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Photography by Andrew Beverage

BIOGRAPHY

Frida Las Vegas is the moniker of Australian artist and designer Stavroula Adameitis. Stavroula celebrates artefacts of popular culture through an Antipodean lens, creating visually bombastic graphics, textiles, installations and collaborations across mediums as ‘kitsch camouflage’ for people who stand out.

After leaving Australia to cut her aesthetic chops interning with celebrated Sex And The City stylist Patricia Field in New York City, Stavroula found herself unexpectedly inspired by the uniqueness of the so-called ‘cultural backwater’ she sought to leave behind. Emboldened by her travels, Stavroula embarked on a creative journey to explore the symbols, places and faces of her memories growing up in the thick of Down Under suburbia at the junction point of the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Founding FRIDA LAS VEGAS in 2013, Stavroula quickly discovered others shared her passion for graphic glamour, cheeky humour, unapologetic self-expression and nostalgic reverie. These loud and proud pop culture vultures from all corners of the globe have welcomed FRIDA LAS VEGAS into their wardrobes and homes, united by a mutual love of colour and bold aesthetics. She has also collaborated with a wide range of clients and brands, including:

  • Cultural Institutions - Sydney Opera House, Art Gallery of South Australia, Powerhouse Museum

  • Global Brands - Adobe, Meta, Disney, Microsoft, Westpac, Peter Alexander, Fremantle Media

  • Iconoclastic Performers - Katy Perry, Sam Smith, Kate Miller-Heidke

Stavroula lives and works in Adelaide/Tartanya from her time-travelling studio atelier. Alongside her art and design practice, she is the Artistic Director of SA Futures Agency and a member of the Guildhouse Artist Advisory Group, a not-for-profit organisation that supports South Australian visual artists, craftspeople and designers to build and maintain sustainable careers.

Stavroula is consistently working on a bunch of projects at any point in time that adhere to the principles she believes in most:

  1. Fabulous is a State of Mind

  2. Beauty is always lurking in the Everyday.

  3. Clothing is a human-scale billboard for Exuberant Personal Expression.

  4. Bad Taste is just Good Taste in drag (and all the better for it!)

Stavroula Adameitis Frida Las Vegas Artist Designer Australia Pop Art

Photography by Samuel Graves

PRODUCTION ETHICS

Choosing to wear FRIDA LAS VEGAS is choosing to wear art fashion, not fast fashion!

Let’s face it, the planet does not need any more stuff. But from time-to-time, we spice up our lives with external things that speak to (and reflect) our internal worlds.

Stavroula consciously creates all FRIDA LAS VEGAS clothing and accessories on a small-scale boutique level that are designed, printed and proudly sewn in Australia.

Stavroula chooses to work with a small team of Australian pattern makers, fabric printers, cutters and machinists to produce her clothing. This allows her to personally oversee quality, fit and flair.

All FRIDA LAS VEGAS garments and accessories are consciously produced by the following production processes:

  • Made to Order for each individual customer;

  • Limited Edition production runs that are purchased on a pre-order basis

Both processes minimise fabric wastage and the need to produce excess stock. FRIDA LAS VEGAS clothing will never go on sale because excess quantities are never produced in the first place!

Each FRIDA LAS VEGAS statement piece is expressly designed with the intention of becoming a seasonless heirloom piece, to be worn and treasured year after year.

WORKSHOPS AND PANEL DISCUSSIONs

‘Sydney Opera House BUILD’ Program Host and Workshop Facilitator, Sydney Opera House, 2022 - 2024

‘The Boring Bits’, Seminar and Workshop, Guildhouse, 2024

‘The New Exuberance: Contemporary Australian Textiles’, Artist Talk, JamFactory, 2023

‘Frida Las Vegas: Illustration and Digital Painting’ Presenting Speaker, Adobe MAX creativity conference, 2021

‘School of Surface: The Side Hustle Edition’ Presenting Speaker, Microsoft, 2021

‘Fashion And The Future Of The Planet’, Moderator, Australian Design Centre, 2021

‘Performing the Self: Fashion and Identity’, Panellist, Powerhouse Museum, 2020

‘What Is Art’, Panellist, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2019

‘Have We Reached Peak Creativity’, Panellist, University of Technology Sydney, 2016

2024

‘Radical Textiles’ exhibition, Art Gallery of South Australia (SA)

2023

‘The New Exuberance: Contemporary Australian Textile Design’ exhibition, JamFactory (SA) + touring across Australia 2023/2024

2022

‘Thinking Through Pink’ exhibition, Wollongong Art Gallery (NSW)

2021

‘U.N.I.T.Y’ group show, B-Side Gallery (Melb)

2020

‘The Locals’ group show, Outre Gallery (Melb)

‘Hollywood Forever’ Mardi Gras, The Imperial Erskineville (Syd)

2019

‘Smoke And Mirrors’ immersive art and dining experience, Chin Chin (Syd)

‘Troublemakers #2’ group show, Vs. Gallery (Melb)

2018

‘Eleganza Australiana’ solo show, The Imperial Erskineville (Syd)

Event Props and theming for Dollar Bin Darlings, Sydney Festival (Syd)

2017

‘The Bold & The Beautiful’ solo show, Disorder Gallery (Syd)

2015

FRIDA LAS VEGAS launch showcase, Outre Gallery (Syd)

“Seen through the inclusive democratic sensibility of Stavroula Adameitis, ordinary artefacts of a personally remembered past are joyfully celebrated in colourful exuberance.”
— Dr Sally Grey. Curator, cultural historian and author of 'Friends, Fashion and Fabulousness: The Making of an Australian Style'