Senses of the City: Runway Show

When I first arrived in NYC, I was a wee bit overwhelmed. Mostly in a good way. There are so many sights, sounds, smells, feelings and tastes involved in living here. One of my very first posts after arriving was, "Senses of the City" because that was the best way for me to describe what the first few days felt like. About a week ago, I had the opportunity to volunteer for an actual runway show. A real. live. fashion show. During New York Fashion Week. Needless to say, I was excited. It was an overwhelming, exciting, exhilarating and so many more adjectives that I will spare you, experience. Instead, I will share the senses of the show with you, with the focus being: seeing and hearing.

At the show, I saw:

• People running madly in all directions trying to get everything ready for show time
• Stacks and stacks of paper that had to be placed in the program folders - exactly parallel to the edges (we had the fear of god put into us that we took forever stuffing those programs!)
• Racks upon racks of garment bags
• Suitcase upon suitcase of beauty and hair products
• A fair amount of confusion as to why there was a group of six lost looking souls loitering in hair and makeup (apparently we were NOT supposed to get inside the elevator...)
• Numerous cans of red bull being consumed by the show's organizers (you gotta do what you gotta do!)
• Annoyed guests when their name (and their friend's name, then friend of a friend's name) did not appear on my check-in list
• An explosion of camera flashes as the first model emerged on the runway
•  An actual runway show! (totally unexpected, totally awesome.)

At the show, I heard:

• The stress in peoples' voices as the minutes crept closer to show time
• Hundreds of people talking at the same time
• The shuffling of papers as we stuffed, restuffed (when the missing pages arrived from the printer), then restuffed once more (to staple the papers together...true story!) hundreds of program folders
• Hairspray being spritzed out of aerosol cans
• The barking orders of an organizer as she yelled out seat changes very, very quickly (it was like playing bingo for the very first time....in a foreign language)
• The lightning fast snaps of camera shutters as an army of photographers fired their weapons at the same time
• The deep rythmic bass of the music as the models marched down the runway
• The steady stomp of stilletos as the models expertly strutted their stuff
• Two hundred people stand up at the same time and barrel toward the exit as soon as the 8 minute show concluded

It was incredible to be a part of a fashion show. Especially during NYFW. Sort of a dream come true, if I take the time to think about it. The biggest thing I took away was how much work and planning goes into a show that probably costs upwards of a million dollars and literally lasts no longer than ten minutes. That is one. zero. And that would be considered long!! Now that is cray-zy!

j.