Two months after the Melbourne Fashion Festival carpet runway was rolled up at the Royal Exhibition Building and put into storage, chief executive Caroline Ralphsmith is taking her final bow, announcing her resignation today.
The surprise vacancy has prominent Melbourne designer Lisa Barron, a fixture of the fashion industry since 1983, calling for Ralphsmith’s replacement to also come from the local community.
“Ralph brought a distinct energy to the festival,” says Barron. “Looking ahead, having leadership with true Melbourne DNA feels essential.”
“We stand alongside Milan, Paris and New York, but to stay there, the voice at the helm must be local. I deeply believe in supporting the Melbourne mood.”
Veteran designer Kara Baker, also applauded Ralphsmith’s support of Melbourne labels across the three festivals she programmed.
“I had previous chief executives tell me that my work did not belong on the premium runway and will never appear there,” Baker says. “After being introduced to me, Ralphsmith made it happen, and I was a label that she had never heard about before.”
The trend towards parochialism is understandable, with only two Melbourne designers taking part in next month’s Sydney-based Australian Fashion Week.
Ralphsmith’s nearly four-year flirtation with fashion, following senior roles at the Victoria Racing Club and 15 months as chief executive of Federation Square, will be remembered for prioritising older women in a runway show called F*ck The Invisible, the controversial inclusion of fast fashion producer KMart in the program, along with her towering shoes and frequent outfit changes to sit front row.
“I’m proud the festival is now a truly major event, with consumers at its heart, that supports local designers and industry, champions diversity and brings the joy of fashion to so many people,” Ralphsmith says.
The financial results for this year’s festival are currently unavailable. The previous year the annual ticketed event for the public filed a loss of $711,390, with a revenue of $4.57 million down from $5.75 million for the 2024 financial year.
“While numbers are not yet finalised so shortly after the festival, we are in much better position than we were last year,” Ralphsmith says.
“Total attendance for the 2026 Festival was over 750,000, which is growth of 47 per cent year-on-year. This includes attendance across all 158 events in our full program such as premium runways, core events like the Australian Fashion Business Lunch, the independent program and new Geelong Fashion Fortnight.”
“With the festival in such a strong position, I feel this is the right moment to hand over to a new chapter in MFF’s leadership and to move on to the next stage of my career,” Ralphmith says. “I’ll be taking a breath, and a lovely long holiday…hopefully enjoying a glass of champagne on a boat somewhere. After which, I’ll start to consider new opportunities.”
The search for a new leader has begun, with Sydney-based co-founder of Ginger & Smart, MFF board member Alexandra Smart, holding the sequinned reins in the interim as acting chief executive.
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