Love Affairs in Melbourne-Chapter 249 - 244: Irrelevant as Windhorse and Ox

March 2015.

Melbourne.

Victoria Market.

Designer Yan Yan’s sixth fashion show.

Yan II brand’s first high-end "ready-to-wear" collection presentation.

To call it ready-to-wear is somewhat misleading, as these are all designs and craftsmanship from Maison Yan II Haute Couture.

Moreover, most of the clothes had already been designed by Yan Yan in previous seasons.

This is why Yan Yan could manage another show just two months after the Paris Haute Couture Fashion Week ended in January 2015.

Haute Couture has always been elusive and exclusive.

The idea of Haute Couture clothes juxtaposed with a vegetable market is nearly inconceivable.

Which Persian Gulf Noble would ever wander through a vegetable market themselves?

Actually, this question is pretty interesting.

You’re not a Persian Gulf Noble, so how would you know they wouldn’t?

No matter how rich a person is, they’re still just a person.

Jack Ma eats instant noodles just the same, and billionaires eat at roadside stalls — even the kind where there are no decent tables or chairs and you have to squat at the side to eat.

If you enjoy cooking yourself, then you must pick the freshest, finest ingredients.

Sure, a plethora of housekeepers at home can do the shopping for you, but can they really satisfy your standards 100%?

Although it’s quite a rare occurrence, it’s not surprising for Persian Gulf Nobles to spontaneously desire to cook a gourmet dish without having decided which side dishes to use.

Without visiting a vegetable market, how would you find inspiration?

If you’re buying Haute Couture as if it’s a "sacred offering" to be treasured rather than worn, then you’re not really a regular Haute Couture customer.

Real Persian Gulf Nobles treat Haute Couture as everyday wear.

If Yan Yan were a Persian Gulf Noble, then her purchase of 32 suits for daytime wear during her first visit to a Haute Couture Fashion Week wouldn’t be considered big news.

After all, in countries abundant with oil, nobles tend to omit several zeros when spending money.

Introducing a Haute Couture show to a vegetable market, such a heaven-shocking, earth-startling idea, even Old Buddha from the Chanel dynasty, who’s never short of creative ideas, has never thought of it.

Old Buddha has tried transforming his favorite venue, the Grand Palais in Paris, into a supermarket, restaurant, and terminal.

But those settings were "fake," man-made, all within the Grand Palais; they were not real nor open-air spaces.

Yan Yan chose the Queen Victoria Market for her show venue.

Apart from a canopy overhead, this vegetable market is basically an open-air space or, more precisely, semi open-air.

This oldest market in the Southern Hemisphere, aside from holding a night market on Wednesdays, usually "closes" early during other days.

For the Victoria Market, closing is merely a formality, as each stall can be moved.

Stallholders often have one or two "Mini Containers".

In the afternoon, they push their stalls into these containers, secure them near pillars, then lock them up.

To avoid disturbing the market’s daily operations, Yan Yan chose Monday night for her first show outside of Paris.

The Queen Victoria Market is closed on Mondays, this allows for stage construction to start after the market’s operations end at 4 p.m. on Sunday, providing 24 hours for installation and adjustments, as long as everything is ready by 4 p.m. on Monday.

However, 24 hours is far from enough for setting up a grand fashion show stage.

Lighting and backdrops on the market ceiling can be prepared in advance, posing no problems for the market’s routine opening and closing as long as they don’t exceed the height of the Mini Containers.

But once the model’s catwalk stage is set up, it’s not possible to conduct a show without interfering with the market’s daily activities.

The design of the show venue is just as crucial for a fashion presentation.

Indeed, many people attend Fashion Weeks specifically to see the design of the show venues.

Top luxury brands usually have their own architects and design firms they regularly collaborate with.

In Paris, finding a design team for a show venue is very easy.

Paris is a city that belongs to fashion shows.

Melbourne, however, is an entirely different concept.

Yan II chose Melbourne as the location for its second global Haute Couture studio and its first high-end ready-to-wear flagship store.

Yan Yan chose Melbourne for the opening of Yan II’s first ready-to-wear flagship store because it gave her a sense of coming home.

Of course, she would have preferred Wenzhou, but it’s still quite removed from being an international metropolis.

The only metropolis that could make Yan Yan feel at home was Melbourne.

Besides Yan Yan’s personal reasons, several of her newly acquired regular Haute Couture buyers were from Australia.

These clients were frequenting Paris so often that they grew tired of making the trip.

For established Haute Couture studios with many tailors and design assistants, Australian nouveau riches could even ask designers to visit their homes; to these wealthy clients, issues solvable with money are never a big deal.

Yan Yan, however, didn’t have as many tailors and assistants, and she never offered "home visits".

If not for her own weariness of Paris, she wouldn’t consider offering "home visits" for her Australian regulars.

And of course, there was another client, far more important than any High-end Custom Club Member.

The person who passed the fashion genes to Yan Yan — her mother, Lu Bingran.

Unlike other clients who only sought Haite Couture from Yan Yan.

The flagship store in Melbourne, from site selection to contract negotiation to renovation, had been managed entirely by Lu Bingran.

Retired and away from the clamor of sewing machines, Yan Dabang could delve into his own craft while Lu Bingran was restless without something to do.

Typically, securing the right storefront, negotiating a contract, and completing renovations on Collins Street — often dubbed Australia’s premier street and one of the world’s top ten luxury shopping districts — would take at least two years.

Armed with her "dedicated translator" Bao Bao, Lu Bingran settled everything in just one year and two months.

Yan Yan initially planned to hold her first ready-to-wear show in Melbourne by the end of the year, but since the flagship store was already renovated — positioned on Collins Street where rent costs more than gold — such a large space fully furnished and window displays perfectly styled, waiting another year to open would be impractical.