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Dior Transforms Mumbai’s Gateway of India into Fashion Ramp

Models present creations from Christian Dior's Fall 2023 collection during a fashion show in Mumbai on March 30, 2023. (AFP)
Models present creations from Christian Dior's Fall 2023 collection during a fashion show in Mumbai on March 30, 2023. (AFP)
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Dior Transforms Mumbai’s Gateway of India into Fashion Ramp

Models present creations from Christian Dior's Fall 2023 collection during a fashion show in Mumbai on March 30, 2023. (AFP)
Models present creations from Christian Dior's Fall 2023 collection during a fashion show in Mumbai on March 30, 2023. (AFP)

In a glittering splash of luxury fashion, Dior transformed Mumbai’s grand, historic Gateway of India monument into a runway laden with celebrity, beauty and craftsmanship.

Flanked by the brightly lit, iconic Taj Mahal Palace hotel, the spectacular decor turned the heritage site in India’s entertainment and business capital into a blend of color and style as the models lined up Thursday to showcase the Paris fashion house's 2023 pre-fall collection.

The runway, lined with traditional Indian floral designs, reverberated with fusion beats from live musicians as Indian artistry and craftsmanship took center stage in creative director Maria Grazia Chiuri’s collection.

The lineup featured silk dresses, evening coats and sari-inspired skirts that referenced traditional Indian silhouettes. The show opened with an array of neutrals, subtly transitioning to forest green before giving way to a blaze of bright colors and patterns. Throughout it all, most of the models sported strings of pearls wound around their necks.

“I personally wanted to celebrate and showcase the incredible knowledge India offers to the international world of fashion in the field of embroidery, the mastery of the artisans who continue to work on this craft, and the commitment of Chanakya’s founders to preserving India’s history and culture, portrayed by each embroidery technique,” Chiuri said in an Instagram post.

Dior has had a long association with India through the Mumbai-based atelier Chanakya, which works with artisans and underprivileged women. The show brought the spotlight back on India’s luxury fashion market where major Western fashion brands like Pierre Cardin, Yves Saint Laurent and Valentino have presented their collections in the past.

India, now the world’s fifth-largest economy, has always been known for its intricate embroidery art, opulent textiles and embellishments. With a young and aspirational middle class that has easy access to internet — and a rising number of uber-rich — it is fast emerging as a key consumer market for international fashion labels.

Many Indian designers have also opened stores in the global fashion capitals like New York and Dubai and have been showcasing their collections during international fashion weeks.

To flesh out the guest list, Dior drew on a range of A-list invitees from India and elsewhere. Bollywood actors in attendance included the legendary Rekha, fashion icon Sonam Kapoor Ahuja and Anushka Sharma, accompanied by her husband, Indian cricketer Virat Kohli.

Western celebrities of Indian origin or descent — like Freida Pinto, Simone Ashley of “Bridgerton”, sitarist Anoushka Shankar and Vanity Fair editor-in-chief Radhika Jones — took in the show. Other guests included actor Maisie Williams from “Game of Thrones” and Thai actors Mile and Apo from “KinnPorsche.”

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Fashion

As Fast Fashion's Waste Pollutes Africa's Environment, Designers in Ghana are Finding a Solution

Attendees at a thrift and an upcycle show pose for a photograph in Accra, Ghana, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Misper Apawu)
Attendees at a thrift and an upcycle show pose for a photograph in Accra, Ghana, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Misper Apawu)
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As Fast Fashion's Waste Pollutes Africa's Environment, Designers in Ghana are Finding a Solution

Attendees at a thrift and an upcycle show pose for a photograph in Accra, Ghana, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Misper Apawu)
Attendees at a thrift and an upcycle show pose for a photograph in Accra, Ghana, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Misper Apawu)

In a sprawling secondhand clothing market in Ghana’s capital, early morning shoppers jostle as they search through piles of garments, eager to pluck a bargain or a designer find from the stalls selling used and low-quality apparel imported from the West.
At the other end of the street, an upcycled fashion and thrifting festival unfolds with glamour and glitz, The Associated Press reported. Models parade along a makeshift runway in outfits that designers created out of discarded materials from the Kantamanto market, ranging from floral blouses and denim jeans to leather bags, caps and socks.
The festival is called Obroni Wawu October, using a phrase that in the local Akan language means “dead white man’s clothes.” Organizers see the event as a small way to disrupt a destructive cycle that has made Western overconsumption into an environmental problem in Africa, where some of the worn-out clothes end up in waterways and garbage dumps.
“Instead of allowing (textile waste) to choke our gutters or beaches or landfills, I decided to use it to create something ... for us to use again,” said Richard Asante Palmer, one of the designers at the annual festival organized by the Or Foundation, a nonprofit that works at the intersection of environmental justice and fashion development.
Ghana is one of Africa's leading importers of used clothing. It also ships some of what it gets from the United Kingdom, Canada, China and elsewhere to other West African nations, the United States and the UK, according to the Ghana Used Clothing Dealers Association.
Some of the imported clothes arrive in such poor shape, however, that vendors dispose of them to make room for the next shipments. On average, 40% of the millions of garments exported weekly to Ghana end up as waste, according to Neesha-Ann Longdon, the business manager for the Or Foundation’s executive director.
The clothing dealers association, in a report published earlier this year on the socioeconomic and environmental impact of the nation’s secondhand clothing trade, cited a much lower estimate, saying only 5% of the items that reach Ghana in bulk are thrown out because they cannot be sold or reused.
In many African countries, citizens typically buy preowned clothes — as well as used cars, phones and other necessities — because they cost less than new ones. Secondhand shopping also gives them a chance to score designer goods that most people in the region can only dream of.
But neither Ghana's fast-growing population of 34 million people nor its overtaxed infrastructure is equipped to absorb the amount of cast-off attire entering the country. Mounds of textile waste litter beaches across the capital, Accra, and the lagoon which serves as the main outlet through which the city’s major drainage channels empty into the Gulf of Guinea.
“Fast fashion has taken over as the dominant mode of production, which is characterized here as higher volumes of lower-quality goods,” Longdon said.
Jonathan Abbey, a fisherman in the area, said his nets often capture textile waste from the sea. Unsold used clothes “aren’t even burned but are thrown into the Korle Lagoon, which then goes into the sea,” Abbey said.
The ease of online shopping has sped up this waste cycle, according to Andrew Brooks, a King’s College London researcher and the author of “Clothing Poverty: The Hidden World of Fast Fashion and Second-hand Clothes.”
In countries like the UK, unwanted purchases often end up as charity donations, but clothes are sometimes stolen from street donation bins and exported to places where the consumer demand is perceived to be higher, Brooks said. Authorities rarely investigate such theft because the clothes are "seen as low-value items,” he said.
Donors, meanwhile, think their castoffs are “going to be recycled rather than reused, or given away rather than sold, or sold in the UK rather than exported overseas,” Brooks said.
The volume of secondhand clothing sent to Africa has led to complaints of the continent being used as a dumping ground. In 2018, Rwanda raised tariffs on such imports in defiance of US pressure, citing concerns the West's refuse undermined efforts to strengthen the domestic textile industry. Last year, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said he would ban imports of clothing “from dead people.”
Trade restrictions might not go far in either reducing textile pollution or encouraging clothing production in Africa, where profits are low and incentives for designers are few, experts say.
In the absence of adequate measures to stop the pollution, organizations like the Or Foundation are trying to make a difference by rallying young people and fashion creators to find a good use for scrapped materials.
Ghana's beaches had hardly any discarded clothes on them before the country's waste management problems worsened in recent years, foundation co-founder Allison Bartella said.
“Fast forward to today, 2024, there are mountains of textile waste on the beaches,” she said.