that are attached to it — her winning gold and the speech she made that night,” Vasileff recalled. “But also working with her that year was a lot of fun ... I think two or three weeks before she had given birth.

“It was crazy but fun and we couldn’t sew it together until the last minute and we ended up having to take it in at the end because her body was changing dramatically after giving birth.”