Lakme Fashion Week press meet

Lakmé Fashion Week announces
Designers and Sponsors for Winter/Festive 2010
? 74 designers to participate
? Strong line up with mix of eminent and new designers*
? September 17 – September 21, 2010 at Grand Hyatt, Mumbai

Mumbai, August 26, 2010: Lakmé Fashion Week (LFW), India’s premier fashion trade event and pioneer platform in promoting business of fashion announced 74 designers and 12 sponsors today for LFW Winter / Festive 2010 at Grand Hyatt, Mumbai. Last season, LFW moved towards customizing the fashion week platform to the Indian market and introduced ‘Resort’. This season the platform continues in this vein by providing an opportunity to showcase Winter/Festive collections.
Defining the future of fashion, Lakmé Fashion Week this season innovates further to offer some commendable highlights: With the Gen Next program completing 5 years, LFW will showcase a special “Gen Next 5 Year Show” celebrating the spirit of ‘Defining the Future of Fashion’. The show will see designer alumni of Gen Next like Aneeth Arora, Anuj Sharma, Kallol Datta, Kunal Rawal, Nachiket Barve, Nitin Bal Chauhan, Rahul Mishra, Rimzim Dadu, Sailex Ngairangbam and Swapnil Shinde showcase together *This season will celebrate the presence of renowned designers like Manish Arora and Ritu Kumar for the first time on the LFW runway. Returning LFW patrons such as Anita Dongre, Anand Kabra, Anupama Dayal, Krishna Mehta, Little Shilpa, Manish Malhotra , Neeta Lulla, Satya Paul and Troy Costa round out the 74 designers participating this season An offsite show by Narendra Kumar at Tote is a new addition to LFW’s array of innovative displays. The show, that marks Tote’s Anniversary on September 16th, will embrace a higher sense of fine aesthetics and bring alive varied expressions of the collection whilst breaking away from routine of the ramp
Celebrated designer Malini Ramani will present the ‘Lakmé Grand Finale ’with a new theme “Gypsy Collection” dedicated to the ‘Gypsy’, who draws together experiences from her travels through meandering routes of the world at large Following the footsteps of renowned British designer Christopher Kane for the Lakmé Studio & Catwalk by TIGI show presented in March, is contemporary and young designer Raakesh Agarvwal. Lakmé Studio & Catwalk by TIGI collaborate with Raakesh this season to launch CATWALK ‘Sleek Mystique’ and showcase international hair styling and fashion trends on the ramp
Taking the prestigious event ahead and making it even more enterprising is LFW’s strong line-up of like-minded and committed partners: Joining the LFW family as an Associate Sponsor is India’s leading Mobile Services provider, Aircel. The brand plans to deepen its engagement with its consumers at Lakmé Fashion Week by taking fashion to the first screen of Indian consumers which is the Mobile phone For the first time, LFW welcomes India’s leading fashion trade portal – Fashion and You, as its official online Retail Partner to further the business of fashion using E-Commerce. The unique collaboration will enable LFW to facilitate trade for budding Gen Next and Emerging designers through a special “Launch My Line” space created on the portal in addition to targeted sales events which will promote all LFW designers Alongside supporters like ŠkodaAuto, Philips, Killer Jeans, DHL, iNIFD, Kingfisher, Tre?Mode and Stylekandy while Hotel Grand Hyatt, Mumbai remains the official venue and hospitality partner
With Winter/Festive 2010, Lakmé Fashion Week further continues the strategic shift and increases its focus on the current season requirements, promoting business of fashion in the country. As fashion trade and the customer base is veritably growing big in India, this season promises to showcase exuberant trends specially catering to the discerning festive buyer, while addressing the fashion requirements of the fraternity.
Sharing his views, N Rajaram, Vice President – Lakmé said, “As a contemporary beauty expert, Lakmé understands the sensibilities of the Indian woman. The brand continuously innovates to create products that are unique, by combining international cosmetic technology with an in-depth understanding of the consumer. LFW Grand Finale will see the ‘Lakmé Gypsy Collection’ designed by Malini Ramani, who captures the nomadic influences from around the world, including many journeys of her own, to create this inspired collection, perfectly suited for the Indian woman.”
Talking about the talent at LFW, Anil Chopra, CEO – Lakmé Lever said, “Lakmé Fashion Week stands for quality and high standards of excellence in designer participation which is epitomized by the talent we endorse at Lakmé Fashion Week. The strategic shift we initiated last season with introduction of ‘Resort wear’ in India continues as we now tailor our upcoming season to focus on ‘Festive wear’. The Gen Next program, that completes 5 years, has encouraged debutantes and nurtured some of the leading names in the industry today. The Gen Next 5 year show indicates the variety of talent that has made LFW a force to reckon with and talked about as one of the best fashion forums representing Indian fashion to the world.
Ravi Krishnan, Managing Director – IMG – South Asia said, “In its eleventh year of bringing Indian fashion to the forefront, Lakmé Fashion Week continues to be the leader in recognizing creative excellence, providing a platform for new potential, operating on international standards of excellence, and providing the most significant and commercially relevant platform for sponsor association. LFW demonstrates its leadership position among fashion industry platforms in delivering value to sponsors and brand associations as exemplified this season with the addition of our new Associate Sponsor – Aircel. Additionally, as pioneers of a premier fashion trade event, we constantly strive to build opportunities for Indian designers, making it possible for them to showcase their talent at an event as celebrated as LFW. This season recorded an incredible 70% increase in number of applications across all designer categories – this includes 172 applications in Gen Next and 92 in the Emerging category. LFW remains the industry leading fashion trade event, and we would like to thank all our partners for their, support in our endeavor to continue delivering superior value to all stakeholders.”

Commenting on the designer participation this season, Sujal Shah, Vice President and Head of Fashion, IMG–India said, “LFW’s contribution to the furthering of new talent in fashion is unmatched in India. We aim to take this a step further by looking for ways to not only discover and launch new talent, but also to provide commercial viability to these designers early in their career. As such, this season will mark the beginning of a strategic plan to provide more relevant commercial and business options for our new talent as well as all LFW designers. By associating with online fashion trade portals such as Fashion and You, we are taking the lead to embrace the future and reality of business in India, which is online, and provide a direct sales channel for all LFW designers. We continue to innovate this season with our first offsite show on September 16, 2010, which will be held at Tote with Nari. We also welcome and celebrate the entry of highly reputed designers such as Manish Arora and Ritu Kumar for the first time on the LFW runway. This season truly takes us several steps forward in our constant endeavor to further the cause of business and fashion while integrating India into the global fashion world.”

PARTICIPATING DESIGNERS ESTABLISHED DESIGNERS
Abhishek Dutta
Nitin Bal Chauhan
Anand Kabra
Paromita Banerjee
Aneeth Arora
Payal Singhal
Anita Dongre
Raakesh Agarvwal
Anuj Sharma
Rahul Mishra
Anupama Dayal
Raj Shroff
Arpan Vohra
Rehane Yavar Dhala
Asmita Marwa
Rimzim Dadu
Babita Malkani
Ritu Kumar
Debarun Mukherjee
Sailex Ngairangbam
Digvijay Singh
Sanjay Hingu
Jatin Varma
Satya Paul
Kallol Datta
Sulakshana Monga
Krishna Mehta
Shilpa Chavan
Kunal Rawal
Shradha Murarka
Malini Ramani
Shyamal & Bhumika Shodhan
Manish Arora
Soumitra Mondal
Manish Malhotra
Swapnil Shinde
Nachiket Barve Troy Costa
Nandita Thirani Vivek Karunakaran & Shreya Kamalia
Narendra Kumar Ahmed Vivek Kumar
Neeta Lulla
EMERGING DESIGNERS GEN NEXT DESIGNERS
Amalraj Sengupta
Fazal Mahmood & Akanksha Arora
Arjun Agarwal
Jelin George
Atithi Gupta
Juilee Bendkhale
Harangad Singh Jandu
Pragya & Megha Samor
Manju Agarwal
Riddhi & Siddhi Mapxencar
Masaba Gupta
Ruchika Sachdeva
Purvi Doshi
ACCESORY STALLS ONLY
Shrivan Bhatia & Narresh Kukreja ACCESORY STALLS
Smriti Gupta
Mehak Gupta
Sougat Paul Voila Kapoor Aditya
Vijay Balhara Supriya Dhingra
Vikramjit Choudhury
ACCESORY SHOW DESIGNERS
Eina Ahluwalia
Rohan Arora
Malini Agarwalla
Suhani Pittie
SPONSORS
Associate Sponsor
Aircel
Co-Sponsor
ŠkodaAuto, Philips, Killer
Official Partner
DHL, INIFD, Kingfisher, Tre?Mode, Fashion and You
Official Hotel
Grand Hyatt
Block your dates for Lakmé Fashion Week Winter/Festive 2010 scheduled from September 17 – September 21, 2010 at Grand Hyatt, Mumbai.
About Lakmé Fashion Week:
Lakmé Fashion Week (LFW) is jointly organised by Lakmé, the No.1 cosmetics and beauty services brand in India and IMG, the global leader in fashion weeks and event production. LFW has been conceived and created with a vision to “Redefine the future of fashion and Integrate India into the global fashion world”. LFW is organized twice every year. LFW Winter/ Festive 2010 will be held from September 17 – September 21, 2010 at Grand Hyatt Hotel, Mumbai.
For further information log on to http://www.lakmefashionweek.co.in
About Lakmé:
The contemporary Indian Beauty expert in the beauty industry, Lakmé continuously innovates to offer a wide range of, high performance and exceptional quality color cosmetics, skincare products, and beauty salons. In addition to leveraging Unilever’s worldwide expertise, Lakmé also partners with the leading cosmetic house Milan-based Intercos Italia, Schwann Stabilo Germany and Paris-based Fiabila. Combining international cosmetic technology with an in-depth understanding of the Indian woman’s needs, Lakmé also offers its consumers a holistic ‘Beauty Sutra’ experience through its products and services at the Lakmé Salons. For further information log on to www.lakmeindia.com
About IMG Fashion:
IMG Fashion is dedicated to facilitating a gateway to the fashion world – from creation to consumer. We offer solutions that seamlessly connect and associate fashion’s key constituents and corporate brands using IMG’s global resources, influence and expertise.
Within the fashion industry IMG represents the world’s top models, leading designers and the most influential photographers, art directors and stylists. The division produces the leading fashion events around the globe and represents many of the industry’s top organizations and federations as well as works with various local and national governments, creating regional and international fashion platforms. For more information on IMG and its business visit www.imgworld.com