Fashion Designer Josh Goot for Target

Last year it was Sydney-based fashion designer labels Alice McCall and Tina Kalivas and the Melbourne designer label T.L. Wood and then, earlier this year it was Stella McCartney's. But who will be the next fashion designer for the Designers for Target collection?

Will it be another International fashion designer, perhaps New York based Marc Jacobs or Kenneth Cole, or Paris based Hermes, or Costume National of Milan? Or will it be yet another Australian-label, perhaps a designer from Sydney like fashion designer Lisa Ho, Alex Perry, Nicola Finetti and Zimmermann? Then it might well be one of the Melbourne based fashion designers like Alannah Hill? It's a question that everyone has been talking about ever since the Stella McCartney's mania hit Target Stores throughout Australia.

However, with Australian Fashion Week officially launched over night, there are some clues now emerging! In fact, the gossip now is that it will be the Australian and Internationally acclaimed, award wining fashion designer label Josh Goot.

Fashion guru Patty Huntington of The Sydney Morning Herald writes: "Two months after Target shelves around the country were stripped bare within minutes of the arrival of a Stella McCartney's collaboration collection, Target Australia plans to unveil a top secret project with one of Australia's brightest fashion lights, Josh Goot."

Huntington goes on to say that "Target is the principle sponsor of Goot's Fashion Week show on Thursday May 3 at 9.00am - and its logo appears on the invitation. But although neither the Target or Goot camps were spilling any other beans this afternoon, Fashion Season has learned that a Josh Goot/Target collaboration is due be either announced or else unveiled at Target in mid May."

When asked by Rebekah van Druten of the ABC News: Arts & Entertainment site, "The Shallow End" whether he would consider creating a collection for chain stores, Josh Goot replied: "Yeah I would love to. I think it's great. I think it's great to give a wider audience access to great clothes and great designs. I think it's really important. I think it's one of the more exciting initiatives or developments in global fashion this millennium."

So while it hasn't as yet been confirmed, it suggested that Josh Goot will be the next fashion designer for the Designers for Target collection and if it is then the question is, will the not so well known Josh Goot create the same hysteria that Stella McCartney's did with her womens designer clothing collection? Time will tell!

Also, if it is Josh Goot then two other question spring to my mind. Firstly, what can we expect from a Josh Goot/Tarjay collection and secondly, will it be based on the same predominantly grey marl signature shades as in previous Josh Goot collections? The clue to answers to these questions may be found in the Josh Goot collection planned for Australian Fashion Week and on this, the recent Josh Goot interview with Rebekah van Druten of the ABC News: Arts & Entertainment site, "The Fashion End" referred to above might give us some clues. Goot said that "we can expect a lot of bright, fresh, young, sexy clothing. You can expect some new silhouettes from the brand, some new fabric and some new lines. Also a slight ancient Roman current running through it."

And when it comes to the color, Josh Goot says that "What I've done this season is, the colour might be the same but the way that we're dealing with the grey marl is completely different. For example, originally we used it in the 100 per cent cotton. Now we're using it in 100 per cent viscose, we're using it in other blended knits - for example, modal and elastic ... So the grey marl is now being treated by us in a completely different way and performing at a much higher level. So we've evolved the grey marl and that's what the critics should really be noticing."

So it will be interesting to see if the fashion pundits are right and it is Josh Goot, and if so, what the final collection will look like. It will also be very interesting to see if the same hysteria surrounds the release of this collection as it did with the womens designer fashion by Stella McCartney's.