The tracks outside of Sydney’s Carriageworks have been the unofficial runway for Australian Fashion Week since 2013. Whether it’s a phone or professional DSLR, there’s a camera everywhere you look, and everyone is trying to capture one thing: street style.
Australian Fashion Week is frequented by some of the country’s hottest up-and-comers in fashion. I’ll admit, coming onto the scene for the very first time (and as an amateur photographer), it was intimidating to map out which outfits I wanted to capture. There were so many! Still, I wanted to look for ensembles that were interesting, had varying textures and leaned more into timelessness than micro trends.
More importantly, I wanted to try and photograph outfits from people of diverse backgrounds. Historically, fashion week coverage — both in Australia and globally — has leaned into spotlighting conventional, Eurocentric beauty standards, often prioritising that over truly creative outfits. This was my chance to showcase a different side of fashion week, and I wanted to take it.
Australian Fashion Week: Expectations Vs Reality?
As a Filipina woman with a curvier body, shorter stature, coloured skin and unfashionable wardrobe, I always had the idea that these spaces weren’t for people like me. When I imagined what fashion week looked like, I envisioned it being filled with tall, white and thin people. Being there for myself, I saw that to some degree, I was right. But there are also creatives like Lizzie Cao, Bhavninder Sanghera, Suzan Mutesi and Bernad Ngendakumana — people who show that there’s a shift happening. Over time, I can only hope that more mainstream media outlets will see that unique fashion can, and does, exist on all body types and skin tones. This creativity deserves to be seen.
Without further ado, here are the street style looks from mornings one to three that caught the eye of an amateur photographer on a mission at Australian Fashion Week:
Australian Fashion Week 2024 Street Style
To see these outfits in motion and more from the unofficial runway, check out POPSUGAR Australia’s Fashion Week coverage on TikTok and Instagram.
Want more on Australian Fashion Week? Check out these stories below:
- The Fashion Trend I Saw in Nearly Every AFW Show
- 13 Street Style Looks From Past AFWs We’d Still Wear Today
- 5 Aus Fashion Week Events That Go Beyond the Runway and Inspire the Mind
- 5 New Labels Set to Shake Up This Year’s Australian Fashion Week
