Dubai Fashion Week: Are we buying it?

Fashion week. It's all hot models, beautiful dresses and all-night partying, right? Well, yes and no. On the surface, any fashion week has to be about glamour - it's the light that draws the moths to the flame.

But if any fashion week - including Dubai Fashion Week, which kicks off today - is to be a success, those moths had better be carrying some cold hard cash under their wings.

For the designers involved, fashion week is not a party. It's not a social event. It's a nail-biting, cold-sweat-inducing chance to show what you've got to the people with serious clout and cash.

"The number one factor is buyers," says Dubai-based designer Furne One, fresh from his award-winning turn at Miami Fashion Week.

One won't be showing at Dubai Fashion Week (DFW) because of scheduling difficulties, but had initially hoped to present a collection.

Delhi-based designer Ekta Singh, who is showing for the first time at DFW, agrees it's all about the buyers being present. Business - not partying - is why she's come to Dubai.

"I know my clothing does really well [in the UAE] and I thought DFW would be a great platform," says Singh, a veteran of Delhi Fashion Week. "I've had a great response from the media - and the buyers too."

"Delhi is very serious about business. I don't know if Dubai is business focused or if it's more of a social event - I'll only know that once I book orders. But at the end of the day, we're there to work."

For her part, Muskan Taurani, who with designer Rashmi Kumari makes up the vivacious fashion duo C'est Moi, says the buyers - or lack of them - was an issue when they presented their collection last year.

"There are no buyers. [The organisers] did their homework but there's only so much you can do. Whether they come is a different matter."

Dubai's newly established fashion week - this is the only fifth season - has had an uphill challenge convincing the industry it should be taken seriously.

Until DFW, local designers had to either fund their own runway shows or get the backing of multi-brand stores. That's an expense few designers starting out want.

Yet some designers, like Taurani, still feel it's the most effective way to draw attention to their designs.

"We showed our line privately beforehand, so the [DFW] show was a sell-out. I don't know how the experience was for others, but I saw lots of press kits left on seats. The organisers are working out of a place like Dubai, which is also limited. They're doing the best they can with the resources - they're working with leading companies."

Taurani is skipping this season altogether - she sees the financial crisis as a chance to re-focus - but promises to return in October with a "fabulous" collection, mainly she says, because the support given by the organisers to young designers is unbeatable.

"I remember a week before the show getting the jitters. The producer Selina Robson counselled us, and Marc [Robinson, one of the co-founders of Dubai International Fashion Week, DFW's precursor] is amazing as a choreographer.

"What they're lacking is the buzz. Once the buzz is there, automatically you attract people. Maybe if they got in a couple of recognised models that would take them to the next level."

"If there's someone willing to pay the money, I can get Naomi Campbell or whoever you want from LA and Hollywood," laughs Rohit Sabikhi, DFW's event director, when asked if Campbell would be hitting Dubai's catwalk the way she did in Mumbai last week.

She appeared on the runway at Lakme India Fashion Week, an event Sabikhi started three years ago, which has begun attracting international attention.

"A lot of buyers and fashion media are now travelling to see what these new fashion weeks like Lakme and DFW can give. They've seen all the great designers in Milan and Paris and they want to see what the designers in a new part of the world have to offer."

That, he says, is DFW's unique selling point. With fashion's insatiable thirst for the hot new thing, it's imperative for those driving that thirst to look outside their comfort zone - be they media or buyers. Dubai's mix of cultures - and its undeniably stylish residents could be prime hunting ground.

DFW may only just be starting, says Sabikhi, but it has already offered a few gems to the fashion altar.

"Boutique 1 is selling Toby by Hatem Alakeel, who showed his first collection in at DFW last year," says Sabikhi. "He's going to be back in October. All this is starting to happen now and you've got to give Fashion Week credit for that."

Alakeel has certainly had success - even Christian Louboutin put in a cameo appearance at his runway show in October - but he's from Saudi Arabia. What puts the Dubai in DFW?

"The designers may be of different origins, but that's what Dubai's all about,"says Sabikhi. "When I came in here a year ago, we established DFW with the objective that the designers come from the region, from GCC, the Middle East and to an extent South Asia. We looked for designers who are of different origins, but have a good base in Dubai. [Pakistani designer] HSY is a good example - he has a good business set up in Dubai, and operates in London and Pakistan too."