Heart of the Nation: Wahroonga 2076
ONCE, people would look at photos of their grandparents' era and smile fondly - or even laugh outright - at all the strange fashions.
ONCE, people would look at photos of their grandparents' era and smile fondly - or even laugh outright - at all the strange fashions. So how to explain the emergence of a subculture among Gen Y that worships 1950s style?
Rita Fontaine, pictured second from right, is a good person to ask. Growing up in Brisbane, she was a proper tomboy; you'd find her most days in bare feet, cut-off jeans and flannelette shirt, riding her BMX.
But all that changed six years ago after going to GreazeFest, a vintage rock'n'roll festival. "I was amazed by what people were wearing," she says. "I just felt like this was the glamour that was missing from modern life. Most people these days spend a lot of money to look quite boring; vintage fashion opened up a whole world of colour and style and fun."
Fontaine, who's pictured at the Fifties Fair at Rose Seidler House in Sydney, modelling Sunday Best daywear, makes a living as a burlesque performer. She moved down to Sydney a couple of years ago to pursue her career, and it's going great - she has already won a Miss Burlesque Australia title and there's no shortage of work at the city's cabaret nights. The recent resurgence of burlesque, she says, is all of a piece with the 50s revival. In case you're wondering, the impossibly glamorous "Rita Fontaine" isn't her real name.
Pictured far left is Katerina Valentina. Is that her real name? "It might be, or it might not," Valentina says coyly. The 28-year-old lives and breathes the subculture, too. She has a nine-to-five job in publishing, but evenings are spent designing and making retro lingerie, meeting orders for her online business. She grew up in Orchard Hills in Sydney's west, daydreaming over pictures of vintage Dior house models. What is it about 50s style that obsesses her still? "The tailoring is just so elegant and feminine," she says. "It's all about emphasising what the woman already has; it flatters the female form."
Valentina admits she often feels like she was "born in the wrong era". Having said that, she's got an iPhone 5 on order. You can only take this vintage thing so far.