This year’s New York Fashion Week will include an innovative initiative to highlight, recognize, and appreciate South Asian fashion designers through a stand-alone platform. Held from Sept. 8 to14, at venues all over Manhattan, the South Asian New York Fashion Week (SANYFW) will take over the city’s fashion scene with some noteworthy names in international couture like Nomi Ansari and Mayyur Girotra, as well some established and well-known designers.
Almost a decade in the making, SANYFW is the brainchild of fashion entrepreneur Shipra Sharma, who after partnering with Hetal Patel, made it her life’s mission to showcase and uplift South Asian fashion inspired by traditional and modern South Asian attire and culture.
According to founder and CEO Sharma, SANYFW aims to “highlight and share the history of our fashion and culture, while celebrating the fashion pioneers who have been trailblazers for our community universally.”
“Never before has New York City seen South Asian culture come alive during New York Fashion Week the way we plan to showcase it,” said co-founder and COO Patel. “With an expected high projected audience and increased participation from leading pioneers of the South Asian fashion industry, SANYFW promises to be the must-attend week for fashionistas this fall.”
During the week-long experience, hosted at quintessential NYC venues, influencers, celebrities, icons, and enthusiasts of South Asian design, fashion, and culture will have access to runway shows categorized by streetwear, sustainability, menswear, traditional, bridal, and Indo-Western styles.
Established designers showcasing their collections during SANYFW include Rivesse (Ishan Sanghvi), Margi Official (Margi Sutaria), and jewelry by ReeMat Designs (Reena Mathur) and Avigna (Deepti Mandhava), while Sezan Khan, Vinod Muralidhar and Harika & Anusha Sabbineni are among the emerging names in South Asian fashion.
In addition to the shows, SANYFW will also create a marketplace of vendors plus an interactive collaboration with the app Aina (Nisha Saboo) that helps shoppers virtually try on clothing to see how it fits their body sizes. The high-energy week will culminate with a health and wellness pop-up, which will include yoga activities and Ayurvedic learning. SANYFW’s official tech partner is Nate — www.nate.tech, is billed as the first solution to bring the hottest looks from the runway directly to the consumer, in real-time.
