Aussie Collective Says 'G'Day' to Westfield Century City Shop

Kari Hamanaka, wwd.com

Image from article,  with caption: Aussie Collective pop-up at Westfield Century City

DIPLOMATIC MOVES: Australian designers will get a good plug with a January pop-up store called the Aussie Collective for Los Angeles area shoppers.

The 1,000-square-foot temporary store at Westfield Century City represents the first time the Australian public diplomacy program G’Day USA [JB -- see] is bringing fashion and other lifestyle brands to the U.S. through a public-facing measure.

The aim, said Australian consul general of Los Angeles Chelsey Martin, is awareness for the 15-year-old program’s goal marketing Australia to the U.S. Starting with a West Coast project made sense for a few reasons, Martin said.  

“We feel that there’s a lot of synergies between the fashion culture here in California and our Australian brands that are represented in the pop-up,” she said. “The types of designs when you go into the store really represent a great diversity of Australian talent.”

The pop-up will run in conjunction with several Los Angeles area events throughout January, including yoga, a public concert on Australia Day and a gala honoring individuals such as Margot Robbie.

The temporary store features 11 brands ranging from swimwear and sunglasses to home and men’s and women’s apparel. Lines sold in the store include Gorman, Kirrikin, Swisse, Teamm8, Kip + Co, Incy, MJ Bale, Pared Eyewear, Vie Active and Elyptol.

G’Day USA plans to hold additional events Stateside throughout the year with plans of making the pop-up a regular occurrence.

“We hope that it’s something we can make an annual feature of our program,” Martin said. “We’re going to see how it goes, but we’d like to do it again here in Los Angeles in January [2019].”