Bebeto Matthews, Associated PressCleveland designer Valerie Mayen had just a month and a half to prepare 10 looks for the “Project Runway†show at Mercedes-Benz New York Fashion Week on Thursday. This tomato-red showstopper stood out from the crowd. NEW YORK — Nothing says New York Fashion Week like 11-year-old girls in faux-fur dresses and mirrored sunglasses.
But this year, the too-cool, black-clad fashionistas gathered at Lincoln Center to vet the looks of spring 2011 were treated to a bright, brash dose of Cleveland style courtesy of pixyish designer Valerie Mayen.
Mayen, 29, has wowed “Project Runway” judges throughout the show’s tumultuous season 8 with her innovative creations — like the darling cocktail dress she made from hundreds of party-store napkins — and impeccable construction.
And Thursday, among a sea of sun-bleached hues, her vibrant palette exploded off the runway.
“Latinas, we don’t shy away from color,” Mayen told the packed theater filled with power brokers, celebs and hangers-on before unveiling her 10-piece collection.
“I wanted to bring something really crackerjack,” she said, vibrating with good-natured energy. Her inspiration for the looks? “If Rainbow Bright and David Bowie had a love child,” giving a shout-out to the Thin White Duke, the one person in the world she’s said she’d most like to design for.
Mayen’s debut at Lincoln Center doesn’t mean she’s one of the top three finalists on the Lifetime reality-TV series. That little piece of information is being jealously guarded until the last episodes air over the coming weeks.
Contestants are under wraps, too. Mayen and nine designers who have yet to be told auf Wiedersehen by supermodel Heidi Klum — at least formally on TV — were unavailable for comment before and after the 10 a.m. runway show, sequestered like jurors at a mob trial.
When Simpson arrived, enveloped by an entourage, her much (and cruelly) commented-upon weight gain caused a catty stir in the audience. So much for USA Today’s prediction that “fuller bodies are definitely in” for spring.
Mayen styled her models in matching blonde and brunette bobbed wigs with severe bangs, giving them the look of futuristic flappers, the perfect complement to her aggressively modern collection that pays classic attention to craftsmanship and detail.
While her colleagues sent whispering grays, quiet nudes and soothing browns down the runway, Mayen’s designs shouted out loud with saturated jewel tones, the designer unafraid to pair a lipstick-red sleeveless vest and a fluorescent-pink dress with tulip layering.
Then again, what would you expect from a woman who named her label after that dessert classic of the 1950s, Yellowcake? Echoes of Mayen’s heroes, mod pioneers Rudi Gernreich and Paco Rabanne, the costume designer for the Jane Fonda space-vixen fantasy “Barbarella,” were evident in her runway pieces as was her love of architectural and geometric shapes.
Seven Hills native Stephen “Suede” Baum was on hand to cheer for the home team.
“Did you see our girl?” he said. Mayen’s “was one of my favorite collections,” he gushed. (That’s no lie. Consider his Tweet minutes after the end of the show: “totally luved Valerie, Michael C., n Mondo’s collections! Congrats cast of Season 8!!!”)
“I love that it was very forward, very futuristic. As the economy’s killing everybody, we’re looking for something fresh and new, something to capture our eye, and hers definitely stood out in a really good way. And I think the colors were awesome,” he said, sporting a burst of fuchsia in his signature Mohawk. “And you know I like my colors.”
Other fans? Jay Manuel, Tyra Banks’ right hand man on “America’s Next Top Model,” looking dapper in a camel fedora, and his pal, celebrity stylist June Ambrose.
“The construction of those garments was genius,” Manuel said.
For the beturbaned Ambrose, a music-video veteran famous for putting Missy Elliot in a Hefty bag and making it look like the must-have piece of the season and dressing a young Sean “Puffy” Combs in his signature shiny suit, Mayen’s collection reminded her of “Japanese anime” with a touch of the sci-fi flick “The Fifth Element.”
Though Ambrose appreciated Mayen’s “fit,” and the way she built garments around the body, “I loved the energy and the gumption and the nerve that was sustained in that collection. I like her a lot.”
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