September 1st, The Grand Family Affair turned protest into pageant. Across forty minutes, more than 80 voices from fashion, nightlife and performance merged into a single choreography: drag as resistance, couture as protest banner, the runway as a rallying point for a generation raised in collapse.
For two years, The Patchwork Family has transformed Club Church into a temple of upcycled couture and radical joy. Yesterday, the collective flooded Paradiso, blending fashion, performance, and nightlife into a catwalk-performance hybrid that radiated urgency and euphoria.
Becky Stabber did the honours of opening the runway on a trampoline. a quintessential Family move that felt less like a runway entrance and more like the lights coming on in a nightclub at the right, wrong moment. Applause rippled through the room as the first designer stepped forward. First up is Rachel Klok, whose leather skirt, printed with a trompe l’oeil thong, set the tone for her playful skewering of sexuality. Fur-trimmed jackets swung past bias-cut dresses, all in shades that seemed almost saccharine until you noticed the undertow of provocation. Her finale, a gown patched from pink satin panties, felt like a love letter to lingerie, rewritten as satire. Trash Couture queen at her finest, the designer showcased looks on a tightrope walk of camp and craft, where the obvious was made slyly elusive.
Marco Blazevic marched their army of misfits straight into battle. A masked figure in a patchwork, loose-thread denim silenced the runway, camo trousers stuffed into heavy boots, pausing only to deliver a stiff salute before disappearing. What followed was tactical anarchy: a crinoline skirt stitched with literal razorblades, spiked army caps that looked lethal on their own, and armour hammered to fit not one but two sets of breasts, knives flashing in hand. Headgear was pushed into delirium, one model crushed beneath a helmet built from BMW rims, another clomping out in boots made from keffiyeh scarves. Fashion week loves “statement looks”; Blazevic brought actual statements and dared the audience to read them.
Berber took masculinity apart seam by seam and returned with her clownesk fashion. Bigger, bolder, and decidedly more muscular. Medieval silhouettes met toxic masculinity in corsets that looked like armour, spray-painted and embossed with delicate ornaments, while tiny doll keychains dangled like ironic medals. The models were tough clowns, stronger than before, each one carrying the weight of humour, menace, and camp in equal measure. Patchwork mega-denim skirts split to reveal fur-lined crotches, while melted babydoll heads were fused into matching hats fringed with textile scraps. A wide cowboy belt cinched it all together, grounding the absurdity with a sly nod to Americana. Every look suggested that gender performance is just another outfit we slip into.
Daniel Bosco, one of The Patchwork Family’s new additions, presented a high-camp explosion of theatrical glamour with Gone Fishing: Left my Husband at Home. One model brandished a fishing rod, attempting to “catch” the crowd, whilst fish, dead or alive took over the runway. Sculpted fish clung to hips or peeked from under skirts as if mid-escape. Handbags fashioned from dead fish made their inevitable, slightly macabre cameo, while a gigantic fish-fin hat towered over a black fur top and denim mini dress. Bosco’s standout was a white lacquer mermaid gown, trimmed with lace and a fishnet veil over the face, shells stitched into the net like something pulled straight from a fisher boat. A couture reverie teetering between whimsy, warning, and blatantly absurd.
Elle R. sent out clothes that looked like they’d survived the night before: lace flares dragging, shredded cotton clinging, halters tied a little too loosely. Her palette, ivory, blush, faint grey, made collapse look strangely soft, almost romantic. Lace disco pants with side ruffles, alongside all her other looks, sprang from the under-bed archives, the remnants everyone else would sweep into the trash. The catwalk became a miniature arena, models prowling like sexy sirens through a tangle of textures and movement. Messy, deliberate, and unexpectedly seductive, collapse had never looked so enticing.
Alien eroticism meets self-commodification critique. Salomé Jeanne served 2000s-core chaos with ‘Sexy4ever’. The designer got their wigs out for another banger of a performance. Models wore bikini tops of long blonde hair, striped fluffy knee-high socks, and lace corsets over dangling mega panties; creepy meets candy-floss cute. Their standout white dress had a muscular corset built in, a feathered bustle at the back, and was bedazzled with crosses, “COCAINE,” and Che Guevara’s face. Another look layered a white corset mini dress over a floor-length skirt stuffed with giant silica bags turned into plush mini-pillows, finished with a faux-fur stole and laced balaclava. Outrageously cute, astonishingly creepy, and endlessly smart.
The words “Stay together. Stay healthy. Stay kind. Don’t fuck with fascists” appeared as a final blow to the spectacle, before the runway turned into a drag show. By the early hours, Paradiso was vibrating with residual energy, sticky with sequins, sweat, and brazen attitude. The Grand Family Affair left no corner untouched: a riotous, brilliant testament to glamour that roars, rebels, and refuses to be polite. In 2025, The Patchwork Family reminded everyone that fashion can be a performance, a protest, and a party all at once.
