Phoenix Fashion 2011: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

By Becky Bartkowski Tue., Dec. 20 2011 at 11:48 AM

Categories: Fashion

Claire Lawton

The Phoenix fashion scene may be small, but try to tell anyone within the tight-knit community that there's nothing going on, and you'll quickly be reminded that our city has a bevy of local designers, independent, beautifully curated boutiques, and more than a few fashion shows that embrace both wearable art and everyday threads.

And while it finds inspiration in national and international trends and forms an identity of its own, this little corner of the fashion world continues to surprise, scare, and stun us.

Here's a look back at Phoenix fashion in 2011.

The Good: The opening of Tiffe Fermaint and Crystal Phelps' "Sepulture" at eye lounge over the summer marked one of the first local gallery shows to feature a collaborative effort by a visual artist and a fashion designer.

Ryan Wolf

The Bad: Project Ethos came through the Valley twice in 2011, and, while we love the idea of spurring competition between local designers (who, for some reason, seem to live in their own bubble boy worlds instead of trying to best each other), being "inspired" by Vitamin Water just plain sucks.

The Ugly: Look. We're not asking for non-stop, honest-to-Gaultier couture or anything. But t-shirts at Phoenix Fashion Week? You design t-shirts? Come on.

The Good: Amidst the Missoni for Target mayhem, Vintage By Misty brought in yards of the Italian house's famed fabric. And, well, to slightly modify a Rachel Zoe-ism: We died.

The Bad: Scottsdale Fashion Week was postponed until 2012 due to folks getting confused about the difference between SFW and Phoenix Fashion Week. Duh? Why do we need two fashion weeks -- let alone in the same season? The postponement gets a "bad" tag because we were kind of-slash-really hoping that it would be canceled outright.

The Ugly: Scottsdale was statistically proven to be a mecca for shopaholics. We didn't need a study to figure that out, we've seen enough gratuitously bedazzled, blinged, and barf-worthy outfits in Old Town to prove that ladies (and gents) will buy just about anything to out-sparkle and out-douche their clubbing counterparts.

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