Dayton Fashion Week

On Saturday April 7, 2012 from 10a-1p Miami FL and the Miami Valley will be partnering up when Dayton Fashion Week holds a casting call looking for four hosts to cover DFW for Miami, FL based fashion series Inside Couture—the casting call will be held at Sun Watch Indian Village located at 2301 W. River Rd, Dayton, OH 45418.  You will need to bring a recent head and full body shot, with your name, phone number, and email address the back.

When I first heard that Inside Couture would be coming to cover Dayton Fashion Week and would need four hosts, I immediately grabbed one of those spots—when you are the Director of Operations you can do things like that!   However, as I started to learn the ins and outs of my position I began to question whether or not I would have the time to run around doing interviews for Inside Couture AND make sure that everything is in order and running smoothly during Dayton Fashion Week.  A question that was answered this past Saturday at our Pre Launch Soirée which was a HUGE SUCCESS, everyone really enjoyed themselves and we reached capacity—but at the same time, I found myself running around like a chicken with its head cut off and that was just a one day event that lasted a couple of  hours.  So with that being said I made the decision to give up my spot as a host and to focus on making sure DFW is a success. To see more photo’s from the Pre Launch please “Like” our page.

Dayton Fashion Week's Pre Launch Soiree

Junda (The Founder of DFW) first introduced me to McKinley Pierre, the owner and Executive Producer of Inside Couture a couple of months ago and he has been  a strong supporter of DFW and the  go to person for both Junda and I for advice on how to handle the stress and pressure that comes along with planning an event of this magnitude. We find ourselves calling him almost on a weekly basis and the conversations normally last a couple of hours.  So when I called McKinley this week, he was out on his boat fishing but he made the time for a quick interview to introduce himself  and his show to the people of Dayton, OH and we talked about a little surprise for a couple of the host selected from our casting call this Saturday.

Dayton Fashion Week: Can you introduce yourself and your show to the people from Dayton, OH?

McKinley Pierre:  Hello, my name is McKinley Pierre and I’m one of the owners for Inside Couture, and I’m the Executive Producer, and basically our show Inside Couture is about fashion– started on the concept of me and my friends who are in the business but you never hear about the people behind the scenes. The stylist, hair and makeup artist, designers the models, the PR– So we are bringing the people from the back to the front!

DFW: What are you looking for in a host for Inside Couture?

MP: What I wanted to do with the show is give people the opportunities who ordinarily wouldn’t have the chance and introduce them to the fashion world, so that they can learn the behind the scenes happenings.  I want them to learn how to act, how to present themselves, and better themselves because it might introduce them to other things, they might become an assistant, or get into production and etc–it’s all about having fun with it.

Basically, I want somebody excited to be there, somebody who likes to have fun, and somebody who commands attention—yet knows how to talk to people.  You don’t have to have experience but I want you to know how to bring it!

DFW:  Had you ever heard of Dayton, Ohio before we had Dayton Fashion Week?

MP: Oh I definitely have heard of Dayton, OH–everyone has heard of Dayton, OH but not in the Fashion World. When Junda called me and said that she was thinking about putting together a Fashion Week in Dayton, honestly I started to laugh because when you think fashion it’s in Europe, Miami, New York, and L.A. and I didn’t think there was fashion in Dayton, OH!! So, I told her if you’re serious about it I will help you do whatever it is you’re wanting to do in Dayton—you can use our show to promote DFW because we have the big names from Roberto Cavali, Custo Barcelona, Nicole Miller, photographer Mike Ruiz who shot the Beckhams and the Kardashians, and anyone that you can think of in the Industry, we have the stylist James Santiago from Sex and The City and Burn Notice, we have access to all of the behind the scenes happenings in the fashion industry.

Editor and Chief of Elle Magazine - Robbie Myers talks to Inside Couture about the first Elle Spa in the world. Photo by Inside Couture

DFW: So what are you looking forward to the most with Dayton Fashion week?

MP:   Aside from the great fishing I hear Dayton has, I want to  bring a couple of the hosts that you selected down to Miami and let them do some interviews here in South Beach, so we are going to work some things out for that too!  I want to bring you guys down here to have some fun, get some experience and you never know where this could go and what other opportunities that this might lead to, you never know who’s going to see you, and you never know who’s watching!

We had Miami Fashion Week here a couple of weeks ago and I actually had the chance to meet a couple of hair stylist and makeup artist from Dayton and they were so excited that they were finally having something right there in their own back yard!  So I look forward to seeing the people in Dayton having fun if you can’t have fun don’t even show up!

DFW:  What makes a great Fashion Week?

MP:  Fashion Weeks are only as good as your models!  if you have a good model they’ll make a trash bag look good!  It’s the model, it’s the hair, it’s the makeup, a lot of people don’t realize that it takes a whole team to make somebody up, it’s not just one person.  It’s the people behind the scenes that determine the success of a show–they’re the ones that are running everything.

[yframe url=’http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=u2yaslZUMqY’]

DFW:  You have been getting bombarded with emails from people in Dayton who have questions about how to prepare for Saturday, what advice to do you have for the people coming out to the audition?

MP: Oh yeah,  we’ve had a lot of people contact us via our Inside Couture website, they’ve been sending their reels, they’re trying to get a head start on the competition.  In any type of business you have to hustle and have a step up on people.  So show up, act like you want to do something and dress the part. YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE SKINNY TO BE A HOST FOR INSIDE COUTURE!!!  We want to see diversity, we want somebody who knows how to talk and have fun.  A lot of people want to exclude people for certain things and people sit at home wanting to do this but they don’t think that they’ll be chosen, how will you know if you don’t get off of the couch and try?

Don’t come in sounding like a Newscaster, we don’t want that, we don’t like that.  Don’t come in acting like you know everything, if you know everything, I’m not going to be able to work with you because if you know everything, you can’t grow.

I look at it like this—you either got it or you don’t!  Don’t be fake people can see right through that talk to them like you’re talking to your cousin or your friends, if you get star struck and start asking to take pictures with them they aren’t going to want to do other interviews with, they’re not going to invite you their parties.

I want to show people the lives of celebrities and let people know that you don’t have to sell your souls or lay down on the casting couch to make it in the industry.  These young models need to learn that everyone is not their friend, people lie, there’s always that person outside of the club telling you to do something that won’t get you into the club.

DFW:  What else do you want to share with Dayton about what you have going on?

MP:  We also have a music show that we are going to be casting for and I plan on doing some stuff there it’s called IA Live, it’s music, fashion, and art.  We’ve had interviews with Akon, Lady Gaga, to David Getta, and Justin Beiber.  One of the alst interviews I had was with Flo Rida and Lil Wayne who is my neighbor

DFW:  When we spoke a couple of weeks ago, you talked about knowing your Host weakness and you mentioned that you were friends with Lenny Kravitz and I freaked out because I love Lenny Kravitz and you said ok you are going to keep me away from Lenny, why is it important to know your Host weakness?

MP:  Yeah, I live down the street from Lenny, one of my host Lechelle won’t do any interviews with Trey Songz, she melts if you talk about him.  So I like to know who their weakness is, so when you said Lenny Kravitz is your weakness, when I bring you down here for some interviews, I’m keeping you away from Lenny(me and my big mouth Insert sad face and tear drops here).  I like to know the weakness and the genre of music people listen to.  Some people prefer to only interview the celebs that they aren’t fans of to make things easier—it’s all about having fun!

For more information check out the Inside Couture website.