IT’S ALMOST THAT time of year again — where Instagram is saturated with friends sipping Aperols atop Mediterranean cliffs, endless texts about a Greek bar you simply must visit some day, and half the office appears to be empty because no one wants to stick around for puffer jacket season. That’s right, European Summer is right around the corner.

This year, if you’ve given in to the wanderlust and heading abroad for la dolce vita — your biggest question likely isn’t about visas or flights or hotel stays (though if it is, check out our comprehensive Euro Summer guide here). Rather, it’s: “What am I going to wear?”

As much as European summer trips are about living your best life and exploring the magnificent continent, let’s be real — it’s also about the clothing. Social media users have been sharing their holiday hauls en masse, providing guides on what to buy, and how to style a Euro-specific capsule wardrobe. But with the sheer mass of content, it can be difficult to actually find fashion inspiration that is both practical and chic.

Lucky for us, this year the celebrity set landed in Europe early offering endless inspiration. Just this month, a myriad of stars touched down in France for the Cannes Film Festival, showing off their enviable European street style while wandering around between events. Even celebs who weren’t invited to cinema’s glitziest event are also abroad — such as Hailey Bieber who declared she’s “about to have the best summer of my life.”

In addition to your core wardrobe — tank tops, shorts, bikinis and t-shirts — it’s always worth having a few flashier pieces on hand to upgrade an ensemble. Ahead, we break down the top trends celebs are wearing and the non-capsule garments you should pack to ensure your Euro Summer style is top-tier.

Related: How Australians can travel in style this Euro summer

Euro Summer 2023 outfit inspiration

WHEN it comes to looks that toe the line between elevated-casual and elegant, you need not look further than Kendall Jenner for inspiration.

The model has become renowned for her pared-back — often The Row-heavy — street style looks, which epitomise the trending ‘quiet luxury’ aesthetic. But, when she’s not donning denim, classic slacks and elevated basics, Jenner has proved she knows how to provoke and impress with her style. And her go-to style choice? Something sheer.

Sheer clothing has been omnipresent as of late, taking over the runways and street-style galleries alike. But as is to be discovered ahead, Jenner has been donning and rocking the controversial style for years. From gowns to singlets to near-naked dresses, the reality star has long had an affinity for see-through ensembles. Ahead, we round up the very best of them.

Related: How to style sheer clothing like a pro

Our favourite sheer looks Kendall Jenner has ever worn

SERENA WILLIAMS is stylishly showing off her growing baby bump while holidaying in Italy.

The tennis legend and entrepreneur posted two pictures to Instagram of her wearing a sophisticated figure-hugging black gown with Barbiecore sandals. The first, sees Williams look straight to camera — showing no signs of pregnancy — with the second, revealing her side profile of her bump and derrière.

“CAUTION: Things are not always how they appear,” the 41-year-old captioned the Post, of her also standing in what looks to be a floral lined wedding aisle.

“I am Seriously trying to figure out if the baby is in the front or….back,” she concluded.

Famous friends flooded the comments section, with Khloe Kardashian commenting: “Hahahahaha dying lol;” meanwhile Williams’ husband Alexis Ohanian wrote: “This kid somehow kicks more than Olympia. It’s everywhere .”

The tennis star first revealed the happy news at the 2023 Met Gala. Prior to walking the red carpet, she posted to Instagram a series of images of her in an elegant Gucci look — a black-and-white dress — which beautifully showed off her growing baby bump.

“Was so excited when Anna Wintour invited the 3 of us to the Met Gala,” she wrote in the caption, speaking of herself, husband Alexis Ohanian, and their unborn child.

Williams wore a black dress with sheer, billowing long sleeves and a breezy white chiffon skirt which flowed into a long train. The piece was embellished with pink-toned crystals at the neck and skirt, and featured white cuffs with pink crystal buttons. She accessorized the dramatic piece with layers of white pearl necklaces, a pearl headband by Lelet NY, and diamond stud earrings from Tiffany & Co., as well as her diamond engagement ring and wedding band. For beauty, she wore dark eye liner and a berry lip, and had her hair slicked back into a neat bob.

Williams’s big pregnancy reveal comes after she announced last year that she would be retiring from playing professional tennis in order to focus on and grow her family.

In an emotional essay, she wrote: “I have never liked the word retirement. It doesn’t feel like a modern word to me. I’ve been thinking of this as a transition, but I want to be sensitive about how I use that word, which means something very specific and important to a community of people. Maybe the best word to describe what I’m up to is evolution.”

She added, “I’m here to tell you that I’m evolving away from tennis, toward other things that are important to me. A few years ago I quietly started Serena Ventures, a venture capital firm. Soon after that, I started a family. I want to grow that family.”

She and Ohanian welcomed their first child, daughter Alexis Olympia Ohanian Jr., in 2017.

Stay up to date with BAZAAR’s 2023 Met Gala coverage:
• Everything they’re wearing on the 2023 Met Gala red carpet
• Beauty notes from the 2023 Met Gala
• Best menswear moments at the 2023 Met Gala
• Everything to know about the 2023 Met Gala
• These were the funniest memes about this year’s Met Gala
• Which celebrities skipped the Met Gala, and why
• At the Met Gala 2023, these are the cutest couples
• Sheer looks reign supreme once again on the Met red carpet
• The best behind-the-scenes snaps from celebs ahead of the Met Gala

This article originally appeared on Harper’s BAZAAR US.

“WARDROBE MALFUNCTION” used to be a headline — now it’s a fashion statement. Back in the 2000s, tabloids would have a field day with any kind of celebrity slip — a sans-bra celeb papped on their morning coffee run; an underwear band exposed above a low-rise jean; or (gasp) a bra strap just in sight.

Well in 2023, all fashion ‘controversies’ are not only considered trendy — but they’re actually pretty chic. Fashion has ditched the bra, sheer looks (softly layered over flashy lingerie) are everywhere and those cheeky bumsters are back. In essence, the days of safekeeping your lingerie for yourself and significant other are well behind — and it’s no more obvious than with the latest “peek-a-boo bra” trend seen at Cannes.

While underwear-as-outerwear has been big for a while, here’s a quick fashion rundown on how the exposed bra came to be at cinema’s glitziest event. First, came Bridgerton in 2020 with its corsetry consume — which inspired a new wave of tightly-cinched party dressing to millennials and Gen Z. Then in late 2021, anyone who was anyone was lacing up before they headed out — with the 2022 Met Gala only reinforcing that boudoir-inspired looks can fashionably leave the bedroom. Style icon (depending on who you ask) Julia Fox then famously followed in a most risqué grocery shopping get-up, which included not much more than an Alexander Wang underwear set.

Related: Politics, art and self-expression: A brief history of the underwear-as-outerwear lingerie trend

In the year since, we’ve seen a myriad of celebrities and social media stars take on the covetable lingerie trend, including Dua Lipa at the GCDS show during Milan Fashion Week. Few of these bare-all fads — such as the micro bra and g-string dress — have managed to resist the rapidly-shifting trend cycle and claim a more permanent space in the style spotlight. That is until the exposed bra came along.

While some celebrities have been ditching the bra in favour of freeing the nipple, others are making an equally sexy and empowering fashion statement by showing theirs off at The Croisette in Cannes.

Scarlett Johansson led the celeb pack in a pink Prada column dress for her Asteroid City premiere on May 24, which featured an attached white peek-a-boo bra detail. That same evening, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley debuted a Fendi couture look, which also boasted a sequinned brassiere-like neckline. And most recently, Sydney Sweeney was spotted at the Hôtel Martinez with a visible baby blue bra peeking out the top of her silky Miu Miu slip dress.

But getting on the bra-baring trend doesn’t have to be as overtly glam as the Cannes crowd make it out to be. Just take a look at Kim Kardashian, whose Time 100 Gala get-up included a slip dress by John Galliano featuring split straps with clasps, reminiscent of a bra; and even Hailey Bieber — who was way ahead of the trend. Last year, she showed us how to dress down the look by layering a mint bralette under a blazer.

On the Bieber-approved bra and blazer combo, Harling Ross previously wrote for Harper’s BAZAAR: “There aren’t many stylistic choices that facilitate both self-expression and sex appeal in equal measure, a power that is clearly at the crux of this trend’s charm.”

It’s perhaps this balance that positions the peek-a-boo bra as a once-wardrobe-malfunction look with staying power. It’s head-turning and sexy — while still offering just a little sartorial mystery. All the while, it still looks intentional and sophisticated. Don’t worry, it doesn’t give the impression you just woke up.

As we enter into an era where fashion battles between conservative ‘quiet luxury‘ looks and ultra-sexy, body-baring naked dresses, the peek-a-boo bra strikes the perfect balance. Regardless of which way the pendulum swings — whether skin is deemed in or, in fact, out by the masses — the visible bra will always poke out.

Think of it this way: if you’re spending upwards of $70 on a bra, why not give it the attention it deserves?

IS THERE ANYTHING a celebrity can’t sell?

There’s no denying the power Hollywood wields in the fashion and beauty industry — with the ultimate cultural combo not only incentivising us to shop, but capturing us with legendary campaigns. One only needs to be reminded of previous iconic collaborations including Lady Gaga morphing into Donatella Versace for the brand’s spring/summer 2014 campaign and Kate Moss’ career-defining moment for Calvin Klein in the early ’90s.

And while sartorial seasons change and trends differ, one thing continues to remain the same: The ever-present, celeb-fronted campaign. In 2022, we’ve already seen a slew of famous faces star in fashion’s most awe-inspiring advertisements.

From Jenna Ortega starring as the face of adidas’ first new sub-label in over 50 years to Emily Ratajkowski’s one-year-old son, Sylvester Apollo Bear making his fashion debut, here’s the best celebrity campaigns this year.

Like jeans and a white T-shirt, a classic Burberry trench is never out of fashion. With new colourways and silhouette variations, there’s a style for everyone. Here, six creatives wear theirs on their own terms.

CARLA URIARTE

Carla Uriarte wears many hats. The artist, designer and mother is also the co-owner of Sydney’s beloved Cafe Freda’s, home to Abstract Thoughts Gallery, a space dedicated to championing up-and-coming creatives. With such varied tasks each day, her wardrobe must be up to the challenge: “Being that I am constantly in motion creating art, working in a professional setting, or running after my child, I need my clothes to be comfortable while still giving that chic, 32-year-old cool girl mum energy,” she says.

“I need to be able to move, dance or run at any given moment.” Cue, the Burberry trench.

Uriarte has plenty of achievements to her name, but her daughter remains her greatest pride and inspiration. “Being a mother has been my biggest achievement as my daughter has introduced a life of patience, gratitude and love,” she says.

The qualities her daughter has brought out in her extend into the other aspects of Uriarte’s life, too. “My current self is more patient and moves slower,” she says. “I’m not trying to win a race but instead trusting the process and the beauty in the every day.” She’s ultimately learnt the value of “giving myself time and patience to be consistent with my expression, whether through artworks, design or creating expressions through ambience and curation”, she says. Looking towards the future, Uriarte hopes to support burgeoning creative minds, albeit slightly differently to how she does now at Freda’s: “In the next decade, I want to open a school on a farm,” she says.

SERWAH ATTAFUAH

The digital visual artist and musician Serwah Attafuah’s NFTs have caught the attention of major players in the international art world, including Paris Hilton. Based in Western Sydney (Dhuarg land), Attafuah creates what she calls “cyber dreamscapes and heavenly wastelands populated with Afrofuturistic reflections of self”. (Afrofuturism depicts African diaspora culture fused with science-fiction and futuristic elements.) Hilton commissioned Attafuah via Instagram DM to create an NFT, titled Aether: Galaxy Goddess, which she then auctioned off through Sotheby’s digital marketplace for US$20,160 (about $26,000).

Alongside her multidisciplinary art practice, Attafuah also plays “death metal, black metal and extreme styles of music on guitar” and has written and released three albums with NASHO and Dispossessed. The latter’s Warpath Never Ended was nominated for an Australian Music Prize in 2019.

Attafuah’s musical leanings heavily influence her style, which she mixes with staples such as the Burberry trench. “I customise my clothes to show off the bands I love and to give my style that darker edge,” she says. “I’m a big futurist too, so I try to pick out pieces and silhouettes that feel very bleeding edge.”

Creativity is at the fore of Attafuah’s life, yet she doesn’t believe in mastering a craft. “To me, it’s more about the journey,” she says. “I love to learn new things and evolve every day.” Despite her incredible success, she is happy to take the milestones as they come: “I’m not a big planner when it comes to achievements,” she says, “but I’m just working towards making more meaningful art and music on an even larger scale.”

GEMMA CHUA-TRAN

In Netflix’s Heartbreak High, Gemma Chua-Tran played the pink- haired Sasha So, a (mostly positive) walking gen Z stereotype. The Australian show spent three weeks in the streamer’s global top 10 TV shows and reached top 10 in more than 43 countries, yet Chua-Tran remains humble and grounded. Their main goal: to maintain their “kitchen appliance hoarder” status, which has seen them purchase a duck-themed toaster oven: “My pride and joy.”

If the actor and sometimes photographer seems more relaxed than you’d expect of someone so early in their career, it’s because they are comfortable in front of a camera and open to learning as each new experience presents itself. “Acting is such a thing where I know I will just continue to learn and grow and discover new things,” Chua-Tran says. “And that’s such an exciting prospect.”

Chua-Tran has already taken away a lot from their experience in the industry — including style cues. “Being able to play different characters with such diverse costume design really allows me to consider clothes out of the general realm of my personal style,” Chua-Tran says. “I’ve been so lucky enough to attend shoots like these with brilliant stylists. I’ll always try to take note of what they pull and put together.”

As a result, Chua-Tran’s style has become an eclectic mix of colours and silhouettes. “With the Burberry trench being such a classic staple, I would brighten it up with a mishmash of brighter items,” they add. “A football jersey, a pair of tights and lace-up dance shoes — nothing that really makes sense together but is a lot of fun.”

BRIDGET GAO HOLLITT

If Bridget Gao Hollit could tell her younger self how she’ll turn out, she wouldn’t lead with being an actor, musician or model. “I’d say, ‘I’m the most powerful witch I’ve ever been,’” she says.

Hollitt’s affection for the bizarre permeates her life and her style, which is why, for this shoot, she played with doubling the coats and wearing one backwards. “I like to make beautiful things just a little weird,” she says by way of explanation.

Hollitt also harbours a fascination with the intersection of humanity and technology — cyborgs, in particular, which she muses on in the song “Algorithm Defined Fantasy Girl” from her recently-released debut EP, how was that for you.

For inspiration, she looks to “incredible god-like women in music who have taught me the importance and power of living with as much design on the outside as you do on the inside”, she says, referencing Karen O, Kate Bush, Björk, Laurie Anderson and FKA twigs. “I try to be more like them every day.”

She is striving to achieve a holistic level of creativity: “I think when you master a craft, it becomes a lens through which you see everything,” she says. “Then you can create anything because everything is included. You don’t have to leave anything out.” That said, when it comes to her goals, she has just three: “I hope to find a way to procreate with an AI, I’d love to go post-physical, and to meet Tilda Swinton.”

BEBE BETTENCOURT

As an actor, Bebe Bettencourt is no stranger to playing dress-ups — it’s something she counts herself lucky to be able to do “all the time”. The rising star has worked alongside some of Australia’s most successful actors, including Eric Bana in 2020’s The Dry and Chris Hemsworth in 2022’s Spiderhead. In 2021, she starred alongside Sophie Wilde in the Stan series Eden.

“I’ve learnt so much about myself and my body through the characters I’ve played and through collaboration with truly incredible costume designers,” she says, adding that for this shoot, she relished the idea of “[playing] around with different decades and fashions of the past”.

Bettencourt says she is prepared to experience all the ups and downs that come with carving out a career on the screen. “I think you have to remain open and embrace failure,” she says. “There are so many different perspectives to gain knowledge from. I don’t think learning and growth ever stop.”

Artistic expression is in Bettencourt’s genes. Her father, Nuno Bettencourt, is, among other things, best known as the lead guitarist for the band Extreme, while her mother, Suze DeMarchi, fronted the band Baby Animals before going solo. Growing up, BeBe lived between Sydney, Boston and Los Angeles.

If she were to speak to her younger self, she would “tell her that I’m still figuring it out, but life is pretty magical and I get to do the thing we love … To be able to reach people, to make them feel — whether it’s good or bad — is a privilege to me,” she says.

“Life is an achievement, and I try to celebrate the little things and the big things! I just hope to continue surrounding myself with love and doing what feels fulfilling.”

YEMI SUL

Olivia Oluwayemi Suleimon — better known by her Nigerian nickname, Yemi — is a DJ with a penchant for urban and Black genres such as dancehall and Afrobeat. She’s also worked in documentary filmmaking, has a production company called Freckle TV and is a model. But for her, going down the “multi-hyphenate creative” pathway wasn’t necessarily an active choice, she explains. “As a millennial coming up in the age of perpetual technological change, mastering a single craft has not really been an option afforded to me … I got savvy.”

Coming out of university with an arts degree and experiencing the subsequent curse of “endless interning with no real promise of a job”, Suleimon quickly learnt the value of throwing aside the rulebook of how things should be done in favour of mapping out her own journey. “The only way to really make it in your chosen field is to do it yourself,” she says. “Mastering multiple things at the same time is my way of forging my own path.”

Her self-described “jack-of-all-trades” mentality has influenced every part of her life, including her style, where her dabbling in music, fashion and film provides endless inspiration. A certain nostalgia for the ’90s, when she grew up, also plays its part. She calls upon ’90s off-duty supermodels, the baggy jeans and mini-tee combos of R’n’B groups and rappers of the decade, even “It girl actors in rom-coms”. Comfort is also key: “I love to be the most dressed down person in the club, especially as the DJ. I see it as a flex … I’m not there to impress anyone but myself,” she says. A mix of streetwear and luxury designers is the perfect formula for her ideal ensemble: “It gives effortless and I’m booked and busy energy.”

This article originally appeared in the June/July issue of Harper’s BAZAAR Australia/New Zealand. Get your copy here.

Hair by Richard Kavanagh and Amiee Hershan, both at DLMAU; makeup by Nisha Van Berkel at AP-Reps, Isabella Schimid at Assembly Agency, and Kristyan Low at DLMAU. Cinematography by James Anderson.

TODAY, the museum offers programs, such as mentoring and therapeutic art and writing classes, to support young people. While there, Kate met with adoptive and foster parents and discussed how nurturing a child — and being nurtured as a child — can impact one’s life.

For the meaningful occasion, Princess Kate looked lovely in a monochrome business look. It consisted of a structured baby-pink suit by Alexander McQueen—made up of a fitted blazer and tailored pants—layered over a V-neck blouse in the same soft shade. The stylish royal paired the statement suit with chic white pieces, including pointed-toe pumps, a leather belt embellished with a faux-pearl buckle with golden accents, and small gold hoop earrings with drop pearls. Her hair was down in smooth waves, and she wore her signature subtle smoky eye and pink lip.

The Princess of Wales is helping raise funds to secure the long-term future of the Foundling Museum. In a statement yesterday, she said the institution’s “ground-breaking work to support each care-experienced young person to fundamentally change the future direction of their lives is one that means the world to me. Importantly, it shows that it is never too late to make a difference, and that by providing the right support, we can enable those who have faced real difficulties to overcome their challenges and achieve their goals.”

This article originally appeared on Harper’s BAZAAR US.

THE GLITZIEST red carpet is back for another French chic year. Cannes Film Festival returned with all the glamour, fan-fare, and haute couture on May 16 — in celebration of the world’s biggest movie-making event.

With an impressive cinematic line-up over two weeks, including Wes Anderson’s The Asteroid starring Margot Robbie, Maya Hawke and Scarlett Johansson; Todd Haynes’ May December featuring Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore; as well as The Weeknd and Sam Levinson’s The Idol starring Lily-Rose Depp;  Jennie Kim and Troye Sivan — naturally, we can expect plenty of resplendent gowns, sharp suiting and shimmering jewellery to sparkle off the sea.

Already, we’ve seen a plethora of captivating custom looks such as Elle Fanning in a strapless Alexander McQueen gown with Cartier jewellery; as well as Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones making a rare family red carpet appearance attending the opening event with their 20-year-old daughter Carys Zeta Douglas. See all the most lavish bespoke and archival looks to ascend the iconic Croisette thus far.

Related: All the films premiering at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival

The best fashion at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival

AUSTRALIA’S BALLROOM SCENE has been itching for its closeup, and on February 24, it was delivered one. Sydney WorldPride’s opening concert featured a high-energy voguing showcase of three local houses — House of Silky, House of Luna and House of Slé.

For those unfamiliar, or for whom “ballroom dancing” conjures images of couples doing the Fox Trot at Arthur Murray Dance Studios, the specific ballroom scene we’re talking about here refers to the late 20th-century New York City subculture, which has a long and complicated history dating back to the 1800s, but which trans women of colour reclaimed as an act of resistance against the racial bias of the drag queen pageant circuit. It then expanded to become a safe space for all LGBTQI+ people, especially displaced queer and trans youth. Performers join Houses, often referred to as “chosen families”, and battle it out with other Houses on a catwalk.

The House of LaBeija is considered the first ballroom House, started in 1972 by Crystal LaBeija and her friend Lottie. LaBeija took on the role of House Mother, and they staged their first ball in Harlem. Other Houses quickly followed. The House of Dupree founder, Paris Dupree, is considered the pioneer of ballroom’s signature voguing technique, inspired by fashion models and featuring elements such as the duck walk, the catwalk, floor performance, and spins and dips. It burst into the mainstream with Madonna’s 1990 video and song ‘Vogue,’ which became the best-selling single that year and topped the charts in 30 countries, and Paris is Burning, Jenny Livingstone’s documentary about the 1980s ballroom scene, which won the Sundance Film Festival’s Grand Jury Prize for Documentary in 1991.

The ballroom scene kicked off in Australia in 2014 when, part of a global renaissance of queer ballroom culture, Bhenji Ra, a Filipina Australian interdisciplinary artist, dancer and trans woman, established the House of Slé. In 2018, she launched her event Sissy Ball at Sydney’s Carriageworks. That year also saw the launch of the television drama series Pose, a fictionalised account of NYC’s ballroom scene from 1989 to 1998. It ran for four seasons and collected 40 awards, including four Emmy’s.

The next year, Mira, Xander Khoury and Kitana started Sydney’s House of Silky, which is now a collective of 20 queer, trans, Black, Indigenous, people of colour (QTBIPOC). The Australian ballroom scene was small, and the future Silky members met while performing on the ballroom circuit as 007s (ballroom parlance for free agents who are not part of a House).

“There are a few [of us] with some performance background, but overall, we are like the definition of street performers,” says Mira, who plays of the role of House Mother. “We take our time in finding members and making them a part of the House.”

House of Silky members usually compete, perform and judge at ballroom events and parties in around Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Brisbane and Canberra, attracting crowds of up to 2,500 people, as well as in Europe and the United States. So, when five of them performed at WorldPride in front of a crowd of 20,000 and broadcast to a national audience of 214,000, it was something of a milestone moment for them. “It was a really big audience — the biggest for most of us,” Mira says. “It was really exciting, really nerve-racking … we tried to not get burnt by the flames!”

“When ballroom started in Australia, we weren’t getting that [kind of] attention [that we got at WorldPride],” Khoury adds. “Opportunities like that never would have been presented to us. It’s interesting that now, in 2023, people are begging for the ballroom community to be a part of things like this. It just shows the shift in culture and also how important and special and valuable the ballroom scene is.”

A case in point, perhaps, is the involvement House of Silky has had in Afterpay Australian Fashion Week (AAFW) in the past few years. By day, Khoury works in marketing and sponsorship for IMG, which owns and operates AAFW, and in 2021, five House of Silky members appeared in Jordan Gogos’ runway show as Mira DJ’d. “It was the moment in the middle of my show,” Gogos says. “I really loved what they were doing and wanted to give them a space to do it in the mainstream space.” The designer continued to cast House of Silky members in his 2022 and 2023 AAFW shows, and hired Basjia, a House of Silky member, model, performance artist and movement director, as his casting director in 2022. This year, she was named as part of AAFW’s Changemakers program, which highlights “the new guard of Australians leveraging fashion as a cultural catalyst”. Beyond the Jordan Gogos shows, House of Silky members have also walked for a number of other designers in the past two years.

“House of Silky was built on three values: that we would be the nightlife house, that we would be the fashion house, and that would be a family and a support network for everyone [involved],” says Khoury, the House Father. Mira adds, “We really live and breathe ballroom. It’s not just what we do at the balls, but it’s also how we live our life outside. What goals we want, what we want to achieve, and even some life fundamentals of how we can survive, to then thrive.”

Fifty years after the queer ballroom scene kicked off in NYC, one of its key pillars — creating safe spaces for marginalised queer youth — has never been more important. Less than a month after WorldPride, violent clashes between anti-trans protestors and trans rights activists erupted in both Melbourne and Sydney.

“Walking balls, for me, it fills a lot of gaps that I didn’t get to experience, especially in my younger years, growing up female,” says House of Silky’s Kai, a Wakka Wakka trans man who grew up in Queensland. “[The category] Realness [is] about passing as a cis/straight male in everyday life in order to protect yourself, kind of like code-switching between straight and gay and trans. All of the categories that are performed in Realness are ideas of myself that I wish I could have seen when I was younger.”

Transgender people are among Australia’s most marginalised and socioeconomically disadvantaged groups. According to The Telethon Kids Institute’s 2019 Trans Pathways report, trans adolescents aged 14–25 experienced depression and anxiety at approximately 10 times the rate of youth in the general population, with nearly half of respondents (48 per cent) having attempted suicide.

“It’s still hard for Black and brown trans women,” says Akashi, a Tongan Fijian New Zealander trans woman, who also emcees at balls. “I was lucky in the fact that my father and my mother supported me, even though things were hard. But a lot of trans women in my community don’t have that and some of them fall into the wrong groups. It’s imperative that we get our kids together, because there’s a lot of talent and there’s a great future ahead.”

Gigs like Live & Proud and fashion week shows are great, but what ballroom desperately needs right now is resources, says Khoury. He cites multiple NGOs that operate in the States that focus on the ballroom community. They include House Lives Matter, the Hetrick-Martin Institute and Ballroom, We Care.

“We need brands, social services and community groups to start paying more attention to the kids in ballroom and start building support facilities to directly support the communities,” Khoury says. “The majority of ballroom is made up of First Nations, sex workers, people of colour, queer and trans individuals who really need and also deserve a lot more of that attention and resources to help these people achieve what they need in life when facing opposition.”

This article originally appeared in the June/July issue of Harper’s BAZAAR Australia/New Zealand. Get your copy here.

Hair by Laura Mazikana and Georgia Ramman; makeup by Yasmin Goonweyn and Colette Miller.

THERE WAS one question that consumed the population of Stresa, a sleepy, picturesque inlet about an hour and a half out of Milan yesterday: will it rain? Nestled on Lake Maggiore — on the border between Northern Italy and the Swiss Alps — Stresa was brimming with guests of Louis Vuitton. The brand had chosen to unveil their Cruise 2024 collection on Isola Bella, a floating island owned by the aristocratic Borromeo family for more than half a millennia. 

The plan was for creative director Nicolas Ghesquière — an architecture nut whose previous Cruise collections have been staged at the Miho Museum in Kyoto, the Niteroi Contemporary Art Museum in Rio, and the Falk Institute in San Diego — to show his latest collection in Isola Bella’s sprawling and perfectly manicured gardens. But an unexpected bout of torrential rain moved proceedings indoors.

Still, there are worse plan B’s than staging a fashion show in a baroque 20-room palazzo, lined with great artworks from the 17th and 18th centuries (a staging of the show was filmed earlier in the day to capture the splendour of the gardens, which was then live-streamed in the evening—these are the pictures you see in this article). Guests were ferried over to the island, including Cate Blanchett, Jennifer Connelly, Emma Stone, Alicia Vikander and, in a particularly exciting twist, Oprah Winfrey. 

As for the clothes, they were clearly inspired by the venue at which they were unveiled. Opening looks featured Edwardian-style cuffs fashioned out of neoprene and sharply tailored trousers and jackets inspired by wetsuits. Models wore masks custom designed by a Roman atelier that evoked folk tales of mermaids. The collections’ notes revealed Ghesquière’s desire to “give rise to contemporary tales, populated by drifting creatures that abandon aquatic dwellings for the discovery of terrestrial wonders.”

Baroque detailing, like jacquard prints and crystal-embellished capes, were contrasted with Ghesquiere’s signature sporty tailoring. Grand quilted jackets were styled over neoprene bike shorts. Boxing-style shorts were embellished with delicate embroidery. Elsewhere, nautical themes were abundant: cropped jackets with voluminous sleeves and buttons made of oversized gold anchors, military-style jackets, chunky brown leather boots. Mini dresses were made of artfully draped silks that evoked the palazzo’s grand curtains. Sequin-embellished gowns featured frayed hems, giving them a charming “shipwrecked” sensibility. 

The closing looks were a series of architectural gowns in a soft palette of blush, seafoam, and buttercup yellow. Made of a mix of silk, georgette, and organza with structured, hoop-style hemlines, they had the transcendental quality of mermaids brought to life. They were remarkable dresses that looked quite at home among the grand splendour and art-lined walls of palazzo Isola Bella. Come rain or shine, Ghesquière’s designs are nothing short of a delight to behold.

Discover the full collection below.

THE NEWS of Tina Turner’s death has shaken the world today, as we mourn the loss of one of the most powerful voices of the past century.

Turner was beloved for her high-octane performances and her multitude of hit songs, from “Proud Mary” to “River Deep – Mountain High”, which earned her the title of “Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll”. But she was also known for the outrageous looks she would don each time she took to the stage, which grew bolder and bolder throughout her career as she embraced naked dresses, tinsel fringing, showgirl-inspired gowns and of course, her signature voluminous ’80s blowout. That fashion growth was not merely for show: In her photo book That’s My Life, she credited her bolder fashion choices made her feel “stronger, more confident, happier, [and] loved.”

Though there are hundreds — if not thousands — of images from Turner’s illustrious career, but below, we round up a handful of the most iconic fashion moments throughout her life.

Related: Tina Turner, the ultimate trailblazer for women in rock ’n’ roll, has died

Tina Turner’s best fashion moments