“Fashion Week is time to show off a little" – Safinaz

Safinaz Muneer talks about showing at the PFDC Sunsilk Fashion Week, their Spring/Summer 2015 collection and how exhausting fashion weeks can be when they’re two too many!

The Sana Safinaz showing on the fourth and final day of the PFDC Sunsilk Fashion Week was undoubtedly one of the strongest, most memorable of the day. It’s hard to get over those vibrant pops of colour set against a monochrome canvas of black and white stripes. It was a happy collection, one that lifted the soul into a summer vacation on some sandy beach by aqua blue water. That’s the thing about the brand Sana Safinaz, it delivers a unique feel-good factor, one that comes with glamour and gorgeousness.

I bumped into Safinaz as she was exiting the cinema after watching “a very violent” Avengers flick. You may think – and be forgiven – for thinking that all she does is work but she can be spotted at the cinema very often.

“It’s all anyone wanted to watch!” she laughed. “If you’re going in then be prepared for a lot of violence!”

I’d rather think about the PSFW collection, which was a very glamorous take on eveningwear: black and white with pops of colour. It wasn’t visible of the ramp but up close you’d notice that the colourful flowers were done in applique. There was a lot of texture and lace effect, created with fabric on fabric. Some of the prints were screens but others had been created with applique and sequins. It was all quite a glorious bouquet.

“The catwalk is a little platform to show off on,” she said, adding that the outfits may have been predominantly western but these clothes will be diffused and adapted to retail in their stores by the end of the month. They are already taking orders on the heavier eveningwear, mostly the black and white pieces.

I asked her why and how she had decided to show so regularly, as clearly the stores and lawn had kept them extremely busy.

“Showing pays off because it keeps you constantly in the media and that reinforces you as a brand. A good collection shows your strength as a brand, which is important,” she reinforced. “But it really is exhausting and if Karachi and Lahore don’t get their act together and show together then designers will have to make strict choices. If they don’t then I’d say that the councils are being selfish and just feeding egos because so many fashion weeks are not good for the industry. As you noticed, Lahore didn’t have a great lineup this time and that’s only because of fashion fatigue. Designers are scrambling and we’re not on an international level, no matter what we think of ourselves. We have to accept that. I can show twice a year not four times a year.”

Did participation in fashion shows help their business?

“It’s not just about showing but about making a business out of the show,” she replied. “Shows are a great platform and they filter into the media and social media and give good mileage but we’ve gone from shows to lawn to Eid collections and thinking of four shows a year is exhausting and impossible. We still have to decide whether we’ll be showing in Karachi or Lahore in Autumn.”

– Photographs by Faisal Farooqui @ Dragonfly