BEN CHAN: ‘IVARLUSKI ASERON AND DENNIS LUSTICO HELPED DEFINE THE STYLE OF THEIR DESIGN GENERATION.’

The retail giant Bench can afford to rest on its laurels and simply enjoy its leadership in the market, but it does more for the industry it is part of by supporting its growth — for the past, present and future of Philippine fashion. The three-day Bench Fashion Week Holiday 2018 opened with a collection from designers Ivarluski Aseron on the first day and Dennis Lustico — his first show in three years — on the second. On the third day, Bench Tower’s Playground runway belonged to promising up-and-comers in the Bench Design Awards — an opportunity in itself — with the reward of presenting internationally in Amazon Fashion Week Tokyo next month. For the upcoming Ternocon, it’s about adapting our unique fashion heritage to modern-day Filipiniana.

But let’s go back to the present — and these are the two designers who are paving the way. “Ivarluski Aseron and Dennis Lustico helped define the style of their design generation,” Suyen Corporation chairman Ben Chan explains. “Ivar’s expert skills in tailoring allows him to play, break and make new rules to create pieces that are at the same time simple and complicated, masculine and feminine, modern and timeless. We chose them because we thought it would be a good idea to showcase their expertise to the new market, including our new design talents from Bench Design Awards who will benefit from learning from their expertise and experience in creating collections. It is very exciting to see designers such as Ivar and Dennis juxtaposed with young, emerging designers from Bench Design Awards. It is a story of exciting potential from the new generation and a master class in design from the established designers such as Ivar and Dennis.”

In this YStyle roundup, we allow the designers to talk about their inspiration and the process that informed their latest collection — and this era in Philippine fashion design history that they are creating — in their own words.