TWITTER: @FashionInsider1 / INSTAGRAM: TheFI_Mag
November 6, 2016
Photos Courtesy of Riga Fashion Week
Paris, France – Latvia’s RIGA FASHION WEEK completed its 25th jubilee edition from October 27th to November 2nd. This season the diverse program included as professional fashion shows at the Radisson Blu Hotel Latvija, thematic events, designers’ presentations and fashion parties in different creative and conceptual places of the capital.
During the professional shows of RIGA FASHION WEEK the Spring/Summer 2017 pret-a-porter collections were traditionally presented by well-known Latvian and a few foreign designers: M-Couture, NÓLÓ, Amoralle, Katya Katya Shehurina, Anna Led, Dace Bahmann, QooQoo, One Wolf, Paviljons, Deeply Personal, Natalija Jansone, Narciss, Federica Tosi (Italy), Ivo Nikkolo (Estonia) and a debutant of this season – brand Talented. Lazy Francis, Paade Mode and Aristocrat Kids presented kidswear collections this season too.
INCREASED ATTENDANCE TOO
This season the Riga Fashion Week recorded approximately 12,000 persons, who attended the shows. This represents a steady 10% increase in attendance from six months ago. And there were approximately 4,000 persons who attended official social events such as parties throughout the days of the fashion week.
A designer Evija Saitere is one more debutant of this season. She has presented her new fashion collection, which got a special prize at the international competition “Fashion Future for Hong Kong” in Hong Kong this summer, at the conceptual exhibition. It’s worth noting that the Baltic Fashion Federation cooperating with the Italian Embassy in Latvia and Istituto Europeo di Design awarded young and perspective designer Evija Saitere for great achievements in the international competition and presented her 4 weeks IED Summer Courses. The prize was handed to Evija by the professor Bruno Manfuso, who came from Milan especially for the exhibition opening. Also the professor presented a lecture “World fashion capitals nowadays” in the Art Academy of Latvia during his stay in Riga.
Besides the fashion shows the RFW program included also a few thematic events: presentation of designer collections for buyers and journalists in the press-showroom 8 ROOMS, Estonian contemporary jewellery exhibition Castle in the Air in the art gallery PUTTI, Latvian designer’s Elina Dobele footwear collection presentation and ESSENTIAL LOOKS hair-style trends show by Schwarzkopf Professional. Traditionally during the RIGA FASHION WEEK everybody interested in had an opportunity to join two parties in the official RFW club – Coyote Fly Lounge Club: RFW Models & Fans Party and Samsung Galaxy Party as well as had a chance to enjoy designers fashion shows by Bulichev and Baltman. Also during the party the most demanded models in RFW history were announced and awarded: Beate Stivrina, who participate in RFW already for more than ten years; Mara Sleja received the title “The most patriotic model” because of working only in Latvia; Svetlana Kiselyova participated in RFW many times and now she is the owner of the model agency “Freyja Model Managmante”; Eva Berzina is a face of this season’s RFW advertising and she also participated in the shows of the most famous fashion brands: Channel, Docle&Gabbana, Armani, Kenzo and others; Samanta Goldberga – one of the most promising models of the last RFW seasons. Girls got glass statues and a title of RFW Super Model as well as presents from RFW partners: ArtDeсo cosmetics, Rafaello sweets and Evian designed by Kenzo.
The 25th RIGA FASHION WEEK is special for several reasons: RFW designers’ pop-up stores where on November 1 and 2 it was possible to buy items from the designers’ collections that were just shown at the RFW. Besides that there was organized the first ever official live online broadcasting from the podium of RIGA FASHION WEEK in Radisson Blu Hotel Latvija on internet – Tvdom.tv and Delfi TV hosted by a popular TV hostess Maija Silova and a fashion blogger Deniss Schevelove (@fashionslogger). The agenda of the live broadcasts included interviews with designers, guests and foreign media representatives as well as comments by fashion experts and fragments of fashion shows.
A new stage of Riga Fashion Week development is collaboration with the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia (LIAA) this season. The international Lingerie Industry Forum in Latvia, organized by LIAA, took place in the framework of RFW and gave an opportunity to local enterprises of this industry to present themselves in the international arena, but to engaged experts and buyers from abroad – to discover a high quality brands and lingerie producing opportunities in one of the biggest lingerie producing cluster in Europe. In the course of this project the Baltic Fashion Federation organized the show of underwear collections from 12 Latvian producers: Lauma Lingerie, Orhideja, V.O.V.A, Gracija Rim, Rosme, Novella, Nikol Djumon, V.I.P.A, Stefi L, Regina N, Glora, Flash You and Me.
Organized twice a year since 12 years, the RIGA FASHION WEEK has become the central event of the capital’s cultural scene, gathering in one place not only internationally recognized designers, but also representatives of the world’s leading media, bloggers, experts of the fashion industry and buyers from various countries. In this season buyers from 6 counties – LC Fashion (France), Margreeth Olsthoorn (Holland), Temporary Showroom (Germany), www.Baltic.market, Kick The Moon (Lithuania), Freedom Store, Dan Mode and Lef27+2 (Russia) visited Riga and after the fashion shows bought clothes from the Natālija Jansone, QooQoo, Anna Led and Nolo designer collections as well as were interested in brands Katya Katya Shehurina, Deeply Personal and One Wolf.
A record number of the mass media representatives were accredited for the 25th RFW. They include journalists and bloggers from 37 prestigious publications coming from 7 different countries: Vogue.it, Vogue.ru, Elle.it, Elle.ua, L’Officiel Italia, L’Officiel Lithuania, Glamour Italia, Collezioni Donna, TheFashionInsider.com, Eclectic Magazine, Fashion Channel, MediaSet, Geometria.ru, Design42day.com, FashionTime.ru, Intermoda.ru, Fashiondigest.ru, PROfashion, DRESS CODE magazine, TV3+ Estonia, Moteris, Laima, Anne & Stiil, YANA magazine, Naised magazine, NAINE magazine, Delfi.ee, Models.com, Модный magazin, FoxFlyFilm.com, Newkewl.com, Behind scenes PR-girl blog, Catwalk.ee, Hooligan Hamlet blog, Lucine’s Blog, Absentta blog, Lithuanian Beauty Blog.
This edition marks the first in which the RIGA FASHION WEEK is supported by the state institutions: the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia (LIAA) and the State Culture Capital Foundation (VKKF). The organizers of RFW hope that this cooperation will develop and become continuous.
Besides the specialists of the fashion industry and VIP-persons the jubilee 25th season of the RIGA FASHION WEEK was visited by reputable state representatives such as Minister of finance of the Republic of Latvia Dana Reizniece-Ozola; the director of the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia (LIAA), Andris Ozols; politician Inguna Sudraba; his excellency the ambassador of Italy to Latvia, Sebastiano Fulci; deputy of the Riga City Council Dainis Locis; executive director of Latvian Broadcasting Association, Gunta Lidaka; the chairperson of the European Affairs Committee of Saeima, Lolita Cigane; and others.
TheFashionInsider.com Magazine would like to extend particular thanks to Investment and Development Agency of Latvia and LiveRiga for invitation to the Riga Fashion Week.
