Panache of the Punjab: fashion with a 4,000-year DNA

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Panache of the Punjab: fashion with a 4,000-year DNA​

Hilary Alexander finds the designers in Lahore are inspired by their land's rich history to create vivid and vibrant clothes.​

When I first mentioned to friends and colleagues I was going to Pakistan Fashion Week, the two 'b' words were invariably top of the conversational agenda - bombs and burkas.

After a week in Lahore, however, I can report none of the former and very few of the latter.

I met two full hijab and niqab wearing women in Anarkali - the bazaar named for a slave-girl supposedly buried alive by being bricked up in a wall by a Mughal emperor; one agreed to be filmed by the Telegraph's video cameraman, "because you can't see my face anyway", and the other, shopping at an underwear stall in one of the alleys, told me that the silver, purple and gold bras and knickers were "a good souvenir of Lahore."

Pakistan Fashion Week in pictures

Lahore is a city of mind-boggling contrasts: donkey carts laden with water-jars or green feed, jostle with chauffeur-driven cars from the GOR (government official region), mopeds steered by 'dad' and carrying Mum and five children, and the occasional dhoti-clad cyclist with an old Singer sewing machine strapped on the back. Kylie and Madonna compete with techno, garage and Sufi devotional folk-singers, such as Sain Zahoor, winner of a 2006 BBC World Music award, whose verses are 1,000 years old.

The call to prayer resounds over the blare of music and traffic; this is the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, and Lahore, for all its culture, history, love of bling, and liberalised inhabitants who enjoy a glass of 'passable red' from the friendly bootlegger, is staunchly conservative. Western dress, among girls and women, at least, is rare.

Fashion week in Lahore, the capital of Punjab, is organised twice a year by the Pakistan Fashion Design Council. It is a mere babe-in-arms, compared with its emergent rival in India next door, for example, which has been going for about a decade, Iceland Fashion Week, which is 11 years old, or even Malaysian Fashion Week, which is seven. But given the volatile, chaotic political situation in Pakistan it is probably a miracle it happens at all.

Last week's event, only the third, was a demonstration of skills, determination, exuberance, and creativity, not to mention courage. One catwalk model told of being beaten by her strict Muslim uncle and brothers when she first decided to go into the profession; the fact she now earns two million PKR Pakistani rupees a year, is the sweet persuader for her previously violent male relatives.

The fashion week is masterminded by Mrs Sehyr Saigol, a legendary Lahore powerhouse, who also runs her own fashion company and international fashion magazine, both under the brand, Libas. She collects modernist paintings by the controversial Pakistani artist, Ahmad Zoay, and 16th century Mughal wooden doors, a sweep of history reflected in the design on the catwalk.

Apart from the shows starting around 7.30pm and finishing as late as11.30pm, plus a day being cancelled for the India v. Pakistan Cricket World Cup semi-finals, it was catwalk business as usual, with one clear difference between the major weeks in New York, London, Milan or Paris: this was Pakistani design through and through, which a few exceptions, such as Adnan Pardesy's hi-tech, multi-zippered denims, and Omar Farooq's sporty-urban menswear for his Republic label.

Elsewhere,the designers drew on the rich inspiration which lies on their doorstep. Punjab is the cradle of the circa 2,000 BC. Indus Valley civilisation, and has variously been invaded and ruled by Persians, Greeks, Egyptians, Afghans, Mongols and Mughals, among others. For Pakistani designers, this is not a fantasy, as it might be in the West, but living history. Many of the clothes, richly decorated, intricately printed and vibrantly coloured, could have stepped from a museum or a Mughal miniature, but still mirror the tastes of the girl in the street or the fashionista on the style circuit.

But strip away the bling and beading and fanciful accessories which are part and parcel of every young designer's catwalk extravaganza and, very often you are left with two classic staples of the global wardrobe: a tunic and trousers.



Panache of the Punjab: fashion with a 4,000-year DNA - Telegraph