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Coming up roses: Designer Eugenia Leavitt
Emerging Montreal designer Eugenia Leavitt blossoms into a New Labels winner.
By Nathalie Atkinson
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Eugenia Leavitt, the newly anointed winner of ELLE Canada's New Labels Fashion Award, is sitting in her design studio in Montreal's Mile End neighbourhood, recounting how she decided to become a fashion designer. "Recently, my mother showed me a drawing I had done when I was four or five years old," she recalls. It's a typical childish sketch of a stick figure - but it's wearing a very elaborate outfit. "It's a fantastic dress with a crayon patchwork of symmetrical triangles and squares in every colour of the rainbow," describes Leavitt excitedly, "and it tells me that I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing!"
The Montreal native studied fine arts, with a focus on textiles, at NSCAD in Halifax before returning to her hometown to pursue fashion at the International Academy of Design and Technology. She had designed just two capsule collections under her label, Eugenia Designs, before entering the Toronto Fashion Incubator New Labels Fashion Design Competition.
At the contest finale and runway show in Toronto-attended by Canada's fashion-industry elite - Leavitt's fall collection beat out finalists Lara Presber, Ashley Rowe and Adrienne Butikofer. Leavitt's cocktail dresses and classically tailored separates-many embellished with handmade rosettes - and the graphic impact of a black, cream and purple palette won over the judges. The grand finale? A floor-grazing peekaboo ball skirt made entirely of rosettes that, Leavitt admits, took hours to create. The collection's signature floral detail grew out of the designer's fine arts/textiles background; her sombre silhouette reined in the rosette parade and kept the look sleek, not saccharine.
Leavitt's choice of fabrics-shimmering organic silk and hemp blends and matte, textured bamboo and cotton knits-was also modern and inspired. "I feel responsible about where my fabrics come from - that they're not harming the earth," says Leavitt. She only uses organic and sustainable materials, despite the fact that finding organic fabrics suitable for her cocktail-hour designs is frustratingly limited. "It's difficult, but I think that the more designers decide to do it, the more options there will be in the future."
The designer admits that, while the competition's judging process was challenging, the judges' comments helped her understand the business aspects of fashion, such as market readiness, hanger
appeal and trend timeliness. They also forced Leavitt to hone her "look" into a stronger, ultimately more cohesive collection: "I started off with too many ideas; the judging helped me to decide on one point of view and then explore it in one collection." And, she adds, "I got to save my other ideas for later!" ($95 to $425, www.eugeniadesigns.com)
Check out runway footage and backstage interview with Eugenia! Then take a closer look at her collection with our slide show!
Portrait courtesy of Eugenia Leavitt, runway image courtesy of Paul Toogood
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