Luvvies, it's that Fashion Week time again

Daarlings... Sorry, but if you haven't got your hair and makeup done and your Louis Vuitton notebook filled with invites yet, then you're just not on the list for the country's fashion industry's hottest ticket.

But don't worry, we can get you front row seats to all the shows at New Zealand Fashion Week and take you behind the scenes as the celeb set cuddle up to their favourite designers. Throughout the week the Herald will bring you daily coverage of what's hot and what's not at the Air New Zealand sponsored event. You won't have to jostle for a seat or stand on stilettos all day, just sit back and size up the latest looks - because, like them or not, in six months they'll be hitting the shops.

And if you don't give a toss whether peony pink is the new black, consider this:

* Apparel is now a leading New Zealand export, just short of wine. In the year to this June, total apparel exports were $302 million, up 7.5 per cent in a year (compared with the 2 per cent the country's exports grew overall).

* Designer apparel makes up around one-sixth of apparel exports, but is the leading edge into new markets.

* Add in footwear and textiles and the total exports are just short of what we earn from the film and IT industries.

* High fashion is one of the creative industries (think also film and design) which the Government is backing to lead New Zealand's niche market appeal to the globe.

* The event's naming rights sponsor, Air New Zealand, also likes the fit because cutting-edge couture and promoting a fashionable end-of-the-world exotic destination have a certain stylish synergy.

That all adds up to growing markets for the country's future.

Plus it brings a host of overseas buyers and media to town for what is essentially a trade event, with glamour attached. For, unlike other product expos, this one has the advantage of being a four-day photo-opportunity.

It is estimated to directly generate $23 million for the economy, most of it for Auckland.

If the guests like what they see, they'll go home with orders filed and stories to spin - all helping to add value to an industry that was badly knocked by 1980s' deregulation and imported clothes that eat into the local manufacturing base.

Skills shortages and cheap imports still bedevil the industry, but exports, particularly to Australia (which takes now 74 per cent of them), are healthy and new markets are being forged in Asia and America.

Reflecting this, Fashion Week's team have been courting guests from New World countries.

The British have been attending since the event started in 2001 and the Australians already buy so many of our clothes that they claim some of our top designers as their own. Expectations are that this fourth Fashion Week should be the best yet.

For the first time, all of the country's around a dozen top designers have signed up. In all, 45 labels will be on offer in 30 individual and group shows.

More than 10,000 people will attend, with 160 overseas buyers registered in addition to the hundreds representing local stores. Most of the overseas contingent is from Australia but others are from Europe, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong and the United States, including buyers from leading department store Nordstom, which last year loved Trelise Cooper's range, helping her expansion State-side.

Media includes London's Telegraph and Times newspapers, Australians from Vogue, Harpers Bazaar and the Sydney Morning Herald. Internationally syndicated television show Fashion File will be represented by fashion commentator Tim Blanks. Hip New York style mag Black Book is sending author and columnist Emma Forrest.

A new venue, the old Team New Zealand base at the Viaduct, offers more flexibility than the smaller Town Hall of previous years and more of a chance for the public to pick up on the atmosphere.

Water taxis will ferry guests - and anyone who wants to pay a small fare to come along for the ride - across the Viaduct. Some of the area's bars and restaurants, including the Hilton where many of the guests are staying, have special events, meals and cocktails on offer.

Best of Fashion Week shows will allow the paying public to see edited highlights of the week on Thursday evening, when official events wind up.

And for anyone not frocked out by Friday, the separate New Zealand Runway event also begins a four-day run over the long weekend.

And if you want to make like a delegate, Max will be selling the official Fashion Week T-shirt and bag from Saturday. Last year they sold out in a flash, showing if you can't make it, then it's cool to fake it.

* Best of Fashion Week tickets from Ticketek.

The Numbers

2000 garments from 45 labels.

200 models with 70 dressers.

560 hairstyles by 48 stylists using 600 cans of hairspray.

5000 minimum cost of an on-site show. Off-site your sponsor is the limit.

2000m of black lycra and 5000 flowers to dress the venue.

35,000 Fashion Week-themed paper cups for use this week on domestic flights of sponsor Air New Zealand.

4000 uniforms for the national carriers crew designed by Zambesi and to be unveiled at Fashion Week 2005,

200 taxis - Alert is dedicating its entire fleet of late-model Fords and Holdens to ferrying delegates about

2km of cabling to feed screens and projectors, including public screens at the Viaduct.

50 DJs broadcasting live on George FM for four hours a day for four days.

720 Glam Shine Sorbet lipsticks form L'Oreal, which is also supplying 30 makeup artists and 100s of concealers and mascaras.

8000 piccolos of Deutz.

4500 bottles of Waiwera Water.

40,000 glasses of champagne - well that was last year.

* The Hilton's White restaurant sells more bubbly during Fashion Week than at any other time of the year.


Herald Feature: Fashion Week

Fashion Week photo gallery

NZ Fashion Week - official site