LIFW

Okay, so it's late, it's out of date but bear with me. I could only publish once the issue was outdated, and it's too fun a piece to miss out on Blah!

It’s Done With Mirrors

LIFW, I was told by one and all was all about the business. The show’s the glitz; the glamour was all just a cover up to India’s biggest designer fashion sale, and almost all of that trade I was assured was foreign.

I talked with a Media Representative from FDCI, who told me that the show was basically designed to sell to International Buyers. She told me how it was all about the business, and how the designers were creating clothes to meet that market, and abjuring their stereotypically risqué, revealing, or just simply un-wearable clothes. Clearly, she had not taken a look at some of the shows that I had. But I was new, and keen to find out more, so I asked her if there indeed existed a market for Indian brands, and she promptly replied that there was, and that most of the designers were sold out. Clearly, no one had taken a look at the figures.

Research at their wonderfully well equipped Media Center revealed to me that the entire industry as a whole was worth a pittance. How much, you may ask, and let me tell you. A KPMG survey done in 2004 valued the entire industry, designers, models PR agencies and all, at an incredible….build the suspense…Rs. 176 crores! When I confronted the same representative with this figure, I was told how it was a niche industry, still in Development. Now, lets not kid ourselves, India has many niche industries, the computer and IT sector can still be said to be niche, our Food and Hospitality sector in development is niche, but all these markets are valued at staggeringly large sums of money, compared to the pittance that is Rs. 175 crores. More famous Dhaba’s in Delhi, such as Rajinder Da Dhaba run up annual sales of over 2 crores each, forget established restaurants. The fashion industry is not niche; it is as good as nonexistent. Something is sustaining them, therefore. Something is propping them up, allowing them to survive, because it sure isn’t the promise of rapid growth. A ten year projection by Industry Leaders claims that they might grow to a 200 million dollar industry. Assuming the rest of the market doesn’t grow, and only our share in it does, this is still a measly 0.6% of the world fashion market. It’s done with mirrors, ladies and gentlemen.

I don’t think it can be called a fashion industry; the word industry doesn’t really fit. They’re not industrious about it, it’s a self sustaining industry. The little money they do make doesn’t exactly go into expanding output; it goes into trips to Milan, and other fashionable locales. It’s an industry that seems to drain rather than generate wealth, and yet has the highest markups of any product in any Market. Where else can you take Rs 50 of cloth and turn it into a dress worth Rs 50000? But then, who’ll buy it? You? Me? Or the three hundred celebrities who turn up for LIFW.

You decide what all the fuss is about.

Almost Famous

Any of you seen Almost Famous? Where the kid reporter gets sent on a whirlwind adventure with a rock band? That pretty much sums up how I’ve been feeling for the last couple of days. I’ve been a stranger in a strange land, the outsider looking in, and I can’t say I’ve always liked what I’ve seen.

When I entered, I was totally out of my league. Everyone around me could tell I don’t belong, and but for the pass around my neck, I would have been thrown out of the shows, the media lounge, and I suspect the hotel as well. A faded shirt and a pair of jeans was my chosen garb, and I had entered the only place in the world where this actually made me stand out. As you enter, the lobby is crowded with every single woman in Delhi taller than me, and guys who’ve spent the better part of two years in the Gym, here are the wannabe models, hoping a designer will notice them. As the designers race through the lobby, they brush these few off, and run towards the show, or he backstage to get their models ready.

I saw quite a few of the fashion shows. Ever heard of Anjana Bhargava? Maybe Shantanu and Nikhil? Don’t sound familiar? Don’t worry; I hadn’t heard of them either, they only pop up every so often. They’ll exist in your collective conscious a week every year, and then disappear again, never to be seen or heard.

As the show begins, you see the entire page three crowd show up, which I figure it pretty much the entire market for their wear, aside from the one lone buyer from Harrods, who looks least interested. A hundred reporters and cameramen from different media groups are there, who are also faux interested, and to my great and unnerving surprise, know as little about fashion as I do. Which is why the reports don’t contain much insight, they’re just vomiting out lines from the press releases that are neatly placed on their seats before the show starts.

After each show, there is a Release Interview, which involves journo’s asking, and I quote “So, why were there so many colors used in your designs?”

The reply to which was equally inane.

“Basically, I really like colors.” But then you can’t blame them, how are you supposed to answer a question like that?

The designs themselves range from over the top, to simply ridiculous. Now, over the top is great for lookers like me, but I really can’t figure out to which occasion someone could wear the clothes these people produce. Fancy dress parties, possibly, but not much else.

Shows however, are brilliant for heterosexual males, and the sad part is there aren’t enough of them in there to appreciate the display. Here’s the deal. Guys, we’re discreet in general when checking out females, to stare wide eyed is considered to be bad form, even in a city of Lukhas as Delhi is. The fashion show gives you sanction, nay acceptability to ogle, you are SUPPOSED to look straight ahead. This is every man’s dream come true.

Eager to learn, and figure out what lay beneath, I have a word with enough people around me. Everywhere, I heard conflicting views. The Fashion Design Council of India representatives drill it into my head that the show’s about the business, and the Elle magazine stylist covering the event assured me that the designers only cared about their own creative talent, and didn’t give a stuff whether the clothes would sell or not. I saw the shows, I’ll show you the pictures, and I’m sure you’ll side with the Stylist on this one.

The designers themselves seemed interested in “The Indian Market”. Wendell Roderick’s candidly stated that he didn’t care if even four of his pieces were sold in the international market, as long as he could “help expand the fashion industry in India.” But my favorite conversation was with a professor at NIFT, who kept arguing that the couture and prêt fashion employed many, and thus was beneficial to the country. Yeah, that’s the best argument I’ve heard so far.

In the designer stalls, I run into Indian Idol, Abhijeet Sawant, who looks as lost as I am. Surrounded by two bouncers, a PR agent, and a stylist, he’s putting on an endless series of shirts to give interviews for Sony. Once that ends, I manage to have a couple of words with him, and joke that he’s not in fact the worst informed person over here, there’s me and Virender Sehwag too. He laughs, and tells me how he’s just a Jeans and T-shirt chap, and how all this is a bit much for him. I sympathized, as a minute later, he was rushed away by the PR lady, off to prepare for his modeling assignment. He looked quite harried.

So that’s how it went, the few days of India’s greatest fashion extravaganza. It’s one hell of a show, but leaves you with a bitter aftertaste. When I got the assignment, I had great dreams of finding out what lies beneath it all. In the end, I discover that like a balloon, it’s got shape, and form, and is filled with a lot of gas.

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