London Fashion Week: IRK Takes Over the Century Club Rooftop with VIP LFW

IRK joined VIP LFW and Fashion Scout for the opening party of London Fashion Week. VIP LFW unfolded on the Soho roof terrace of the Century Club beneath the open London sky, with Mermaid Gin cocktails, rooftop dancing, and a crowd drawn from across the industry.

VIP LFW is the first event since before lockdown to be hosted by London Artist and club promoter SYRETT. SYRETT a veteran of the fashion, art and club world is famous for dance nights such as ICON in Liverpool, Bubblegum Casino in Manchester and the award winning Art events Soho Salon Supper Club held at Blacks Club in London. You may also recognise SYRETT’s name from IRK as he is our Global Publisher. So when Dan asked us to join him in running a party to open London Fashion Week, we said YES!!

Like all Fashion Weeks the world over the crowds move quickly. Shows end, invitations change hands and the crowd races across the city towards whatever comes next. This season, IRK created something designed to travel with them.

The IRK Zine is a free, smaller-format version of IRK Magazine, created to make the publication more immediate, portable and accessible. Throughout Fashion Week, copies appeared at events across London. For example, Fashion Scout distributed the zine at its runway shows. While Tatty Devine and Stuart Trevor shared it with guests at their own events.

Rather than waiting on a newsstand, the IRK Zine entered the city’s fashion circuit directly. It moved from show to show, venue to venue and hand to hand.

Pandemonia Takes the Cover

The first IRK Zine needed a cover capable of stopping London Fashion Week in its tracks. Pandemonia was the inevitable choice.

The artist and living fashion phenomenon not only appeared on the cover. She also brought it to life at the launch. That is, throughout the evening, Pandemonia swept in and out of the party, returning each hour dressed in a different one of her extraordinary creations.

Every entrance changed the atmosphere. As a result, conversations paused, cameras turned, and the rooftop became her stage. She did not simply attend the IRK Zine launch. Her presence took the party to another level. Indeed, she brought a sharp sense of fashion theatre to the Century Club rooftop.

A Rooftop Launch Under the London Sky

The zine’s journey across London culminated on the rooftop of Century Club, where IRK celebrated its launch alongside Fashion Scout’s 20th anniversary.

Designers, artists, editors, models and members of London’s creative community gathered above Soho for an evening of cocktails, conversation and dancing. Against the city skyline, introductions became collaborations before the dance floor took command.

Mermaid Gin supplied the gin for cocktails created and served by the Century Club bartenders. Perfume VIP also joined the celebration, adding another sensory dimension to a night devoted to independent creativity and the people pushing it forward.

IRK at London Fashion Week

The IRK Zine extends the magazine’s commitment to independent designers, artists and image-makers in a format created for discovery. Free and compact, it can circulate beyond traditional magazine distribution and meet readers inside the events where fashion is actually happening.

Its London Fashion Week launch showed exactly what that can mean. The zine travelled through runway shows and creative gatherings across the city before taking centre stage at Century Club. Meanwhile, the arrival of the IRK Zine opened a new chapter for IRK, one designed to move faster, travel further and place bold independent voices directly into the hands of a new audience.

High above Soho, with Pandemonia making another entrance and London glowing beyond the terrace, the first issue was officially set loose on the city.