2nd Fashion Meets Music Festival a big improvement

Fashion and popular music have been inextricably linked since Frank Sinatra made his bobby-soxed fans swoon, terminally cool bebop jazz musicians wore berets, the Beatles got a whole lot of kids in trouble with long hair, and the Sex Pistols rode the wave of design created by Vivienne Westwood.

It should be a no-brainer to highlight them both in one weekend festival. As the organizers of the Fashion Meets Music Festival, which opened its second year Saturday night, will tell you, it is not as easy as it may seem.

Where last year’s program missed making its point by a long shot, this year’s much-improved fest comes much closer.

First and foremost, the fashion runway has landed right in the middle of the Arena District’s archway park, complete with icy lighting and a long white promenade. It is also midway between the two largest stages.

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When rapper Ludacris, the biggest act of Saturday afternoon, finished his set on the middle stage, the crowd, perhaps 1,000 by then, scattered to the opposite ends of the festival’s giant “ L."

Many came to rest at the fashion tent, just in time to watch Columbus designer Celeste Malvar-Stewart trot out her collection. A perhaps-accidental intersection was formed between fashion and music.

Outside, the crowd reflected the style consciousness of the festival slightly more this year than last. Still, it was made of a wide range of mostly young people, very few pushing the envelope.

But Malvar-Stewart’s brave designs focused on gauzy, flowing pastiches of fabric, mostly white but including a few earth colors. Outside, in a theme that may have echoed the collection, many women were dressed in long, organically flowing skirts.

The confluence between clothes and tunes surely was an attraction to some. Zalexas Morris volunteered because of her parallel interest in both. “It’s a good idea that draws more people,” the 23 year-old sometime-model said. “It was my main reason for volunteering.”

Perhaps the message is getting through. Steve Dickson, a volunteer both years, said that the main gate had for a time sold out of general admission tickets and that the festival clearly was drawing better than the inaugural year. A Columbus police officer, watching at the other end of the venue, agreed with this writer’s guess about the crowd number during the Ludacris set.

The festival has made other positive changes, as well. Gone are the Ferris wheel and the zip line. The quality of food has improved, with the state fair stands replaced by local food trucks.

The selection even includes health-minded offerings such as the Short North shop Native Cold Pressed juices. Owner Nicole Davis said the link is not so surprising and explained why she approached the organizers: “Yoga and fashion is a big part of our brand. … There is so much more at the core of what we do.”

As for the fashion part of the retail offerings, there is little chance of the runway designs being found on the retail concourse, which included mostly T-shirt shops.

Alex Rosa, chief operating officer for Traxler Custom Printing, one of the city’s best-known on-demand shirt producers, said he was not surprised by the lack of high-end boutique representation. It would be impractical for those businesses, many of which are open during the weekend, to drag their inventory out of their stores.

Reptile Fiction, a one-man electropop outfit, accompanied Malvar-Stewart’s presentation with alternately otherworldly, gloomy and dreamy music, as the models paraded with serious determination. Later, on the smallest stage, the One & Only PPL MVR played to a small crowd with a fashion statement of its own. The five-piece psychedelic metal band featured a trio of furry Sasquatches, pounding guitars, drums and screaming electronically altered vocals.

It may have been the most unique interpretation of the intersection all weekend.

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