Vinyl material maestro

BY admin on January 8, 2020

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Alex Perry is an Australian fashion designer and television personality best known for his women’s wear. Perry was born February 14th, 1963 and grew up in a working-class family in Sydney. In 1984 he attended the prestigious East Sydney Fashion Design Studio.

After graduation he began his career in the fashion industry as a model representing Australian talent for international labels. Eight years later he would launch his own brand of fashions in a suburb of Kensington with a collection of gowns, corsets, and sheath dresses.

His gowns quickly received critical acclaim and very shortly thereafter his designs were seen in magazines like Vogue, InStyle, Harpers Bazaar and Marie Claire. In 1994 Perry relocated his studio to Double Bay Sydney where he focused his efforts on high-profile celebrities. The list of well-known names that have worn his dresses includes Elle Macpherson, Miranda Kerr, Linda Evangelista, Alessandra Ambrosio, Megan Gale, and Alyssa Sutherland.

His statement dresses have elements of glamour, fantasy, and intricate detailing. Recently Perry has also serverd as a judge and mentor on Australia’s Next Top Model, Project Runway Australia, Ultimate Make Over, and as a commentator for Prince Charles and Camilla’s wedding.

Today we are focusing on his vinyl fashions and gowns which you can find at both Perry’s retail shops and online through high-end vendors that carry his brand. Below we review 6 of his current designs that are offered today.

Fitted Midi dress

First up is a fitted midi dress with two darts on the top to ensure an excellent fit. This dress is more structured with less stretch, giving it a more formal look. In order to get more of a fitted look without leveraging fabric stretch, he added two darts.

One dart comes from the side an angled toward the center of the breast which allows for a tighter fit while giving room for the chest, and another dart that travels from the waist and upward to the empire. This second dart gives the dress the ability to fit closer around the waist.

You’ll also notice a near full-length zipper at the rear of the dress with contrasting silver teeth. We love how zippers can be used to highlight the sexiness of the back of a dress, and Perry runs the zipper almost the entire length of the skirt to draw the eye, and then leaves enough room at the bottom of the dress along with a slit to enable the wearer to be able to walk freely.

The dress is currently available for $1,700 with limited availability from FarFetch. The model in the above images is 5 ft 10 in wearing size 2. If you don’t fit into “model” sizing or don’t have nearly $2k to spend on a dress, we would welcome you to make a knock-off for far less using our black patent vinyl fabric.

Hart layered-effect dress

One of our favorite effects is ruching with vinyl fabrics. The high-gloss reflects light incredibly well, and when you add ruching it creates all these ridges and round edges that will increase the refraction of the light.

This dress has a round neck, structured shoulders, long sleeves, a rear zip fastening, a slim fit and a mid-length. The structured shoulders also differentiate the dress from anything else you might find in the marketplace. When you look at the dress your eye is first drawn to the vinyl at the bust line and then you work your way down, then back up to the pointed shoulders.

That level of detail is what separates Perry from other designers. There is also his signature long zipper down the rear that you’ll find in this collection. The zipper design brings cohesiveness to the entire line, and shows that when Perry designs it is not just about a single piece, but the entire collection.

Perry’s layered effect dress is available as of this writing (January 6th) for $2,248 with 30% off at farfetch: https://www.farfetch.com/shopping/women/alex-perry-hart-layered-effect-dress-item-14300271.aspx?storeid=11625

Powell vinyl-effect dress

Most of the Perry’s dresses that we review today at made from black vinyl, however, the Powell vinyl-effect dress brings a fresh pop of pastel pink color to the palette.

While it isn’t noticeable from the pictures, there is a high side slit going up the side of the dress. Perry is a master at creating volume and playing off the strengths of the vinyl fabrics reflective properties by creating a long flowing flounce that curves and adds to the effect of the dress.

Similar to his other designs in this collection, he uses darts that shoot upward from a waist seam and stop at the center of the bust to ensure increased fit. Unlike the black dresses, the pink “vinyl-effect” dress does not have a full length contrasting zipper down the back.

We love the girliness of this dress via the pastel pink color, volume, and flow of the material. You can purchase it for your next party from https://www.modaoperandi.com/alex-perry-r20/powell-a-line-vinyl-midi-dress for $2,400. We also have pastel pink vinyl with matching pink zippers should you prefer to make your own.

Strapless Midi Dress

In case the other dresses weren’t expensive enough to reach a level of exclusiveness that suited you, we’re happy to show off Perry’s Strapless Midi Dress in patent vinyl currently retailing for over $4k.

Perry takes this dress in a darker direction. Despite it having a similar look to the baby pink vinyl dress above, the modification of the top to have more of a corsetted appearance moves this dress closer to that of a dominatrix. The long flowing nature of it prevents it from going too far in that direction, but the corset-style seams across the top provide a more serious and threatening / sexy tone.

Notice that his model also sports a pair of black patent leather sandals with silver spikes to keep with the edgier tone of the dress. The rear has that signature contrasting silver zipper that goes almost the full length of the dress, although you can’t see it in the images as the zipper gets lost within the folds of the vinyl.

Hunter Vinyl Midi Dress

Next in our list of Perry’s vinyl fashions is what he calls the “Hunter” Vinyl Midi dress. It’s styled like a cocktail dress and perhaps he named it hunter because you’ll be going after your prey in a dress like this.

Just as with his other dresses, this one features a long metal zipper down the rear that stops about 6-8 inches short of the end of the dress. Unlike the others, this dress features a deep V-plunge down the back, showing off the backside skin of the wearer.

In tying in with some of Perry’s longer running themes, he uses corset style seems in the top of this dress, similar to the pink vinyl-effect dress. Out of all the vinyl dresses featured in this post, this is the skirt that our staff would love to wear out to a party or holiday event.

The hunter dress costs less than the previous, however, it is still out of range for the average customer at $1,500. Regardless, if you want one you can find it at Modesens: https://modesens.com/us/en/product/alex-perry-hunter-vinyl-midi-dress-black-13659760/

Carter Dress

Made for a younger audience with similar gathering running down the side seams, the Carter dress is just a lot less fabric than the other designs we have reviewed so far. It is essentially a tube dress, but with Perry’s long metal signature zipper down the rear and perfectly executed gathering that takes it from average to outstanding.

One of the details that we love in Perry’s collection of vinyl dresses is that he doesn’t mix and match different materials. In cheaper designs we frequently see dresses where the front is made from non-stretch vinyl fabric, and then the rear uses a jersey or high-stretch spandex / polyester mix so that you don’t have to worry much about fit.

The stretch of the non-vinyl material makes up for poor craftsmanship and ensures that the fit is decent. Perry uses vinyl, and it does not appear to be high-stretch vinyl, along with darts, seams, and other mechanisms to ensure good fit.

We thoroughly enjoyed reviewing Perry’s masterpiece of vinyl dresses and hope that you did as well. Do you have designers or clothing that think deserves attention? Send a link to us at sales@MJTrends.com and we’ll review it for the blog.

If you can’t afford his fashions hopefully you have taken away some inspiration from viewing and thinking about the amazing work that Perry has done with these designs. Don’t forget to checkout our selection of PVC, 4-way stretch vinyl, faux leather, and real leather hides for your next project.

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