Style It Up

Once upon a time in a land called Boston University, a student group called Umoja hosted a magical show called Fashionably Ever After on February 27, 2010. Now this event had many characters featured but our main characters were the designers of the night. Let’s see how this fairy tale played out.

This show always draws a huge crowd and this year was no different. It was a bit disappointing to have an extreme late start for the show (Show was suppose to start at 7 but started at because the audience grew extremely restless as the minutes ticked on by. This definitely meant that the show had to be of great quality for such a huge delay. Showtime and we were introduced to the models of the evening. The audience cheered for all and especially the ones they came out to support. Our hosts for the evening were Jonathan Priester and Ashley Lattimore. The audience had mixed feelings about their hosting skills. The audience favored Jonathan more than his co-host Ashley. Jonathan was quite entertaining and had a natural stage presence. His co-host seems to try to hard to get a laugh from the audience. At times she was a bit over the top when she really did not have to be. As a team, it seems a bit forced with the chemistry that at times their performance felt awkward to watch. There were a few hit moments but a lot miss moments that the audience wanted the show to move along.

The fashion presentations were very well done. 6 designers presented their collections. The six were Autumn Adeigbo, Ty Scott, Akia Ramsay, Sonjia Williams, Renee Sweeney, and Prajje Couture. The designers’ collections represented a different Disney childhood movie. A few of the scenes had little snippets from the movie to highlight the fashion.

Autumn Adeigbo represented The Lion King with the title scene Hakuna Matata. This collection’s color scheme was based on warm hues with emphasis on different African prints. There were a lot of yellows, oranges, browns, yellowish greens, orangish red in the mix. Her line was a very relaxed ready-to-wear featuring a combination of dresses and separates. Adegbo displayed a style that is ready for a great summer day or night.

Keeping up with a cool collection was Ty Scott. He represented Aladdin with the title scene Arabian Nights. Ty showcased a white and copper/bronze urban line full of separates for that individual who wants to be comfortable and stylish. Now SIU and Ty Scott fans, we have seen a bit of this collection before from 2009 Boston Fashion Week. But Ty took this section of his collection and remixed it. You could not say you have seen this remixed collection before. This line had a fresh appeal to it that the college students fell in love with. As a designer, it is all about the craft of making clothes and making a collection fresh and memorable. Ty Scott continues to do that while bringing out new creations.

Designer Akia Ramsay played into the theme from Pocahontas with Colors of the Wind. Her collection was a mix of Aztec patterns, pinks and different earthy solids. It was a nice collection for the show’s theme but not really a memorable one.

Designer Sonjia Williams kicked off the second half of the show. Her movie theme was Snow White and her scene was Mirror, Mirror on the Wall. She did a mix of soft and hard with this collection. We saw a couple dresses and separates that used lace and fabric that flowed on the body for a soft touch. Majority of the collection had military like jackets, a few with capes, with harem pants. The military jackets were very well constructed. They had a sharp, edgy feel to them. She used dark colors for the jackets, which was a play on to the wicked queen from Snow White. Harem pants were big for last spring so I bit lost to see this element as apart of the collection. The harem would have been more fitting to be seen in the Arabian Nights scene. Sonjia did pay homage to Snow White with her modern day version of Snow White’s staple outfit.

To Infinity and Beyond was the scene for Renee Sweeney. Playing on the Toy Story’s infamous phrase, we were expecting to see futuristic styles. This collection did not live up to that at all. It was very passive and leaning on the side of forgettable. There was a mix of body suits, flowing tailored outfits and shorts for the men. The color palette was a blend of khaki and pink with the strong base of gray. The collection was too safe. It would have been nice to see an edgier line to match the scene.

Closing out the fashion show and capturing the title of the show, Fashionable Ever After, Prajje Couture delivered elegant eveningwear. As we all know in every fairy tale, the princess needs a beautiful gown to make a dramatic entrance when show goes to the ball. Well look no further princesses; Prajje Couture is the designer for you. He showed a mix of eveningwear that range from soft and feminine to show stopping chic. He also showcased a couple of bridal dresses. He did not forget about the men. Prajje featured a couple of tailored suits. He was definitely a crowd pleaser. You could hear through out the audience how the women were in awe and falling in love with each of the gowns.

Sprinkled between the fashion scenes were different performances. The overall vibe was a mixed one for the talent. There were a few hits and a couple of misses. Major of theses came from the vocal performances. The performers represented from 3 schools: Berkley College of Music, Northeastern University and host school Boston University. Here’s a recap.

Berkley student Alain Lubin performed a melody of R&B songs while playing his acoustic guitar. His melody featured My Girl by The Temptations, I Wanna Know by Joe, and Bedrock by Young Money featuring Lloyd. The last song the audience was surprise to hear that song mixed in. They thought he would go old school all the way. Alain features a young Maxwell with a loveable personality. The crowd was singing along with him. Alain gave an overall good performance.

Reggae soul singer Mario Evon hailing from Kingston, Jamaica and another Berkley student gave a great performance. He opened with Bob Marley’s Turn Your Lights Down Low. The audience participation with Mario made the performance an intimate one. He closed out with one of his original songs, Love You in the Morning. This song was definitely well embraced by the ladies. This is one artist to definitely look out for in the future.

Rapper Oumar Sow from Northeastern University missed the mark his performance. Katrina Bello performed with him when he performed Jay-Z’s Bonnie and Clyde. Alain Lubin played acoustic guitar for the melody. It was a decent performance until Oumar did Forever by Drake with Alain singing the chorus of the song. That song turned off the audience. It was not a right match for these to perform this song. It was received as more as a joke than actual appreciation of Oumar’s set.

Singer Orlando Dixon was another singer that did not impress the crowd. His vocals are all right but he did not give a memorable performance. He sang Chris Brown’s Transform Ya. In the middle of the song to the same Transform Ya rhythm, Dixon mixed it up with singing Trey Songz’s Invented Sex. He may have good intentions for this but it did not work at all.

Closing out the night and rounding out the vocals was Berkley student Katrina Bello. We saw her earlier in the night singing with Oumar Sow. It was now her time to shine. She performed a beautiful song but due to how late the night was getting majority of the audience left after the last fashion presentation. Katrina did not play to a full house like she did earlier, which was really unfortunate. She gave a great performance to the remaining audience.

Singing was not the only form of entertainment we were treated to for the night. BU’s own spoken word artists Jessica Kontchou and self-proclaimed feminist Karla Heredia performed their pieces. These ladies did not disappoint at all. Each one did their take on fairy tales and so called happily ever afters. BU’s step team X-Ception gave a powerful step routine. This year’s theme was Disney Rehab with Dr. Drew. They did little skits that played off the fairy tale theme. BU’s dance team Soulstice gave an all right performance. It was not as memorable as past years. Contemporary dancer Myesha Mullens did a nice dance performance.

Overall the show was good, a bit on the long side, but good. They could have subtracted out the dance contest and audience model walk-off with the time creeping into the late hour. I understand its tradition to have but these are things to consider subtracting when running an event with a long program. The fashion was what it was all about for the evening. Fashionably Ever After accomplished the goal with paying homage to the fairy tales that we all knew and grew to love from a fashionable point of view.

Til the next runway,

Ms. B