For each of the past 5 years STYLEAID has focused on 5 emerging designers as part of the event’s main fashion parade.

With such a rich mix of great young talent emerging into the spotlight it was seen as a way to showcase new designers so they could experience a group show first-hand. It also enabled them to get their ranges out into the fashion arena in a non-commercial show and support the work of the WA AIDS Council.

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This year 5 talented labels have once again been chosen to strut their stuff on the catwalk. Comprising a mix of designers from both local and national labels, StyleAID’s selected emerging designers for 2007 are: Stand International, Velvet Sushi, The Vallentine Project, Kooey and CHAUNCEY.

The boys behind the talented CHAUNCEY team are designers Mal Harry (29) and David Jaskiewicz (25) whom, it would seem, were partnered by fate. They have been a couple for 2 years now and have been working together on their label for the past year.

CHAUNCEY’s philosophy revolves around dynamic design using high performance sport and luxury fabrics to produce versatile garments with a focus on tailoring. The boys come from graphic design, illustration and fashion backgrounds, and they both have a love of effortlessness and oddity. Their merging talents and interests challenge conventional design beliefs and push boundaries to create a truly distinctive look that will delight men and women alike.

I sat down with both Mal and Dave to find out how a discussion on leather shoes from Mexico got it all started…

Mark: What inspired your current collection?

Dave: It’s a mixture of things. We focus on music… Currently, our inspiration is around Rio Bailey funk, which is kind of dirty Rio underground meets 80’s electronica. We see our fashion as raw sexy and half naked, splashed with bright colours and very provocative… a cultural thing and what we like to submerge ourselves in. Modern cutting edge is another way to look at it.

Mark: How does being partners affect, if at all, your working relationship?

Dave: A lot of the time, it’s just a matter of finding out what our strengths are and we gravitate to different aspects of our jobs. Mal has more patience…he will do the fiddly tasks, and he will do more graphic design, whereas I will bang out 6 designs in half an hour and Mal will go over them with a fine tooth comb… although we do collaborate closely.

Mal: Dave does a lot of the business side, and I do the more technical. Dave is the schmoozer… we do have our blues, of course, but we try to stay focused as we work from home.

Dave: Domestic chores get in the way and blur the lines from work to home. We have been in a relationship for 2 years and business for nearly 1 year. In the back of our minds we knew when we met that we would probably work together. We met when I approached Mal at Connections and asked him where he got his shoes, and that is how we started talking.

Mark: Where do you see WA fashion heading in the next few years?

Dave: It is going to go to extreme places. Looking at other designers like Material Boy who are breaking new ground, we never thought we would see this type of fashion work in Perth. There is a lot more money in Perth and the demand for Perth fashion is growing faster than ever. The talent is here so why do we have to go over east or overseas to buy great fashion?

Mark: Do you see WA being your base in the future or will you have to base in the east like many other designers to make a living?

Mal: We would love to live in both, have one foot in each side of the country. We love Sydney and Melbourne, David was born in Melbourne, but the way that fashion is going in Perth (besides the cost of getting over to things like Fashion Week), it would be great to be able to stay here. There is less and less reason to consider being based over east because Perth is getting stronger and stronger… and it would be hard to move away from family.

Mark: Why did you want to be involved with STYLEAID?

Dave: For the exposure really and the fact that it is highly regarded in the industry here in Perth and supports a great charity. The event changes your perspective on how the fashion scene is evolving in Perth. [We have] an audience of our peers to show what we are up to.

Mark: What inspired you to do both men’s and women’s fashion and not one or the other, like many designers do when they are launching their labels?

Dave: We wanted to do unisex t-shirts when we first began, which we did. A lot of women will rarely spend money on them but for men they are seen as a staple of their wardrobes. We got a really good pattern that worked.

Mal: We had lots of response about the t-shirts from women and decided to do some. The commercial market is flooded with lots of t-shirt designer, and it is a tough nut to crack.

Dave: To not do women’s wear was too important – two small or medium size ranges that would reflect our style and have similarities for both men and women was something we were striving for. We wanted to have a range that would enable couples to have similar styles, and it was something different for us – the Beckham school of dressing if you like.

Mark: Anything else that you would like to share with our readers?

Dave: Get more sleep and don’t stay up late.

Mal: Really, we are micro managing everything, and both of us are jacks of all trades. We have had tastes of all aspects from photography, graphics, design to fabric printing. We can take on a lot of the roles that we might have to outsource – saving money but the drawback is we have to spend more time learning those things that we only have limited knowledge of. It is one of those things were we are weighing up if it is a false sense of economy and looking at the issue of control over what we do and realizing that we have to let go of some of that control.

Dave: I suppose we are each other’s mentors, and we are learning lessons from each other around how to work on the business from the design to the final output. And sharing so much of our lives and business can be a real challenge, but one we both really thrive on.

For more information on CHAUNCEY, email them at info@chauncey.com.au or check out their website at www.chauncey.com.au or on MySpace.

You can also check out CHAUNCEY’s latest range as well as those of the other emerging designers that are showing at STYLEAID this year on the STYLEAID website.

CHAUNCEY Stockists:

• Saints – Mount Lawley & Subiaco
• Wanderlust – Fremantle
• Tadé …So Chic – Applecross
• United 81 – Margaret River
• Milc – Dunsborough