Charity, clothes and coffee

KARACHI: Karachi’s socialite crowd may be packing its bags for their summer vacations - London and Dubai (where else, dahlings?) but they put in time to don their newest designer outfit and show up at the Etihad Airways and Labels event, a fund-raiser for the non-profit Development in Literacy.

Held late last week, the event featured a fashion show with the designs of Faiza Samee, Ayesha F. Hashwani, Maheen Karim, Nomi Ansari and HSY as well as a one-song performance by Strings, who recently signed up as Etihad Airways’ brand ambassadors.

The venue was decorated beautifully, and the idea to have Etihad’s flight crew act as ushers was a novel one and the champagne flowed freely.

However, Karachi’s socialites were far more responsive to the fashion - and the music - than they were to the charity. A Development in Literacy representative tried his best to get attendees to donate, even resorting to good old-fashioned guilt by reminding them that they can drink expensive coffee at Espresso but can’t donate or that they will go back to their drawing rooms and complain ... But they don’t want to do anything about the situation.

Only one attendee offered to donate to build a school, and the representative walked back to his seat in a huff of sorts, with audible gasps from some of the attendees at the tight-fisted nature of their fellow attendees.

The night had opened with speeches from Development in Literacy and Etihad Airways officials, and segued into a one-song performance by Strings who paraded down the runway singing their hit “Dhaani”, from their 2003 album. Given that the performance was promoted as a ‘concert’ it was a letdown of sorts that they did not stick around for more songs.

The fashion, however, was another series of ‘been there, done that’. Maheen Karim, who last showed at the TRC/Ensemble show in early 2009, put on a stronger show at the event with a capsule collection in her signature trailing evening wear gowns and a variety of encrusted conventional eastern wear. It would have been met with far more applause had Ayesha F. Hashwani not shown a similar collection, and had there not been several socialites in the crowd wearing similar outfits. Perhaps designers need to focus on not repeating their signature pieces, but to actually develop trends (which Karim did in 2008 with the dropped hemline that is now being repeated at every tailor’s atelier). Speaking of socialite wardrobes - has individuality in dressing died? It looked like every designer’s store in Karachi had been raided for samples of their fashion week collections and worn without any concept of accessorising the outfits or melding it with pieces already in their wardrobes.

Nomi Ansari stuck to a loud variation of his bridal wear, while HSY showed a near-repeat of his collection from PFDC Fashion Week (which was also on the runway at Frieha Altaf’s 20th anniversary celebration event).

Faiza Samee, on the other hand, was a disappointment after the exceptional Fashion Pakistan Week collection; sticking to a mix of bridal couture and evening wear outfits.

Elan’s Khadijah Shah showed a little more variety, carrying on from her PFDC Fashion Week collection and including patterned prints in cotton and chiffon.

The event concluded with a tipsy glitterati and winners of the raffle walking away with tickets from Etihad Airways while one socialite sniffed, “Oh, this is only an economy class ticket? Would have been worth it if it was business class!”

Published in the Express Tribune, June 9^th, 2010.