Today a most brilliant article appears in the Australian Financial Review, about the state of the Australian Fashion Industry. I’d recommend you go out and buy a copy, then study it, but if you are on a tram or train, and ‘flicking’ through on your ipad, you can read it online.

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THE HUME REPORT
by Marion Hume

Three months in the making and more than 50 interviews later, international fashion editor Marion Hume’s survey of the state of the industry in Australia makes for sobering reading as?forces global and local are irrevocably changing the way we?shop now.

It is 5am and Joanna Lowry reaches out in the dark of her flat in Sydney’s inner west to hit ‘off’ on the alarm, ‘on’ on her iPad. She’s neither an early morning exercise junkie nor a shift worker: she’s an “eBay troll”. Money is tight for Lowry, 20, so she plans her schedule around the optimum time to place last-second international auction bids and sweep up the style bargains.

“I got a jacket from Sonya Rykiel and this amazing top from Dries van Noten,” she tells me. I ask if she buys from shops as well. “Maryam Nassir Zadeh for Rachel Comey and Isabel Marant and also Assembly New York.” It hasn’t crossed her mind that I mean real stores. It hasn’t crossed mine to specify bricks and mortar.

Lowry’s all-time favourite bargain is an Ann Demeulemeester jacket, circa 1997, a year when she was five and I was the editor of Vogue Australia. The purpose of this report is not to take a trip down memory lane but, before we dig deep into the business of fashion in Australia today, a quick glance back is in order.

Read the full piece at The Australian Financial Review.