How stylist Karinda Mutabazi prepares for Melbourne Fashion Week

A week in the life.

For the unacquainted, it can be tricky to wrap your head around what a stylist’s job entails. Is it dressing models for a photoshoot? Is it sourcing items from shops? Is it styling pieces for a runway? In fact, it’s all of the above and more.

Melbourne-based stylist Karinda Mutabazi is the creative visionary behind Melbourne Fashion Week’s (M/FW) Volvo Electric Runway and the Emporium Fashion Capsules. This meant Karinda was tasked with sourcing accessories and items across Melbourne, as well as putting final looks together for a range of renowned Australian designers, including Atoir, Chris Ran Lin, Wa-Ring and Par Moi.

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“[Being a stylist] is really about the relationships you nurture and the hours spent doing emails, phone calls and driving to a million places to pick things up and drop things off,” Karinda explains. In the lead-up to the runway, Karinda spent her week test-driving the Volvo Electric car (in a very Brat-esque shade of green), venturing from Abbotsford to Richmond and back to Emporium Melbourne.

As an official media partner for M/FW, we can say no matter how much running around she had to do, her efforts were well and truly worth it. Below, we take a look into Karinda’s week prepping for the Volvo Electric Runway and go behind the scenes of the show.

In the days leading up to a Fashion Week runway, Karinda’s mornings usually begin with packing the car. “The show I put together for M/FW this year was sponsored by Volvo [and] as part of the experience, guests had the chance to watch the runway and sit in the cars,” she says. “So I got to test-drive the Volvo EX30 in the lead-up to the show to see what the experience was like inside the car.”

She also happily reported that her clothing rack (a stylist essential) fit perfectly in the back of the car.

One of the key stops along Karinda’s route was a visit to Solari Studio in Abbotsford, where she scoped out its range of Grace Scharf bags and jewellery for the show. “I’m obsessed with these 3D-printed bags – I love adding a bit of drama to my shows,” she tells us.

Another key part of her week was meeting head dresser and show assistant, Joshua Austin, at Alimentari on Smith Street to talk through their plan of attack for the runway.

In prepping for the runway, Karinda ventured over to Armadale to meet up with jewellery designer, Kitte, to work out adornments for the show. “It’s always fun building a story with accessories,” she told us.

Straight from Kitte’s, she then headed to the city. As the stylist for Emporium Melbourne, Karinda was in charge of putting the final touches on all of the Melbourne Fashion Week capsule displays.

“I curated a set of fashion capsules for the festival at Emporium that feature some incredible artists who collaborate, inspire and inform many different fashion designers,” she says.

While she waited for the centre to close, Karinda did some sourcing, heading to Orange Cube for bags and jewellery, as well as Camper and 124 Shoes. “I have to say there is something very peaceful about being in a shopping centre after hours,” she tells us.

Though Karinda’s nights were late and her mornings early in the lead-up to Melbourne Fashion Week, the Volvo Electric Runway at the Queen Victoria Market was a standout in the M/FW calendar. As an official media partner, the FJ girlies were lucky enough to be seated in the Volvo EX30 for the show, giving us front-row access and prime viewing to see her styling in action.

Browse the Volvo electric range here.