Left of centre

In the last few years, something funny has happened to the Irish girl. Along came a (Celtic) tiger, sat down beside her, and now she reads Glamour all day. Yes kids, gone is the fashion in being the great unwashed – in fact, the capital is now gloriously awash with fashion. While Dublin has always been thought of as the spotty, more awkward little sister of the sassy cheerleader that has always been London, she’s growing up, and how.

With that in mind, a new phenomenon is about to sweep the capital that has been a part of the Saturday night experience in London, Paris or New York for years. Want to take in some high fashion/modelising on a Saturday, but you really want to hear some cracking tunes, or go on the sauce with friends instead? Well, fret not because now you can do both, courtesy of a new monthly club night held in the Belvedere Bar in Little Denmark Street, Dublin. Off Centre is an ingenious blend of dance music and high fashion – but before you visualise a room full of chin strokers sneakily eyeballing the Versace/Chanel/Dior as they nurse baby bottles of Moet, it should be said that we’re talking about a different kettle of ball games here.

The sounds are provided by the likes of DJ Sie, DJ Quilli and DK7 (who release on the frighteningly hip Swedish label Output Recordings), and the fashion has so far come courtesy of Se Si and Lara, with future shows featuring the likes of Jane Rankin, and graduates from the NCAD and Limerick College. For this next event, the club’s organisers have scored a massive coup in securing the prodigious DJing talents of Kid Loco, and that’s something to get excited about, even if you don’t know a pashmina from a parka.

“We want to move away from the elitist notion of fashion, and to dispel the idea that fashion shows are like galas,” comments the club’s co-founder, Gearoid Kelleher. “I’d run clubs in San Francisco that were similar to this. The fashion nights there are great – everyone’s commenting on the clothes and talking about the models… it makes for a great vibe. Once I got to Dublin, I asked myself what type of club I would like to go to. There are too many clubs in Dublin where people just show up and get drunk; we want to create a place that is aesthetically pleasing, with plenty of eye candy.”

Having launched last month, it already appears that the club is attracting an enviable clientele – the crowd is a heady cocktail of gay and straight, fashionista and muso. The door policy is relaxed, although the club is the perfect platform for those Saturday night fashion statements.

“Dubliners are much more fashion conscious than before,” notes Kelleher. “Finally, there’s a night where people can try to wear a new look and be in a room with similar-minded people.”

The entire vibe isn’t entirely dissimilar to Fashionably Loud, the MTV programme that cross-fertilised the hottest supermodels, most cutting-edge designers and the hippest music acts to create something of a fashion-show/gig extravaganza.

At Off Centre, Kelleher explains: “The models are friends of ours, or people we’ve picked up in clubs, just real, non-model people.” And while the club is foremost a platform for club DJs, is there a possibility that other types of acts will ever shimmy alongside these non-models? “We do have a male fashion night planned, where the models will only be modelling underwear. If there’s a band out there that will perform without their shirts on, we’d be well up for the idea!”

Could it be that someday soon, we may witness the likes of Glen Hansard, Damien Dempsey or The Thrills performing with their shirts off? Something to look forward to…