London exposure for New Zealand designers

Antipodium showcases Australasian designers and helps them get established overseas. Picture / Antipodium

London-based Ashe Peacock is turning outdated ideas of Downunder design on their head, with her fashion business Antipodium.

Established two years ago in the hip East End, the shop that stocks labels including Karen Walker and Mala Brajkovic is now in central Soho - mere walking distance from London's top fashion buyers and magazines.

Antipodium sells wholesale throughout Europe, the US and Japan. It also helps new designers, such as Brajkovic, establish themselves overseas using its PR expertise and business knowledge.

Peacock, 34, set up Antipodium as a showcase for Australasian designers, but the shop now stocks international labels, too. It is, for example, the only London stockist of ultra-modern Danish designer Jens Laugesen.

"It's about putting Australian and New Zealand labels on an international level, alongside international designers," says PR manager Rae Begley, who is wearing a black Mala Brajkovic jumper with Vivienne Westwood heels. Peacock wears a Karen Walker T-shirt.

"Kiwi designers like Brajkovic and Walker, and Australian labels such as Nicola Finetti, Zimmermann and rising star Gail Sorronda, are unique, and can hold their own in the international market. It's a really exciting time - Australia and New Zealand are really cool right now."

Dunedin-born Peacock first worked in fashion PR when she arrived in London six years ago. The job gave her an important insight into how Australasian designers could sell themselves better overseas.

"The industry here is a lot bigger, a lot more professionally run, and you can see a way of educating the smaller, local designers. They don't need to saturate the domestic market, they can think globally right from the beginning," says Peacock.

"If they are to succeed in a larger market like the UK or Europe, new designers need to realise the importance of building a brand. Back home you can have labels that are well-known but have never even created a look book, let alone thought about marketing."

Each London Fashion Week, Peacock and her team of two (Begley and sales manager Geoffrey Finch) hold an off-schedule show, the most recent being Red Hot 3 featuring Australian labels Nicola Finetti, Zimmermann and Wayne Cooper. For the past five seasons it has also shown at Paris Fashion Week.

Antipodium also went to New Zealand Fashion Week last month. With Peacock on maternity leave with five-month-old son Horatio, Finch went to scout out potential wholesale and press clients, and designers including Hailwood, Trelise Cooper, Little Brother, Workshop and Sabatini.

"Overseas designers must offer something different to succeed in Europe,"says Peacock.

"They can't be derivative [of Europe], otherwise there's just no saleability." "Brajkovic has got what it takes to succeed here," adds Begley.

"Mala's a really strong talent. Her collection is really well thought out in terms of stories, and it's something fresh. After what we've seen at London Fashion Week we think there is a gap for someone like Mala. Trelise [Cooper] would also do really well here, her collections are really strong and so are well-suited to the UK."

Antipodium is carving out a successful foothold in the London fashion scene, with its clothing and jewellery appearing regularly in high-end style titles and national press.

The Soho store's opening party this summer was full of party-goers including journalists from Vogue, Dazed & Confused and GQ; the shop's first sale was to the New Zealand-born Daily Telegraph fashion editor Hilary Alexander.

"I think we're quite nice, easy people to work with, and that works for us. We also like throwing parties."

Antipodium was lucky to have support from big-name journalists and buyers, says Peacock.

"The timing was right. People needed to learn [about Australasian designers] and we needed to create a buzz that the sophistication is there. People don't need to feel nervous about that. Antipodean design has taken off and everyone's proud of it."