Nicol & Ford

La Pouffe marked Nicol & Ford’s Australian Fashion Week debut and translated Carlos de Beistegui’s theatrical interiors into a made-to-order runway vocabulary. Upholstery jacquards, smocked and quilted velvet, hessian, tassels and fringing drew domestic decoration onto the body, while the collection treated camp taste as a form of historical and queer self-fashioning.

Independent makers expanded the material world: Phoebe Hyles contributed jewellery, Matea Gluščević created footwear, J. R. Harvey produced custom handbags and leather details, and Amanda Testa developed accessories. The runway established the collaborative atelier model that would define the founders’ subsequent fashion-week work.