TONIGHT's Fashion For Relief show was star-strikingly, headline-grabbingly, everything we were promised it would be - it's hard to know where to start and we didn't want it to finish... Kate Moss on the catwalk for the first time in forever (in a McQueen dress that Philip Green would later buy at auction for £100,000) - dancing and shaking her booty so that you'd never believe she really hates it; James Corden and David Walliams camping it up spectacularly down the catwalk and snogging at the end of it, in front of all the photographers, with tongues; Naomi Campbell prancing up on the arm of Piers Morgan, giving a final flourish to their famous tabloid battle; Yasmin and Amber le Bon walking the catwalk together; Ronnie Corbett dancing up to Michael Jackson's Billie Jean - and then dancing back down again to be met by Alexandra Burke; Gavin & Stacey and Eastenders star Larry Lamb sauntering up smiling as if he does it every day; Shirley Bassey, in glittering gold Jenny Packham, appearing to a roar from the crowd; a pregnant Denise Van Outen in floaty white Jasmine de Milo; The Saturdays appearing all together wearing Ungaro and Moschino; Jamelia up next with her two little girls (clearly born for the spotlight, grinning shyly but very happily); Bob Geldof and his girlfriend Jeanne Marine in the front row grinning at Pixie as she strode by in DVF.
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There were reality television stars alongside supermodels and actresses, singers and bloggers and people who are just famous for being famous and who were just as welcome: Tamsin Egerton, Erin O'Connor, our own VogueTV presenter Jade Parfitt, Jo Wood, Annabelle Neilson, a blonde still-half shaven-headed Alice Dellal, Gerry Deveaux, Amanda Holden in Christopher Kane, VOGUE.COM blogger Jacquetta Wheeler in Hannah Marshall, David Gandy, Eva Herzigova in a Dolce & Gabbana mesh trench, Skin wearing Gucci, Girls Aloud's Kimberley Walsh and Nicola Roberts, Geri Halliwell - if we stopped looking for a moment (only to Tweet, obviously), we were frightened of what we might miss.
The finale saw the whole line up (bar Kate and Annabelle), reappear in charity T-shirts, all individually customised - this time with Halliwell, an ex-girlfriend of Walliams', walking between he and Corden and then jumping high enough to show the cameras her knickers.
Campbell - who put on this incredible show to raise money for the White Ribbon Alliance to help victims of the Haitian earthquake via her Fashion For Relief charity - opened the show in McQueen spring/summer 2010 and closed it on the arm of her mother Valerie, proving beyond doubt that she uses her fame these days to fantastic gain.
"If we stopped looking for a moment we were frightened of what we might miss"Before the catwalk performance began - in the tent in the courtyard of Somerset House that will be the official destination of London Fashion Week as of tomorrow at 9.30am (when Paul Costelloe's autumn/winter 2010-11 collection will kick things off) - we were welcomed by Sarah Brown, the woman Naomi has credited as a mentor in her latest fundraising successes. Wearing Issa, the Prime Minister's wife thanked everybody for coming to the show - which boasted headline sponsor Stephen Webster - but stopped short of taking a turn on the catwalk herself. "You're about to see some really fantastic catwalking stars - and some not so good," she joked. "And this is absolutely as far as I'm going to go down this runway."
Then came a live performance by Beverley Knight (introduced by Trudie Styler) - who modelled in the show later on - singing Soul Survivor and wearing a glimmering dress from Ashish's spring/summer 2010 collection.
A selection of the clothes we'd just seen modelled will be available to buy at NET-A-PORTER.COM, while the best pieces were auctioned alongside other cash-cow bids including a Damien Hirst painting - which went for £300,000 - and a bespoke "Naomi for Haiti" Lotus Evora, which was the evening's highest auction lot and was won by Naomi's partner, Vladislav Doronin, for an impressive £320,000. All up, the bidding hit £1.4 million at the time of going to press.
It was a stunning start to London Fashion Week and proof that whatever you think of it, a great deal of good can come from the fun that is fashion.
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