After 3 weeks of living in Rome, having already become bored with the monotony of the club scene that entices many global students, my pals and i decided to take in a fashion event presented by AltaRoma. We stayed in an appartement rome centrum. It was to be held at the historic Tempio di Adriano in Piazza di Pietra, an environment that contrasted sharply with the futuristic feel of the event.


AltaRoma, a corporation that provides opportunities and fosters relations among well-known Italian designers, encourages the cultivation of young, talent through coaching,’intended not only as a method of safeguarding the artisan quality but also as the driver of invention, creativity and technology,’ according to the AltaRoma website. Obviously, walking into a room filled with some of the most fashionable young folk in Rome, while brandishing only my tacky beige messenger bag was quite threatening. we didnot let that get in the way of occupying front row seats and grabbing as much promo material as we could get our hands on.

the first act was called’Wit Open Shooting Roger Weiss,’ which consisted of folks dressed in colourful card shapes, most of them phallic, dancing around a still model as photographers shot round the stage. The music was set to techno remixes of well-liked Yank hiphop songs, and the lighting beat to the beats of the music. This composition led one to a sort of hypnotic trance, which came as a welcome distraction after enduring more than forty-five mins – about forty mins too long to my mind – of a similar thing. The bored and out-of-sorts expression worn by the model was the mirror image of those worn by the gang, whose faces and outfits became increasingly more engaging to watch than what was happening on stage. after the performance was over, I started to wonder if the ambiguity of the act was exactly the point of it. Either way, it was something Ihad never before, and might never again, experience.

The second act was a performance art piece by Chicks on Speed. I braced myself for something so foreign and creatively different I wouldnot understand it, as the set commenced with what only can be depicted as 2 howling banshees. Two ladies, dressed in matching jumpsuit, used video pictures, as well as easy, each day and generally female, objects like stilettos, scissors and cloth to form an engaging and forceful performance. The set was an eclectic mixture of a rhythmic montage of derriere slapping to a cover of the Beach Boys song’Surfer Girl’, whose words were modified to create the ultimate female anthem [*CO]’super surfer girl in the death defying curl.’ The act culminated in a dance party in which fashonistas and common students alike could get up on stage and dance to celebrate fashion, self-expression and life.

I strode out of the show re-energized and prepared for the next new and out-of-the- normal experience Rome had to throw my way. We went back to appartement centrum rome.

Read these articles too: