When I looked at last year’s post on Lakme I noticed I did not have many designers, because a few impressed me, however that did not mean that the designers were not back this year or not selling, so I decided to look at this fashion week a little differently.   Firstly I want to say I think everyone has a right to their own opinion, and everyone’s opinion counts. In this case while there are fashion critics, at the end of the day it is the CONSUMER who counts!  I could love a collection but not BUY anything from the label, which actually happens.  I LOVED Givenchy’s last collection but bought nothing from Givenchy.  To be honest while rave reviews might feed on ego’s they don’t pay the bills and with designers there is a whole team behind them, who work hard and need the collection to do well as much as the designer!

We can not deny that it is a global recession and every country and almost EVERY industry is fighting!  This time I looked at the collections to see will consumers buy it, because I think the Indian fashion industry is going to have to fight hard during these times.

I am going to start with my favorite collections:  Kallol Dutta, and Ruchika Sachdeva, these were the one’s where I was in awe of the designers.  I know I will be seeing them in many fashion editorials!

Next I am going to pick out collections which we KNOW will be worn on red carpets:  Isabelle Mittal, Nikhil Thampi, Komal Sood, Vizyon, and Jatin Verma without any doubt focused on GLAM collections.  I actually thought of the lot, Nikhil Thampi had a lot of potential.

Most Sellable Collections:  Shift and Priyadarshini Rao just seemed to nail it with outfits that could easily be seen in stores Internationally.  What I liked about Shift was there were so many separates!  Which for styling purposes really is fun!

Copy Cats:  To be honest I was expecting more Peplum in collections but I didn’t see much unless you count Drashta. What I did see a lot of was FRINGE.  Vizyon, and Pankaj and Nidhi used this trend ALOT! When trends that have already been seen in international collections have been used, seeing them in Indian Fashion week make Indian designers close to being called plagiarists!  However I know for those who can not afford Givenchy or can not go to foreign countries this will make that trend at fingers length and still be a designer collection.

To end it I am going to say that a trend that I noticed was Indian designers are moving away from embellishments and embroidery and moving towards playing with textures and print.  I loved Aarti Vijay Gupta’s silhouettes and her prints (wish it had more colors).  This can also be due to the costs and with Couture being subdued it is no surprise this trickled down to ready to wear.

All images were picked randomly!  I do suggest you guys go look at some of the collections in whole!