The city was decked out in their chameleon attire for Charleston Fashion Week – ready to rock their styling threads from the uber-chic runways shows at Marion Square to the Miami-inspired VIP party at Luxe and then to the grungy warehouse party at Tivoli art studios.
Calhoun and King took on the energy of South Beach with Luxe, the official Charleston Fashion Week after party, brought to you by 26 Industries, the planners behind the NYE party at the Hippodrome. The floor to ceiling glass windows showed all the revelers on the corner what they were missing – a true night club experience for the young social elite. The bodyguards outside reinforced if you didn’t have the right color wristband you would be drinking your Vodka and Red Bull at home.
A true metaphor for how the world has evolved – the former classical music room of Millennium Music (with Mozart quotes still painted on the walls) had been turned into the VIP room full of go-go dancing, glow stick toting, Jersey Shore fist pounding partygoers.
On to Homegrown at Tivoli art studios put on by EF Records, a Brooklyn-inspired warehouse party. Time to ditch the button-down, rock the side braid, put a feather in your hair and turn body painting into a clothing option. It was an adult rave – kegs replaced with coolers of fine sparkling wine, cheeseburgers replaced with Indian street fare.
The coolest thing about this party - apart from the body-moving beats by Electric Friends and their fellow hip DJ friends – was hanging out in the studios of artists, like Mason Greenewald, that spend their days at Tivoli. The creative aura in this place resembled a giant hyper-colored rainbow.
Then the cops showed up. For some reason it was not the buzz kill to be expected but more like a scene from a Beastie Boys video. You almost expected them to jump out of their cars with fake mustaches, Sabotage blaring on the speakers and bust out some breakdancing moves.
There was a little running, I’m pretty sure a couple of people hopped the fence to the other side of town, but mostly everyone just stood there shrugging their shoulders, and holding their stance as if to say, “this is the Homegrown revival – ain’t no one gonna bring us down.”
And they didn’t. The after parties started sprouting up at houses nearby. It got started again at 3:00am at Brad Ball’s (Social Proprietor’s and founder of La Bubbly) pad nearby with Nathan Durfee, Mychael Knight, Ayoka Lucas, Brian Wilder, Shari Knight-Gillum, Elizabeth Bowers, Jenny Ferrara, Savannah Rusher and Dalia Dalili and Josef Kirk Myers.
Let’s all take a moment and raise our glasses to the people of Charleston that have grown up here or moved here and refused to conform and have proven that there is a place for Copper Penny and Streetwear, for the City Gallery and Eye Level Art, for Hootie and Righchus, for the Gibbes and Tivoli studios. That to find your creative outlet, to support your business, to be respected as an artist you don’t have to move to Manhattan, South Beach or Miami, you just have to find your groove right here in Charleston, SC.
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