Stolen Girlfriends Club Fashion Week
Considerations of a permanent space:
Stolen Girlfriends Club is a brand renowned for their fashion, but almost more so their parties. Having hosted a few earlier in the year with Asahi, I was asked to build their Mercedes Benz New Zealand Fashion Week show. Previous years had seen custom rubbish bins, takeovers of dilapidated theatres, speedway track runways - it’s no easy feat to one up 15 years of madness.
Compiling all of the usual suspects, we set out as a team to create a show in Marc’s hometown of Avondale. Avondale has a proud history of being the spider capital of Auckland, home to music acts such as Homebrew, and the remaining site of Avondale Racecourse. Once home to high-life horse racing and spectacular fashion, the racetrack has succumbed to urbanisation and nature reclaiming land. Now occupied for regular bingo nights and the Avondale Markets, the racetrack seemed to be the best place to lure an audience of keen fashion party punters.
Photo: NZ Herald
With curveball after curveball, we found out the weekly elderly bingo was due to be held the same night as the show. This meant we had to install the backstage area in another building. Luckily all buildings flow into another, much like some weird form of maze. Each level has it’s own connecting corridors that allowed us to shuffle models through the hallways and onto the runway - a tight squeeze but easy enough.

The show started bang on time. A man dressed in a black trenchcoat, hoodie, and boots walked down the runway lighting the barrels on fire. Over 30 models walked down the long runway, each giving a glimmer of Stolen’s rock and roll lifestyle. Two rows of allocated with grandstands filled with punters meant the roars were loud when their favourite models walked past.
The models did their final walk. Umbrellas in hand, they each walked side by side to assigned flaming barrels. Waiting patiently, each row opened their umbrella to a sprinkler system shooting rain into the crowds. The models stayed dry while the front row got wet, maybe the front row isn’t always the best seat in the house?
As the models left the runway the crowd leaped into the afterparty. Given Avondale’s somewhat remote location, the afterparty was held in the old original race bar. A tired old building, the pie warmer had pies, the taps had classic lagers going, and the vodka was poured with a heavy hand. Bands performed to a moshing crowd, a mix of punk, hardcore, and rock and roll. We were kicked out in the early hours of the morning.
Art Director: Chris Smith
Producer: Sarah Hough
Client: Stolen Girlfriends Club