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Journalism of Courage
Festive fashion
Though the fashion season has not ended, the week was marked by the absence of major fashion shows at five-star hotels. Instead, smaller but trendier night spots became the venue for intimate showings. Leading the pack was the Fashion Bistro & Cafe — which holds a show every month. This Tuesday, their latest fashion event had a definite festive feel to it. Bela Sanghavi showed her range of brightly-coloured sarees and Muzzaffar and Meera Ali unveiled their fall collection of ethnic wear. The choreographer was Sharmilla Khanna, definitely one of the busiest women in the industry this season. She was the woman behind the Christian Dior and Swarovsoki show last month, and this Wednesday she will put together the Monish Malhotra-Reverie show. The Bistro was crowded as usual with celebs busy with the business of partying. Milind Soman, Queenie Dhody, actress Madhoo (back on the tube with a film) and Esther Daswani all turned up to have a dekko. Up on the ramp were Reshma Bombaywala,Shyla Lopez, Bipasha Basu, Lara Dutta and Carol Gracias.
Sporty nite
The sports bar at the Crossroads, cafe Ole, was also bowled over by fashion for the launch of the Rochas Man fragrance. This time it was the turn of Marc Robinson to put together the event. Sporty in theme — to match the target audience — live Jazz music played by Vivian and Merlin really put the crowd in a party mood. By the time professional dancers boogied to Grease the crowd was ready for the show. And by the time Sampada, Reshma Bombaywala, Shyla Lopez and Carol Gracias (definitely the models of the week) sashayed down the ramp in swimsuits, the show was a huge hit. While the men ogled at the fit bodies, it was fellow model Bipasha Basu who was most complimentary about the catwalkers. "I could never wear a swimsuit down the ramp. It takes real guts to do that," said the ramp queen, who was watching the show along with Sharmila Khanna, Gautam Kapur, Dino Morea, Sangeeta Chopra and Sumeet Chopra. And after the swimsuit-cladwomen came the men dressed in shorts. Tarun Raghavan made sure he was not outdone by the women as he strutted down the ramp sans his shirt. We think could really give Salman Khan a run for his money.
Hemant Trevedi may not have had a major fashion show this year in India but he was definitely the designer of the year. First, he was a sell-out at Dusseldorf’s IGEDO show. And now he has been invited by Swarovski to meet them in Austria which is where he is right now. Swarovski have been looking to tie up with an Indian designer for some time and it looks like Hemant may just be the lucky man. But that’s not all. Hemant’s next project is to open up the Sheetal Design Studio at Mahalalaxmi where he and his team will conjure up couture garments for their exclusive clientele. He really has scored a hat-trick over most other designers.
Cook out
The Bowling Co’s sports bar Silly Point has decided not to focus on fashion but on food. This Sunday, they held a celeb cook-upwhere Jules Fuller and Sophiya Haque, dressed up in Halloween gear, rustled up gourmet delights for their guests. Jules cooked some alcohol-laden mushrooms which went perfectly with Sophiya’s chicken dunked in vodka. They also managed to pack in the crowd as lots of people from media industry had come that night to try out their delicacies including Channel V’s Mel deSouza and Nina Manuel who came with fellow ramp model Jessae Randhawa. Also spotted were Suchita Pillai, Mitali Kakkar and Suman Ranganathan.
White light
Delhi fashion designer Kanwaljit Singh, known more as Delhi hair-stylist Sylvie’s friend, has shifted base to Mumbai. And to proclaim the move, he organised a show at KBN, Linking Road, in Khar. The showing was as interesting as the invite, which read: "Remember the Rolls Royce story? The salesman proudly sniffed to his customer, But of course, Sir, we have a variety of colours. We have 99 different shades of black!" Kanwaljit unfolded a similar story at his fashion parade. Withwhites. From white to more white, models Tora, Ritu Kamal, Puja and Sudanshu Pandey displayed everything from sarees and salwar kameezes to men’s shirts. While the select ones were previewed on Sunday by special buyers like Anil Kapoor’s wife and family friend Mona and Amjad Khan’s wife Shaila, more of the 500 creations will be on show at KBN for three more days, for which the guest list includes mainly film stars, with Azharuddin and wife Sangeeta as special invitees.
And finally…
Aspecial greeting goes out to Dilip Piramal, who celebrated his 50th birthday in style with a bash held at Biscotti, at Crossroads. Hosted by his wife Gita and daughters Aparna and Radha, the invite said, "He is 50, going on 35". Judging by the way Dilip parties the invite was bang on!
