Australian fashion week welcomes a new wave of maturity landing on the industry’s runways | Australian fashion week

Famous faces not seen on Australian runways for over a decade have made a return to Australian fashion week. On Monday afternoon Australian supermodel Gemma Ward opened the show for Melbourne designer Toni Maticevski. Ward was not the only model to signal a change in casting for the week to come. Though they have less name recognition, many of Maticevski’s other models were part of a new wave of maturity on Australian runways.

On Monday evening, former Victoria’s Secret angel Shanina Shaik walked for heritage Australian fashion label Carla Zampatti.

Shaik, who wore the coveted pair of wings in the early 2010s, said “there’s always something grounding” about returning to Australia to model. The last time she walked at Australian fashion week was in 2016, for international label Oscar de la Renta.

“There’s such an incredible energy around Australian fashion right now,” Shaik said. “It’s really nice to reconnect with people I’ve known for years.”

Shaik said she felt “confident and feminine” in the floor length black coat and sequined two piece skirt set she wore to open and close the Carla Zampatti presentation.

Though almost 20 years into her career, Shaik was far from the most experienced model at Carla Zampatti. Kate Bell, who wore a floor-length column dress and black leather opera gloves, has been modelling since before Shaik was born.

Bell went to catwalk castings early in her career, before pivoting to more lucrative work as a commercial model. Now in her 50s, she is a recent runway darling.

“I’m walking the most shows that I’ve walked in Australian fashion week ever,” Bell said. While friends have expressed surprise at her busy week, she said, “I have been putting in the spade work so it’s not all that surprising for me”.

Bell well remembers when anyone over 25 was considered too old to be a “typical” model. Gemma Ward was just 15 years old when she walked her first Australian fashion week runway, for Wayne Cooper in 2003. The next year, she became the youngest model ever to appear on the cover of US Vogue. She went on to walk dozens of international runways, and front a fragrance campaign for Calvin Klein. While the practise of casting teenagers fell out of fashion by the mid 2010s, featuring adults of all ages is a more recent development.

Though other measures of runway diversity, such as size, are backsliding, older women are increasingly visible. In January, Chanel’s haute couture show featured many models in mid-life and beyond. During the recent shows in New York, London, Milan and Paris, casting and front rows followed suit, from silver-haired models on the runway at Tom Ford, to Alicia Silverstone in the audience at Alaia, and Sissy Spacek at Loewe.

Shaik, who is in her 30s, said that the broader age range of models has changed the backstage atmosphere for the better. “I actually love it. I think the industry has evolved so much in the best way.”

“There’s less pressure to fit into one mould and more appreciation for women at different stages of life and career.”

Bell agrees. “I think everyone is just happy about it, the younger models, the more mature models that are there are just thrilled,” she said. However, she thinks the industry has not come far enough.

“There’s a lot more mature models that could be in the mix. And I think that’s what’s been spurring me on. Since my 40s, I’ve just thought the market is going to catch up at some point. And we need this as women.”

For designers, the appeal is twofold. Toni Maticevski, who showed superbly finished sculptural ball gowns, layers of tassels and exaggerated, funnel neck sweaters and coats, said all ages casting better reflects his customers. “My brand is diverse, it’s not pinned to single woman, it’s for a variety of women, and men, and everyone else.”

It also allows him to maintain longstanding relationships. Many of his models were “people that I’ve worked with for the last 15 to 20 years”, he said. When it came time to cast his show – also his first in over a decade – he approached them personally. “I said, ‘I want you in the show’.”

Bell’s busy schedule “shows how much the dial has turned for how women over 40 are ‘supposed’ to dress,” she says.

“I see my 87-year-old mum, and she’s still killing it, fashion wise. That idea that you lose your style as you get older is just some misogynistic madness.”

Bell is not thrilled with how models over 30 are described by the industry. “We’ve all been called ‘classics’ or ‘timeless’ or ‘ageless’ … but all those things are just really old ways of describing women.”

“The whole thing that we’re now selling is our presence, our story and our emotional credibility. We’re fully realised identities.” She would prefer to be known for “confidence, individuality and self-authorship, quite frankly”.

While most runways so far at Australian fashion week have included at least one older model, in one case it was not intentional.

At resort wear brand Commas’ Tuesday morning presentation on Tamarama beach, a silver-haired man strode down the steps ahead of the show’s first models. With a wave to the crowd, he walked part of the runway, then proceeded to warm up for his morning swim.