Less clear was the connection between the folk band playing next to a trio of pale, otherworldly-looking models, draped in white tulle, while guests queued for a buffet of meats and cheeses nearby.

At the other end of the space, a trapeze artist dressed as a glittering fairy was suspended on stings above a giant tennis ball.

This was the much hyped launch of the new CBD shopping centre Emporium, by Australian film director Baz Lurhmann, and the crowds made it feel as though half the city had turned out to celebrate.

Pyjama designer Peter Alexander, actor Isabel Lucas and former swimmer Michael Klim and his wife Lindy walked the red carpet and Melburnians threw on their glad rags for the occasion.

Members of the public could enter a ballot for tickets and winners came to the party in glitter and fur, with a good helping of Melbourne black.

Whether you love or loathe his films, party scenes in Luhrmann's Romeo+Juliet and The Great Gatsby set a high standard for sheer energy and opulence.

Lurhmann said he did not feel pressure to recreate the raucousness of his on-screen bashes.

"People make a party, all you can do is little things to facilitate it," he said.

And it was Baz who made this particular event.

Dapper in a black suit with white piping, Lurhmann posed on the red carpet, chatted with reporters, then moved around the room directing performers and posing with models, giving organisers their money's worth of true celebrity.

It did not quite match the glamour of his films - this was a shopping centre after all, not a Long Island mansion - but as the champagne flowed, no-one seemed to mind too much.