Who is Made in Pakistan for anyway?

By Kiran Haroon
Karachi

As the year 2011 started one found hope in looking for something new and moving into a better phase with bigger promises. But if you are in any way connected to the fashion industry your thoughts immediately went to the imminent fashion weeks. Now with the year reaching its half point we’ve already had a fashion and bridal weeks.

A fashion designer is a person that takes a theme and weaves it into clothes for a person that identifies themselves with that designer. The fashion week has brought about a newer understanding of the business of fashion but at the cost of creativity in fashion.

When a milieu of clothes bombards the ramp in an assembly line, the spark that draws one to seek creativity in fashion is extinguished. Yet again we as a nation have taken it upon ourselves to appease the foreigners that can further our business with their dollar and pound investments. Yet again we fail to realize that the consumer that will wear the shalwar and the kameez will always be in Pakistan. A designer may be technically sound to design a ball gown, dress or trousers for women but does it mean that they can understand its functions in a woman’s life?

Pakistani women bust stereotypes - with business

Chandigarh, May 5 (IANS) Silently suffering behind a burqa, reduced to an inferior gender in a conservative society and confined to an anonymous existence..women from Pakistan are breaking many such stereotypes and, at a trade show in

India, a clutch of them showed how.

"I started my textile business many years back in Multan. Initially, it was only aimed to provide employment to poor people of our locality, but gradually it became a full-time profession for me," Naseem Akhtar, owner of Naseem Akhtar
Enterprises, told IANS.

"Today we have provided jobs to scores of people and our unique Multani designs and embroidery are made by hand by my
workers. We are into both manufacturing and exporting fashion products. I have participated in trade shows in different
parts of India and also in the US, Canada and Dubai," said Akhtar, who is in her early 60s.