Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Swim 2012: Winners and Losers

George Martinez

See all of this year's Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Swim coverage.


Okay, guys. You can all breathe a sigh of relief -- or one of sadness, if you prefer. They're packing up the tents. The models are getting on planes. The fashion gliteratti are going back to their regularly scheduled programming. This year's Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Swim is finally over.

Through rain, through humidity, and through more bottles of champagne than we could count, the models, designers, and fashion elite who mixed and mingled at the Raleigh had plenty to sing about. But if they were anything like us, they also had a few complaints.

Read on for this year's winners and losers at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Swim: the things we loved, the things we hated, and even a few things we loved to hate.

The Winners

George Martinez

The after parties
If you sat within the first two rows of any show, you were granted a bracelet to [insert club name here] for the fashion show's after party. We got to see designers and models frolicking with the common folk, a.k.a. people enjoying free booze. What's not to love?

Red Carter's limo service
Props need to be given where they're due. When Sunday's storms threatened to scare off any Swim Week attendee who wanted to look halfway decent (read: not drenched) at the event, Red Carter rolled out a free limo service from the convention center to the Raleigh for show goers? The result: A packed -- and dry, comfortable, and happy -- house. Why didn't we think of that?

George Martinez

The models
Who doesn't love models? They're so pretty to look at. And this year's batch had plenty of attitude. From the standard runway death-stare to blowing kisses at the cameras during Wildfox's show, we've gotta give it up to the girls of Swim Week.

The colors
Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Swim was extra colorful this year, wasn't it? Lots of neons. Lots of animal prints. Lots of pinks, greens, oranges, blues. Some of the suits were so bright, we needed sunglasses to look at them ... and a pair of shoes to match those sunglasses ... and a matching bag, too.

George Martinez

The free-flowing alcohol (and water and lemonade)
It's hard not to love fashion week when there's free-flowing alcohol. And between sponsor Moet & Chandon's champagne stations and the waiters strolling around with pink, fruity concoctions, Swim Week attendees were never left thirsty. It made dealing with the losers on this list a little bit easier. Your feet hurt? Unwind with a drink. You couldn't get into the last show because it was at capacity? Unwind with a drink. That sounds about right.

Continues to the next page for the Losers...