The Lakmé Fashion Week (LFW) is heralding its first time ever ode to the Indian Summer by announcing the dates of the dates of the Summer/Prêt 2010 season from 5th to 9th March, 2010, to be held at Grand Hyatt Hotel, Mumbai. The ten-year old LFW is setting a new pace for the growing fashion industry in India, with the new fashion week focused more on the current/upcoming season rather than projecting the next season.
Anil Chopra, Advisor, Lakmé said, “Lakmé Fashion Week offers a seamless display of a fashion culture that knows no borders to the ever increasing stakeholders of designers, buyers, sponsors and fashionistas. Always a step ahead in innovation, we believe the business of fashion time cycle in India is going through a dynamic change. The buyers are placing orders for deliveries within 30 - 40 days and not after a stretch of six months.

The new men’s wear designer on the block is Karan Johar, the multifaceted and very talented director of Hindi movies, who participated in the HDIL India Couture Week 09. Teaming up with the well established women’s wear designer, Varun Behl, he launched a jazzy men’s wear collection. Goes without saying that the show was high on silver screen glamour and all his buddies, which include King Shah Rukh Khan and wife Gauri, Dino Morea, Ranbir Kapoor and Imran Khan, walked the ramp in his attire. The rest of the film industry was visible in the front row. The music and the setting of the stylish stage and ramp was top notch, as would be expected coming from the maker of such glamorous movies as Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gum etc. The line comprised three piece suits, long and short jackets, Bermudas, flat front skinny trousers, shorts, blousons, shirts, with built in waistcoats, long coats with mandarin collars, revised form of sherwanis with lapels, double-breasted quilted leather coats and military jackets, tab closures for plackets, looped front Jodhpuri jackets and a discreetly shimmering sherwani.

The HDIL India Couture Week is unfolding at the Grand Hyatt in Mumbai. Indian couture is synonymous with wedding wear and adding a neat quotient of the desired sparkle and glitter was the huge presence of RYSTALLIZED™ – Swarovski Elements not only on the ramp but across the entire venue. Adorning the venue was a huge fiber glass installation of a nose, lips and ears by artist Sumanth Jaikishan, that were highlighted with CRYSTALLIZED™ – Swarovski Elements, as also was the interior of the Kingfisher bar which gleamed with the newly launched Asymmetrical and Chessboard cut CRYSTALLIZED™ – Swarovski Elements now available in a range of colours as both a Flat Back Hotfix and a Sew-on Stone, opening multiple possibilities for creative applications. The chandeliers from Shimera Lighting in Mumbai and the snaking wine were all made of brilliant CRYSTALLIZED™ strings hung over the bar with sporadic lotus flowers as a centerpiece above the bar. Beautiful and sparkling chandeliers adorning the venue were made with STRASS Swarovski Crystal. Couturiers like Manav Gangwani, Suneet Varma, Aki Narula and Varun Bahl added the bling element to the apparel by borrowing on the glitter of CRYSTALLIZED™ – Swarovski Elements.

The second edition of the HDIL India Couture Week is all set to roll out again from 11th to 16th October, at the Grand Hyatt Mumbai. The high glam event will see the participation of such couturiers as Abu Jani-Sandeep Khosla, Manav Gangwani, Manish Malhotra, Monisha Jaising, Pallavi Jaikishan, Suneet Varma and Varun Bahl. Bollywod director Karan Johar is also going to showcase his first ever couture menswear collection that he has designed along with fashion designer Varun Bahl. The new addition for this Couture Week will be a couture jewellery show by Devaunshi Mehta, Maheep Kapoor, Queenie Dhody and Farah Khan. Mumbai is one of only three cities (apart from New York and Paris) in the world to have a Couture Week on its fashion calendar.
The event will also play host to a star studded show in support of Being Human: the Salman Khan Foundation.

Wills India have named Rohit Bal as the Grand Finale designer for the upcoming Wills India Fashion Week spring/summer 2010. This makes the second time that Bal will bring the curtains down at a WIFW season. His collection for the SS10 is titled ‘Yasas’, which has been inspired by India’s cultural heritage, for which he researched ancient Indian costumes of the Mughal era. Rohit Bal said, “I am drawn towards ancient weaves and the revival of all these dying art forms. This is what Yasas is.” The WIFW SS 2010 is set to take place from 24th -28th October.

The British luxury brand Mulberry has been asked by Apple to design 9 piece collection of their favorite bags for Apple’s MacBook, MacBook Pro, iPhone, iPod and iPod Nano. Emma Hill, the creative director of Mulberry was delighted with the collaboration since she herself is a computer buff and rued the lack of nicer looking bags to carry her Apple around. These bags, specially designed with padding for the laptop, will retail out of Mulberry stores on November 1st, and on their website, www.Mulberry.com from 1st December.

Tom Ford, the well known American designer responsible for turning around Gucci as its creative director and going on to launch his personal label ‘Tom Ford’, has let known that he will return to creating women’s wear once again, much to the delight of those who love his creations. He was apparently seeking finances to the tune of nearly $ 50mil to fund this project. Industry sources have projected that he might show his collection for A/W 2010 in February 2010. As reported in WWD, Ford spoke about his debut and said, “You know it will take me 18 months when I start, because [I have] to hire the team, find the factories, put everything together and then get the stores ready so there’s a place for these clothes. Financing is extremely expensive right now, so if we find financing in the right situation we’ll be able to start [a women’s collection] soon. If we don’t, we may have to wait a while.”

In a first for H&M, it has associated with shoe designer Jilmmy Choo to bring out a new line of apparel and accessories that are high on quality and yet fit within the H&M price line. The new line will be available in all of the 200 H&M stores by mid November. Previously the company has had very successful collaborations with such designers as Karl Lagerfeld, Stella McCartney, Viktor & Rolf, Roberto Cavalli. Tamar Mellon, founder and president of Jimmy Choo said that she was inspired by late-Seventies pop icons and hippies in Goa.

Barbie’s creator Mattel has entered into a partnership deal with the top show designer Christian Louboutin, wherein he gets be her godfather for a year. Under the new arrangement, Louboutin will rework her fashion wardrobe, physical attributes and art direct her in different lifelike situations, which has translated into a diary with images of Louboutin and Barbie in different settings. Interestingly, a comment by Louboutin on the size of Barbie’s ankle being not thin enough, set off a huge protest on the net. Stephanie Cota, senior vice president of marketing of Barbie brands at Mattel, said, “Barbie has a long history of working with various designers and artists who use Barbie as a muse. It was a natural for Barbie, not only with her fashion heritage, but also because of her passion for shoes. She has a billion shoes and we needed to do something special for her shoe collection.” Louboutin has designed three themes to be launched in December, February and May. The first one is a jewel thief-themed Barbie, next a safari-themed Barbie, and in May will be launched a Barbie that goes to the Cannes Film Festival.

An international flavour emerged for silhouettes as japanese samurai sleeves and origami for skirts and dresses was favoured by many designers. There was also a touch of the zen like look that added a casual chic to the garments. Innovative constructions included the tunic sari, backless sari gowns and abstract inspirations like cubism for sleeves, necklines and side silts. The dhoti gown and draped sari jumpsuits were other experiments that were tried. For some extreme construction the reversible and switch around dresses made great news while inverted shirts for blouses and skirts were unique. The popular tiered skirts and soft sculpted drapes at times rather intricate were beautifully created. Fabrics were manipulated into twists, twirls and curls for cowls while handkerchief hemlines made strong fashion statements for skirts, blouses and dresses. It was the return of the “v” silhouette, contoured and trapeze shapes with volumes while sheer ankle or calf length wide pajamas with long kalidar kurtas were a perfect summer offering. Waistcoats are back and jodhpuri or skinny pants still hang on to the fashion charts. Long sheer or cotton lightly quilted coats worn over saris or dresses are ideal for cool summer evenings.

Thierry Mugler started out as a ballet dancer but went on to also study design. He shifted to Paris in 1970 and launched his first line Café de Paris in 1973, and founded his own label for women in 1975, to be followed by designs for men in 1978. His creations reflected the times and he was fascinated with glamour of the silver screen as well as the insect kingdom. After his fashion house packed up in 1990, he entered into a partnership with the cosmetic firm Clairns in 1997 and created such perfumes as ‘Angel’. He has since published two books on fashion design and photography.

Tanishq, the jewelry brand from the house of Titan, is working towards improving the working conditions of the artisans in the jewelry trade and has set up eight ‘karigar’ parks in the industrial belt of Hosur in Tamil Nadu. Over 600 artisans from West Bengal, Kochi and Coimbatore are housed here. This endeavor seeks to provide the artisans with well-lit and spacious work spaces, improved work benches, availability of modern tools, upgraded technology and even safety equipment. The artisans also get such benefits as easy loans, finances, medical insurance and free health check ups. Plans are on the anvil to set up such parks in Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan and Mumbai within the next two years.