There’s been a rise in popularity of the fashion documentary, largely thanks to the fashion industry opening up and letting the public in. And they have loved it. The September Issue, Diana Vreeland: The Eye Must Travel and Valentino: The Last Emperor are just a few of the critically acclaimed documentaries we’ve enjoyed over the last decade. 

In February, New Zealand fashion designer Adrian Hailwood presents Fashion Film Month, The Spirit of Avant Garde, on Rialto Channel. The series features Iris (2014), Dior and I (2014), Advanced Style [2014] and Women He’s Undressed (2015). It’s an impressive collection of beautifully crafted and fascinating stories, and it marks Hailwood’s television debut, an experience he found quite amusing.  

There’s been a rise in popularity of the fashion documentary, largely thanks to the fashion industry opening up and letting the public in. And they have loved it. The September Issue, Diana Vreeland: The Eye Must Travel and Valentino: The Last Emperor are just a few of the critically acclaimed documentaries we’ve enjoyed over the last decade. 

In February, New Zealand fashion designer Adrian Hailwood presents Fashion Film Month, The Spirit of Avant Garde, on Rialto Channel. The series features Iris (2014), Dior and I (2014), Advanced Style [2014] and Women He’s Undressed (2015). It’s an impressive collection of beautifully crafted and fascinating stories, and it marks Hailwood’s television debut, an experience he found quite amusing.  

Rialto: So, how was your first television shoot?AH: When I turned up I thought I was just doing stills, I got such a fright - chucked in the deep end. I was completely mortified. I winged it; I didn’t know what I was doing. 

Rialto: Have you seen the footage?
AH: Yes, it’s a bit cringe. I look like an Ewok. A talking Ewok. It’s embarrassing. 

Rialto: But did you enjoy doing it?
AH: I did actually, it was quite fun. That was the first time I’ve ever done it. Reading the teleprompter thing is easy but trying to look like you know what you’re doing with the voice over was quite hard. 

Rialto: This could be the beginning of new things…
AH: I wish I’d worn another shirt! I look like a roly-poly.

Rialto: My next question was going to be “Who did you wear?”
AH: I wore my own clothes, my own shoes and jeans but the shirt was a little bit snug. I look like I’d eaten all the pies.

Rialto: That question provoked a bit of a scandal at the Oscar’s last year when a few actresses took offence to being asked about their clothes as opposed to their work, unlike their male counterparts. Do you think people are interested in what people wear? 

AH: No. You can comment ‘it’s a lovely dress’, but it gets too much. Some people think it’s great, but I’m not really fussed, it doesn’t really bother me. It’s nice when people want to wear your stuff but I have famous clients who order stuff but I never say a thing. There’s nothing more that I hate than blurting out that people are wearing your stuff. It’s a bit naff. 

Rialto: It’s a great collection of films you’re presenting – do you have a favourite?
AH: Dior and I. It was such a great documentary and I love Raf Simons clothing. I thought it was amazing because it showed a modern shift in fashion, but the pressure is too much and he’s quit. He only lasted 2 and a half years and he’s gone. You could see the emotion and pressure he was under, and he’s since left the house. 

Rialto: What I liked about the film is that it reminds you that fashion isn’t about celebrities, models and runways, it is a serious business.
AH: It is, it’s 80% business. There’s probably 20-30 other better designers than me in New Zealand, that are younger than me or whatever, but it’s 80% business and how you run your business and how you survive. Because at the end of the day you’re only as good as your last collection or how well the last collection sells. It’s a pretty tough job. Certainly there’s the glamour side of it, but that’s about 2%. It’s a pretty hard slog 

Rialto: Do you think people realise that?
AH: No, they think it’s a lot of martinis and lattes and a lot of celebs and parties, but it’s so not true. And even that’s kind of work for us, when you’re invited to speak or do functions it’s actually work, it’s not about having fun. 

Rialto: Dior and I goes behind the scenes and shows you literally the kind of work that goes into a collection by many talented people.
AH: That’s the thing, the work room. Most of them have been there for at least 30 years, and they’re incredible. Within the movie Dior and I it shows the amazing breadth of knowledge and skill, and the workroom is absolutely incredible. The head mistresses, tailoring, the pleater, the embroider who did all the 3D printing of embroidery, they wouldn’t be around if these houses didn’t invest in them. It’s pretty cool they’re keeping all these old skills going for couture. For couture there’s only 2000 clients in the whole world, so it wouldn’t make a big profit, it’s just the brand. All the profit comes from perfume, but they need these Dior and Channel shows just to keep the fantasy going.

Rialto: What about you, what’s the reality of running a fashion business in New Zealand?
AH: I do Fashion Week every year so I get to do the big dresses which I love doing but we don’t put them into production; we just do them as special order. But it’s full on – I wholesale to about 60 stores in New Zealand and around the world, so I’m still relatively small but it’s still a big operation to run. So I have a business partner Ricky Ball of Ball Agencies who does all the production for me, and selling, so it’s a good team, I’m lucky. 

Rialto: Women He’s Undressed, I loved the way director Gillian Armstrong told Orry-Kelly’s story.
AH: I went to see it with Tanya Carlson, we went out to Avondale to see it and we were the only people in the theatre and it was amazing, and we were thinking, why aren’t people seeing this film? I thought it was a great film, and it was a story I didn’t really know. I knew he was a famous costume designer in Hollywood in the 30s but I didn’t realise how good he was. You often only hear of Edith Head and Adrian who was the other famous male fashion designer. It’s cool, a really good documentary.

Rialto: Have you ever done costumes for theatre, film or television?
AH: I’ve done a little bit. I’ve done dance costumes for a friend of mine, she works for Douglas Wright - Megan Adams. I’ve done bits and pieces in film because I worked in film. I did art direction and props and used to do t-shirts, so that’s how I got into fashion, through my film work. 

Rialto: Do you think people underestimate how important costume is for an actor or actress to find their character?
AH: I think it’s a massive part really. It’s quite a skilled job, it’s something I’d like to get into further as I love working in film and I haven’t done in a long time, but I used to love doing stuff for commercials. I’d have stuff made and was moving towards wardrobe stuff but then I got into fashion and started doing a label. I think a major part of playing a part in film would be the costume, definitely. 

Rialto: Not only was Orry-Kelly a remarkable designer, but he was a creative, complex, interesting character just like most of the characters in the other documentaries in your series – is the NZ fashion industry as colourful?
AH: I get on with everyone, is all I can say. There’s definitely lots of characters in there, everyone kind of sticks to themselves I feel. There could be a little bit more of a community, but maybe it’s just, I don’t know, tough at the top? I’ve got no idea.

Rialto: Iris is pretty colourful film too.
AH: I loved Iris, I thought it was beautiful. What I found the most interesting about her was her job with her husband, traveling all over the world by boat and going to all these amazing places and buying whatever and turning them into fabrics. I thought that was amazing that job. I didn’t particularly like her style as such, to me it looked like a whole lot of 80s op shop clothes but I loved what she was about and how she did her thing and created her own sort of look. But I would have loved it to delve more into her job of textile design. That was the most interesting part to me. 

Rialto: In Advanced Style and Iris you have a collection of mature women defying convention and expressing themselves through what they chose to wear – do you see that in NZ?
AH: Getting better, definitely. I mean Joe Blogs still tends to wear a uniform, everyone conforms to look the same; the same jeans, the same shoes, the same leather handbag. There's a little bit of that still going on, but there’s definitely colourful characters out there doing their own thing. 

Rialto: Iris Apfel is renown as a ‘Style Icon’. What’s the difference between style and fashion?
AH: I think style is someone that’s always stuck to their guns just like Suzy Menkes [fashion journalist for Vogue online] who wears that funny hairstyle. She’s had that hairstyle for 50 years, it kind of looks like a hedgehog, and Iris has always worn outrageous colour with over-the-top accessories. I think she’s always dressed like that. To us it looks extreme 1980s but she was wearing that in the 60s. I think it’s someone who likes a style and just runs with it. 

You know fashion is very fickle. Designers either do fashion or you do classic styles, it’s what you’re into I suppose. But in terms of money, fashion can do quite well because if something only lasts a season and they like your brand, they go back and buy next season. It’s what buyers tend to do, but I like to do more classic stuff that lasts.   

Rialto: Is it better to be stylish or fashionable?
I think both works. There’s no rhyme or reason, there’s no right or wrong with clothing. 

Catch Adrian Hailwood presenting Fashion Film Month, The Spirit of Avant Garde, on Rialto Channel, every Wednesday at 8.30pm