I keep hearing how thanda and lacklustre fashion week was for many who attended, but the truth about this fashion week – if you ask me – was that it was spot on. Normally, it feels more like wedding than a trade event. Not this time. On 27th October, the last day of the Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week, I bumped into designer after designer, and each one commented on how sales were better than ever.
Fashion week is finally turning into a trade event. The venue, Paragti Maidan, needs a bit of a facelift, but gives the event a feel of business. The large space it provides meant the stalls (the main space for business; where designers display their clothes on racks for buyers) were given the due space they needed. And with shows starting at 2pm, there was plenty of time for buyers and designers to concentrate on placing and taking the orders.
The absence of senior names like Rajesh Pratap Singh, Rohit Bal, and Ranna Gill was a blessing in disguise to the young designers, and names like Anand Kabra, Prashant Verma, Arjun Saluja, Rahul Misra came to the forefront. It also meant that most of our page 3 regulars (women who normally only turn up for the big names) were missing from the event. The focus was on fashion. There were hardly any Bollywood showstoppers, so the dailies had no choice but to focus on the clothes. A refreshing and welcome change.
I have to admit that as one of the few journalists who have been attending fashion week since it began over ten years ago, this was first time I did not feel shattered after the week ended. I did not attend one fashion party, and am actually looking forward to the next fashion week in March!
PS This was also one of Tarun Tahilani's most focused and controlled shows to date, a fitting ending to this edition of Wills India Fashion Week. (Above is the lovely Chitranganda walking the ramp for him)
No comments:
Post a Comment