Toronto designer has golden moment with black dress
Recent Ryerson grad was tapped to design ET Canada host’s Golden Globes red carpet gown
Canadian fashion designer Adrian Arnieri’s Golden Globes experience had as much drama as a Hollywood movie.
The 22-year-old recent Ryerson grad was hand-picked on Nov. 17 by ET Cana
da host Sangita Patel to design the gown she would wear to interview celebrities on the red carpet at Sunday’s 2018 Golden Globe Awards.
It would be a tight turnaround with a Dec. 14 deadline, but Arnieri and Patel quickly agreed on a yellow gown with a nude mesh top with floral appliqué topped with Swarovski crystals and hand-sewn flowers on the skirt.
Then, the day of the final fitting, the news broke that actresses would be wearing black to the awards show to protest sexual harassment in the entertainment industry. Patel would stand in solidarity.
For a moment it appeared Arnieri’s dream of designing a red carpet gown would not come true.
But like many Hollywood movies, Arnieri’s story had a fairytale ending.
Surrounded by friends and family for a Golden Globes party at his Mississauga home, Arnieri saw Patel on the red carpet wearing the black taffeta gown he designed at the 11th hour.
“It felt like a dream that all of this even happened,” he said the next day.
“We didn’t end up seeing her on TV . . . but she posted on her Instagram.
“She looked so stunning in it,” Arnieri said.
“Just seeing her on the red carpet was my award-winning moment,” he said, adding he grabbed his sister and dad and “had a little moment of excitement between the three of us — they saw me working so hard the last few months.”
Patel said the last-minute black gown was a perfect fit and testament to Arnieri’s skill as a designer.
“I am really proud that he made that black dress and I was able to wear it at the Golden Globes for what has become such a historic moment,” she said. “Adrian is going to be one of Canada’s greatest fashion designers and I am so proud that I can be a part of that.”
Arnieri, who graduated from Ryerson School of Fashion in June, landed this golden opportunity after meeting Patel and her stylist, Alicia McNamara, at the White Cashmere Collection design competition in September, where his toilet paper dress won second place. He was soon invited to be Patel’s Canadian designer for 2018.
“I always want to go Canadian when I do red carpet events,” said Patel, who looks to support up-andcoming designers. When she met Arnieri, “they just clicked.”
The Globes was his first big challenge. He designed five sketches and provided fabric samples and together they picked an outfit, what Arnieri now calls the “infamous yellow dress.” Arnieri spent the next couple of weeks hunched over his sewing machine and hand sewing flower pedals and crystals onto fabric.
“The day of the presentation was the day of the big plot twist for me,” Arnieri said. “I had scheduled a mini photo shoot for my portfolio and for Sangita’s social media sharing. Right before the photo shoot, they brought me into the office and sat me down. I thought, ‘Oh gosh, they are about to tell me they hate the dress and don’t need me.’ ”
Instead, they told him the news of the protest and said that Sangita will wear the yellow dress at a later date — at the Canadian Arts and Fashion Awards (CAFA) show in February.
Then they gave him the option of recreating the gown in black or making another gown — if he could turn it around in time.
“I went straight to Queen St. and got fabric swatches, did three new sketches and sent them over,” Arnieri said. “Fashion is very powerful. I appreciate that I am in an industry that can make a statement with one garment.”
There were a lot of challenges but the biggest for Arnieri was the lack of colour.
“All of my outfits are extremely colourful. I find it difficult to stick to black,” said Arnieri, whose target market is celebrity, red carpet and theatrical events.
Nonetheless, he came up with an elegant black taffeta mermaid-style gown, with a plunging neck line, low arm holes, a deep back and a slit at the bottom so Patel could walk easily. The skirt, made of black tulle, had four yards of black crinoline, pleated to 16 inches at the waist to create volume at the back. The skirt is detachable at the waistband. Petals that are hand-sewn into flowers around the bottom of the skirt fade up to the waistline. He finished the gown three days before the deadline. “He killed it,” said Patel. “He came to my workplace with it on Jan. 2 and it was a perfect fit. I put it in my suitcase and was on the plane on Jan. 4.”
Arnieri said creating a garment for the host of ET feels like “a full circle moment.” When he was 6 years old and his father would go on business trips, his mom would let him and his sister stay up on a school night and watch ET. His mother died of cancer seven years ago.
“My mom was never able to see any of my creations as I had not learned to sew at the time, but I feel she is with me in everything I do,” he said.
While this is a big fashion moment for Arnieri, he has much more planned for 2018.
Along with dressing Patel, he is presenting a collection at the Italian film festival in Toronto in June as part of TIFF and has plans to do charity projects for cancer awareness. He is also working on a secret project he’s not quite ready to reveal. The selfdescribed pop-culture fanatic gets his inspiration from the celebrity women he looks up to, namely Katy Perry, Lady Gaga and the Spice Girls.
“They all stand for different things and express themselves in their own ways.” he says. “I am pretty crazy about them. I’ve met Katy Perry, and Lady Gaga and Mel B . . . I worked really hard to meet them.”
By work, he means designing original outfits and promoting them on social media to catch the attention of the stars. He and his sister dressed like Katy Perry for her October concert in Toronto.
They got noticed, were bumped up from nosebleed section to floor tickets and then invited to meet the pop star backstage.
“She posted a video of me on her Instagram and she asked me how I pulled it together,” he said.
“I hope it was because of my talent as a designer.”
“Adrian is going to be one of Canada’s greatest fashion designers and I am so proud that I can be a part of that.” SANGITA PATEL
ET CANADA HOST