
A quiet London Fashion Week? Not if you know where to look
Once home to visionaries such as Vivienne Westwood and Alexander McQueen, London Fashion Week has been synonymous with theatricality and boundary-pushing designs. But increased operational costs and other disruptions in the wake of Brexit, along with diminishing global interest in the city's designers, whose shows garner a fraction of the attention of those in other fashion capitals like Milan, Paris and even New York, has hampered the mood in recent years.
At the event's kickoff, the British Fashion Council's outgoing CEO Caroline Rush addressed some of those difficulties in a speech that concluded her 16-year tenure. 'London Fashion Week is about making meaningful connections… and cementing (designers') place on the global stage,' she said. 'These are challenging times, but this community is resilient — and as someone who has been there for a little while, I can tell you from experience that creativity is heightened even further when businesses face adversity.'
By the next season of shows in September, Rush's successor, Laura Weir, will be well into the role (she joins in April), marking a new chapter for the sector. 'Creativity, innovation, breaking boundaries… that is our role in the fashion industry and one that we are incredibly proud of,' Rush said, adding that London is fueled by 'high-octane creativity that you see nowhere else in the world.'
Despite the transitional period, London Fashion Week brimmed with unabridged talent and creativity — from cult names, like Paolo Carzana and Dilara Findikoglu, to the fledgling labels (Louther, Nuba and Olly Shinder) showing as part of talent incubator Fashion East. All of which, in the absence of bigger, heavy-hitting brands, had more space to shine.
Showgoers held out for a late show by Findikoglu, who returned after a season off, with a collection of body-hugging styles, including a black snakeskin corset worn by supermodel Lara Stone, who opened the show. The venue Electrowerkz — a sprawling warehouse known for its alternative club nights — was a fitting backdrop for Findikoglu's darkly romantic and subversive designs, which have drawn equally bold fans such as Lady Gaga, Madonna and Doja Cat. Also among the highlights were a skin-colored leather dress covered in intricate scrawls by tattoo artist Jonah Slater, and pieces covered in seashells — a nod to the goddess Venus, who was born in the sea.
Also with a late-night slot was Carzana, who drew about 120 people to his show in a cozy pub in Clerkenwell, a neighborhood popular with architects and other creatives. On a digital screen, the clothes can appear raggedy, as if intended to be worn by the cast of 'Les Misérables,' but the Welsh designer's slow fashion approach to hand-making, the use of vegetables, flowers and spice-based dyes, and the acute creativity in his construction, is what makes him a standout among his peers.
Popular mainstays, such as Roksanda, Simone Rocha and Erdem, stayed the course and presented collections that were unmistakably true to their brand identities. Inspired by the late British visual artist Phyllida Barlow, Roksanda leaned into odd color pairings, such as copper brown and Yves Klein blue, and vivid artistic prints. Art also typically plays a key role in Erdem's collections: this time, the eponymous designer partnered with Kaye Donachie, a Scottish painter known for her figurative works, on appliques hand-drawn onto gauzy fabrics, which made the models look like walking watercolor paintings.
Meanwhile, Simone Rocha turned to the childhood fable, 'The Tortoise and the Hare,' as the starting point for her collection. Some famous faces, including model and television host Alexa Chung and actresses Fiona Shaw and Bel Powley, made a surprise appearance on the runway, some carrying rabbit or turtle-shaped accessories. Rocha's signature darkly romantic pieces were complemented by a greater range of accessories, from the knitted neckerchief to the silver hardware (including belts, necklaces and earrings) that featured a padlock.
It was the return of Cool Britannia at brand S.S. Daley, which presented reinvented wardrobe staples such as trench coats, rain jackets, duffle coats, bomber jackets and pea coats to a score of '80s post-punk British hits from The Smiths, Siouxsie and the Banshees, and the Pet Shop Boys. The outerwear — the kind you'd see on a drizzly day in London — were not quite weather-appropriate, ironically. Instead, the classic pieces were refashioned in lightweight blue-and-white printed chiffon, tufted felt and floral chintz.
The collection was inspired by Scottish Colourists, a prolific group of painters in the 1920s known for their vibrant and confident use of colors, resulting in artworks that were often 'quite smudgy and fibrous,', said S.S. Daley founder and designer Steven Stokey-Daley. Backstage, Stokey-Daley shared that he had especially been drawn to Francis Cadell, one of the Scottish Colourists, who 'ventured out to find new color inspiration' — and so he replicated Cadell's painting of Iona Croft, an island off the west coast of Scotland, on felted pieces.
Daniel Fletcher's debut as creative director of Chinese fashion label Mithridate was a similar masterclass in British heritage. Pastel-hued sweaters were tied and swung over the shoulder, while pinstriped Oxford shirts were styled with leather brogues. On joining 'a young brand without an archive,' Fletcher took the opportunity to draw from his own heritage. 'I (wanted to) look at that preppy, eccentric way of dressing that is so unique to the UK,' he told CNN backstage after the show.
There was also plenty of appeal off the runway, as several designers opted to present their new designs privately, while others hosted events for their communities.
Saul Nash collaborated on a collection with athletic-wear maker Lululemon, while Ahluwalia teamed up with jewelry company Pandora on an engraving event. Elsewhere, Stefan Cooke and Grace Wales Bonner (who normally shows in Paris) prioritized in-person previews, while Aaron Esh, 16 Arlington's Marco Capaldo and Feben Vemmenby of Feben hosted private dinners, respectively. Labrum, Karoline Vitto and Tolu Coker opted for presentations, where people could drop in and see the designs throughout the day.
Asked why she had eschewed a show this season, Coker told CNN that a presentation 'felt more aligned' with the brand and business. 'I'm constantly evaluating how I present and how I tell stories. My practice is very multidisciplinary.' It may also mark a permanent shift, she said. 'As a young brand, I think that a runway show every season is not always the most effective way of maximizing resources, which often are very limited.'
Coker added that the label will present its collection via a showroom in Paris, and as a semi-finalist of this year's prestigious LVMH Prize, she will also present her collection alongside the other contestants — a move that will surely give the designer additional exposure outside of the UK. 'Paris makes a lot more sense for us because it's where retailers tend to place orders at the end of the season,' she said.
Some designers, including Jonathan Anderson, Rejina Pyo, Molly Goddard and Marta Marques and Paulo Almeida of Marques Almeida have decided to sit the show season out entirely, focusing instead on developing their collections off the runway. Also absent were Chopova Lowena and Knwls, which now only stage shows once a year, in September, demonstrating their ability to run a fashion business without abiding by traditional rules — which is no bad thing at all.
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The New OceanGate Documentary Dives Into the Depths of the Titan Submersible Tragedy
Two years ago, OceanGate's Titan submersible imploded in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Newfoundland. Now, amid ongoing investigations by the U.S. Coast Guard, Netflix has a new documentary that proposes—citing sound evidence and on-camera interviews with sources that were formerly close to OceanGate—just what went wrong on the ill-fated journey to the site of another prolific sea disaster, RMS Titanic. Much of it has to do with OceanGate's eccentric late CEO, Stockton Rush, one of the five victims of the 2023 incident. On June 11, Netflix released the documentary Titan: The OceanGate Submersible Disaster, which documents the circumstances behind the June 2023 incident that spawned countless memes and endless speculation. While the movie dives deep (ahem) into the specifics of the Titan's implosion, including pointing out the submersible's carbon fiber construction that was vulnerable to deep-sea water pressure, the movie points a finger at Rush, who is described by subjects in the movie as "arrogant" with a major "temper." "I worked for somebody that is probably borderline clinical psychopath. Definitely a narcissist," said Tony Nissen, a former engineering director at OceanGate in the movie. "How do you manage a person like that who owns the company?" In the movie, Stockton Rush is described as having a "privileged background" originating from generational wealth; his family tree includes two signers of the Declaration of Independence. Subjects in the film recall Rush hoping to fashion himself as a billionaire explorer like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, with his eyes set on Earth's oceans instead of Mars. "Big swinging dicks" was a term Rush liked to say out loud and often, and being a "big swinging dick" himself was an explicit goal. (Rush was not a billionaire, but he had money to burn nonetheless.) Joseph Assi, a videographer hired by Rush to capture OceanGate's expeditions, says that one of Rush's personal philosophies was that "accessibility is ownership." As Assi says in the documentary: "If there's a small island in the middle of the ocean, and you're the only one you can access it, it doesn't matter who owns it, you have ownership over it because you have the accessibility to get to it. And he truly believed in that." Titan: The OceanGate Submersible Disaster makes a belabored point that OceanGate's failings leading to the implosion stemmed from Rush's leadership. His short temper and arrogance permeated in all his efforts to build a business around deep-sea commercial tourism. This included trying to skip critical testing conducted by third parties—which is standard practice in the industry—and cutting costs where possible, such as in the aforementioned use of carbon fiber materials which cannot sustain oceanic pressure. Rush also verbally stated he could and would "buy a congressman," which alarmed many OceanGate employees. Rob McCallum, a consultant, recalls in the documentary: "Stockton said that he decided that he saw no need for classification, for third-party oversight. I stood up and said, 'I'm sorry I can't be part of this conversation, nor can I be associated with OceanGate or this vehicle in any way.' And I left. He had every contact in the submersible industry telling him not to do this. But once you start down the path of doing it entirely yourself, and you realize you've taken the wrong turn right back at the beginning... You have to admit you were wrong. That's a big pill to swallow." Rush is also described as having a callous attitude towards employees, refusing to take accountability for his failures. For example: In 2016, Rush and OceanGate hosted an expedition to the SS Andrea Doria. The trip nearly ended in disaster after Rush brought their sub into a dangerous spot; David Lochridge, OceanGate's Director of Marine Ops and a more experienced pilot, took over controls and got everyone aboard safely to the surface. Though Rush thanked Lochridge, the CEO turned cold towards him, later excluding him from important communications. Rush eventually fired Lochridge, in a tense meeting heard in the movie via audio recording. Later, Rush suggested promoting another OceanGate employee, Bonnie Carl, to take over Lochridge as the next lead pilot. But Carl was an accountant who headed the HR department, and had no experience as a submersible pilot. Titan: The OceanGate Submersible Disaster is a cut above typical straight-from-the-headlines Netflix documentaries, as a level-headed if straightforward deep dive (again, ahem) about a disaster that dominated the news cycle two summers ago. But while the ins and outs of a deadly trip into the sea have morbid appeal, it's the movie's interrogation of one man's toxic hubris that makes Titan a worthy watch. You Might Also Like Kid Cudi Is All Right 16 Best Shoe Organizers For Storing and Displaying Your Kicks
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5 Things We Learned from ‘Titan: The OceanGate Disaster'
Stockton Rush, the late CEO of OceanGate who died along with four others when his Titan submersible imploded in June 2023, admired what he called the 'big swingin' dick' energy of fellow businessmen Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. He was obsessed with the Titanic. He had a habit of firing those who disagreed with his judgment. And he pushed forward with his fatal dive after multiple engineers and other experts warned him that his submersible was doomed to fail. These are some of the details laid out in Titan: The OceanGate Disaster, the new Netflix documentary premiering June 11. Titan covers some of the same material as the Discovery documentary Implosion: The Titanic Sub Disaster, including extensive footage of the 2024 U.S. Coast Guard hearing investigating the tragedy. But it has an ace in the hole: David Lochridge, OceanGate's director of marine operations and a submersible pilot, who was fired after challenging Rush's safety standards and later disclosed critical information under the Whistleblower Protection Act. Together with Wired investigative journalist Mark Harris, who was also a consulting producer on Titan, Lochridge provides a barrage of damning factual heft in the new doc. More from Rolling Stone 'Too Much' Trailer: Lena Dunham Directs Semi-Autobiographical Rom-Com Starring Megan Stalter Lady Gaga Praises Queer Music Pioneer Carl Bean in Docu Clip: 'Anthems Unify People' How the Director and Stars of 'Pavements' Brought Many Stephen Malkmuses to Life Here are five things we learned from Titan: Lochridge was shown the door when he insisted that Titan wasn't ready for its big dive to see the wreckage of the Titanic. So was OceanGate director of engineering Tony Niessen. Titan paints a picture of a CEO who surrounded himself with yes men, many of them inexperienced and unqualified. Bonnie Carl, OceanGate's former finance and human resources director, says in the film that at one point Stockton was ready to make her OceanGate's new lead pilot. Her response in the film: 'Are you nuts? I'm an accountant.' Lochridge details Rush's stubborn arrogance in the film: 'He had every contact in the submersible industry telling him not to do this. But once you start down the path of doing it entirely by yourself, and you realize you've taken a wrong turn back at the beginning, then you have to admit that you were wrong.' Nobody interviewed in Titan suggests that Rush was capable of admitting that he was wrong. Niessen is blunt in assessing his experience at OceanGate: 'I worked for somebody who is probably a borderline clinical psychopath. How do you manage a person like that who owns the company?' Emily Hasmmermeister, an OceanGate engineering assistant who Rush saw as a bright young face of the company, left when she realized Titan's carbon-fiber hull was unstable. 'Stockton was so set on getting to the Titanic that nothing that anybody said made much of a difference,' she says in the film. 'I was not going to bolt anyone inside of that sub. And that was something that a lot of my coworkers at the time agreed on. None of them stayed with the company much longer.' Rush comes across as someone who was quick with a 'fuck you,' so it makes sense that he came from what might be called fuck-you money. 'Both Stockton and his wife, Wendy, came from generational wealth,' Harris, the Wired reporter, says in the film. Stockton was a Princeton graduate, even if he didn't have great grades. He traced his ancestry back to two signers of the Declaration of Independence, Richard Stockton and Benjamin Rush. In an ironic twist, Wendy Rush was the great-great granddaughter of two people who died on the Titanic: Isidor and Ida Strauss. Isidor was a co-owner of the Macy's department store. 'Stockton was definitely part of the one percent,' Harris says in the film. If you took a drink every time someone in Titan mentions carbon fiber you'd have a hard time driving home. The material is cheaper than, say, titanium or steel, and it's also less expensive to transport. These factors made it an appealing option for Rush as he built the Titan. The engineers interviewed in the doc also claim it can be highly unstable. A carbon-fiber hull had never been used for as deep a dive as Rush was attempting. In the film, Rob McCallum, who has led many expeditions to the Titanic wreckage as the co-founder of Eyos Expeditions and worked as a consultant for OceanGate, describes carbon fiber as 'essentially string made from carbon. It's coated with resin to hold it together.' He sums up the Titan structure thusly: 'There was no way of knowing when it was going to fail. But it was a mathematical certainty that it would fail.' According to the documentary, Rush refused to have the Titan 'classed,' or certified by a third party to meet industry standards. Lochridge claims that shortly after he insisted on a third-party inspection, and then wrote in a 2018 report that Titan wasn't ready for the 3,800-meter dive to the Titanic wreckage, he was fired. McCallum points out another key Rush workaround: He insisted on classifying his passengers as 'mission specialists.' This categorization was intended to provide legal protection in case something went wrong. 'It was just one of the steps that OceanGate took to make sure that they could work around U.S. legislation,' McCallum says in the film. Rush called them 'Titaniacs.' They're the people who can't get enough of anything related to the Titanic. A few were willing to fork over more than $100,000 for a seat on the Titan. In the film, Rush claims 'there are three words in the English language that are known throughout the planet: Coca-Cola, God, and Titanic.' James Cameron's 1997 blockbuster Titanic surely has something to do with this; it grossed more than $2 billion worldwide, and prompted any number of moviegoers to proclaim themselves king (or queen) of the world. But it's not just the movie that brings people back to RMS Titanic, the British ocean liner which famously sank in 1912, killing approximately 1,500 people. The disaster was due largely to the kind of structural failure that would doom the Titan, a point Titan doesn't fail to make. 'Even now, over 100 years after she sank, she just captures people,' McCallum says in the doc. Something about the combination of massive catastrophe and the dividing lines between social classes aboard the liner — First Class, Second Class, and Steerage, with survival rates declining according to economic position — has proved enthralling. Well before Titanic there was The Unsinkable Molly Brown, a 1960 stage musical (and then a 1964 movie starring Debbie Reynolds) based on the life of Titanic survivor-turned-philanthropist Margaret Brown. Rush was hardly the first gung-ho Titanic enthusiast, though he may have been the most catastrophically arrogant. Best of Rolling Stone Every Super Bowl Halftime Show, Ranked From Worst to Best The United States of Weed Gaming Levels Up


New York Post
2 hours ago
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Former OceanGate employees slam Titan sub disaster company CEO in new doc: ‘Borderline clinical psychopath'
A damning new documentary condemns Stockton Rush, the founder and CEO of OceanGate, the defunct company whose Titan submersible imploded in the Atlantic Ocean June 2023. Former employees allege in 'Titan: The OceanGate Disaster' on Netflix that their boss' self-absorption and consistent willful negligence tragically led to the death of the five passengers, including Rush — a news story that captured the entire world's attention for days. 'I worked for somebody that is probably [a] borderline clinical psychopath,' said former OceanGate engineer Tony Nissen. 6 The late OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush is ripped by former employees in 'TItan: The OceanGate Disaster.' Courtesy of Netflix 'He wanted to be a Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk,' said Bonnie Carl, director of finance and administration, in the doc. 'He referred to those guys as 'big swingin' dicks,' and he loved that term and used it all the time.' Engineering project manager Emily Hammermeister added that repeatedly expressed safety concerns by workers with years of expertise fell on deaf ears and Rush's tunnel vision. 'Stockton was just so set on getting to the Titanic that nothing that anybody said made much of a difference,' she said. Rush was a wealthy California-born engineer who loved 'Star Wars' and 'Star Trek.' He co-founded OceanGate in 2009 with the goal of bringing deep sea exploration to the public — especially dives to the Titanic. In pursuit of his pipe dream, he decided to create the first submersible made from carbon fiber, a strong and cheap material consisting of many small strands. 'It's not like metal,' said Wired journalist Mark Harris, who profiled Rush. 'You know, titanium is extremely well understood. Carbon fiber is far more idiosyncratic in that the little fibers inside there can snap.' 6 Rush aimed to take paying passengers down to the Titanic in cheaply made submerssibles. Courtesy of Netflix Knowing the risks, OceanGate engineers built sensors into the hull — a series of small microphones — to alert people in the sub if there were breaches to the carbon fiber so they could quickly surface. In theory. 'The monitoring system for the hull was something that was dreamt up by OceanGate to try and give some comfort to people who were asking too many questions,' said submersible operations expert Rob McCallum. The film terrifyingly shows years of pressure tests conducted on the sub in which the hull cracked and the vehicle imploded. 'Pop' noises of breaks are loud and frequent — portending the loss of life that was to come. 6 Titan's hull was made of carbon fiber. Courtesy of Brian Weed 'I just can't believe it,' Rush angrily reacted during a trial five years before their first dive. 'We couldn't even get past f–king 4,300 PSI.' Eventually, Titan successfully reached the Titanic — in spite of persistent safety issues. 'It was a mathematical certainty that it would fail,' said McCallum. 'So, having a dive or two or 10 to the Titanic is not a measure of success. And personally I will never understand how it survived the first test dives.' 6 Rush routinely dismissed his experts' safety concerns. Courtesy of Netflix Lochridge emailed Rush and others a safety report in 2018, and was called into a contentious meeting the next day. Rush recorded the interaction. 'I don't want anybody in this company who is uncomfortable with what we're doing,' said an irate Rush. 'We're doing weird s–t here, and I am definitely out of the mold. There's no question. I'm doing things that are completely non-standard. And I'm sure the industry thinks I'm a f–king idiot. That's fine. They've been doing that for eight years. And I'm going to continue on the way I'm doing, but I'm not going to force people to join my religion if they don't want to.' Reacting to Lochridge's report, an angry Rush told Nissen, his engineer, that 'it would be nothing for him to spend $50,000 to ruin somebody's life.' 'That changed my life in that company,' said Nissen. 'I had to make sure nobody spoke up.' 6 Courtesy of Netflix Nissen, Lochridge, Hammermeister and Carl went on to all leave the troubling company. Carl was pushed over the edge when Rush brazenly suggested she assume the role of lead pilot. 'Are you nuts? I'm an accountant,' she remembered thinking. On June 18, 2023, one hour and 33 minutes into a dive, the Titan lost communication with the surface. A four-day search ensued and voracious news outlets displayed countdown clocks of when the sub would run out of oxygen. Debris was finally discovered on June 22. The Titan had actually imploded the same day it ceased pinging. The passengers — Rush, Hamish Harding, Paul-Henri Nargeolet, Suleman Dawood and Shahzada Dawood — all died. Hammermeister still feels shaken up by her association with OceanGate. 6 The five passengers aboard the Titan all died on June 18, 2023. AP 'I've reflected a lot on my time there,' she said. 'And my time there was not normal. I mean, I think back to the times where I was part of dives that happened. And thinking back how uncomfortable I felt bolting people into the sub. And so when that initial news article popped up and it said 'Tourist sub lost in the Atlantic,' I knew right away it was OceanGate.' Lochridge said the tragedy was a result of Rush's narcissism. 'He wanted fame,' he said. 'First and foremost to fuel his ego, fame. That was what he wanted. And he's got it.'