Los Angeles Swim Week debuts in West Hollywood

Los Angeles just hosted its first Swim Fashion Week and Pop-Up event in West Hollywood.

The event featured various designers of swimwear, resort wear, and swim accessories. The event started at 12:00 p.m. allowing locals to shop at the London West Hollywood Hotel. On the third floor, outside on the terrace, several vendors set up shop for the next enduring hours to expose their brands to potential buyers and interested clients. The designers that participated in the event included emerging swimwear designers, jewelry makers, and resort wear retailers.

Los Angeles Swim Week hosts pop-up in West Hollywood

Some of the swimwear designers used the event to their advantage to help display their brand in an innovative way. Carla Pallares of Yemaya Swimwear designed a lovely collection of swimwear for the event due to her inability to find a suit that would fit perfectly. “I started [the collection] because I never felt comfortable in the swimwear I wanted,” said Madi. The collection was inspired largely by Pallares’s upbringing. She said her mother crocheted a lot when she was younger, so she’s incorporating crochet detail into a lot of the two-piece suits. “Everything’s handmade and I’ve perfected the fit so that nothing will pinch your skin so that no matter [what size] you’ll feel comfortable,” said Pallares. The Yemaya brand consists of nudes, bright colors, crocheted pieces, and silk material in order to create one-of-a-kind silhouettes. The pieces start at 62 dollars and go up from there. All of the fabrics are achieved locally and everything is manufactured in Los Angeles. As to why Pallares participated in the pop-up fashion show event, she states that she hopes to attract more Los Angeles locals. “I get a lot of my inspiration from California… I would love for girls all over California to wear the brand,” said Pallares.

Besides the swimwear at the event, there were also various designers for swimwear jewelry. One of the brands named Clamor incorporated the idea of everyday items to make high-quality jewelry that pairs well with swim pieces. The Italy-based jewelry brand imports all of the jewelry to Los Angeles. The company was established in 2011 in Venice, Italy. Since then the company is excited to market in Los Angeles. The pieces consist of gold, silver, and rose gold. The jewelry make the shapes of feathers, keys, matches, and more in the form of bracelets or necklaces.The brand currently sells online as well and decided to participate in the event because of the great exposure and opportunity it would bring for the company. “We hope that our brand will grow in Los Angeles,” said Annalise Brizzante of Clamor.

Los Angeles Swim Week captures attention of emerging brands

Also, resortwear was highlighted at the Los Angeles Swim Week. Resort wear and travel-inspired brand Soul Escape sells unique, high-quality pieces that are used for cover-ups and swimwear outfits. Carley Madi, co-founder and CVO of Soul Escape, decided to do the event because it was a good fit due to the brand’s extensive collection of vacation wear. “We’re slowly building our Los Angeles [market], so we hope that this helps with that,” said Madi. The price range of the pieces starts at 28 and goes up to 120 dollars. The emerging brand just launched in June and so far has had three pop-ups in Los Angeles.

Overall the idea of the event is to bring together up-and-coming swimwear designers that can showcase their brands in a communal event. The event featured six designers for the fashion show including Eleni Armaos, Connie Borja, Chloe Rose, Rebecca Klondinsky and more. The pop-up included approximately 10 or so brands that retailed their pieces. The London West Hollywood Hotel hosted the pop-up for about six hours until the official fashion show. The entire collaborative event ended by 8 p.m. As the first official Los Angeles Swim Week, the event’s main vision was to promote versatile, innovative styles and to highlight fashion designers in the swimwear industry. The designer line-up currently was small, but as this is a new event, next year will expectedly have more designers participating.

Swimwear and beachwear have become an increasing market for the U.S. Swimwear sales for the previous year reached over 4.4 billion dollars in a 12-month period. According to market research company NPD Group, swimwear sales in the U.S. increased by 6 percent from 2013. Specific categories also received growth in sales such as women’s one pieces by 16 percent, women’s two pieces by 8 percent, and cover-ups by 7 percent. Also, a recent report by Statista show that 1.8 percent of households with an annual income of 100,000 dollars or more spent approximately 500 to 999 dollars on women’s swimwear and/or beachwear. This means that more money is being spent on swimwear and that American consumers are gravitating more towards this apparel category. Even specific American companies such as Victoria’s Secret, which is known for stylish lingerie and swimwear, have had increasing sales. According to Business Insider, in May of this year more than 10 percent of swimwear sales have been up for the first quarter for the company. That means the swimwear market for the U.S. is more prominent now than ever.