Asiana Bridal Show London 2012 - First Look

One of my favourite wedding events of the year, the 2012 Asiana Bridal Show, returned to London this weekend at the Park Plaza Riverbank.

The exhibition opened at 10am to a small crowed eager to check out all the wedding suppliers. I was one of the early birds and even though the exhibition was open til much later on in the evening, it was still starting to feel very busy in the first few hours. I'll be writing a bit more about my fashion-finds at the exhibition stands in more detail in future blog posts, but now onto the main attraction - the fashion show!

First let's rewind a little bit: the beautiful clothes on show at the 2011 Asiana Bridal Fashion Show were overshadowed by the fact that there was a distinct lack of brown faces on the catwalk. Thankfully, this wasn't an issue at the 2012 show - I felt there was the right balance and regardless of ethnicity I think all the models carried the outfits well and did a great job.

Seating as always was a bit of an issue, I didn't have a VIP reserved seat this year, but Ziggi Studio very kindly let me have one of their exhibitor passes so I managed to get myself on the 4th row. The only way to get a seat on the front three rows was to be on the guest list of one of the big sponsors - Madhu's, Sony Entertainment, or Sunrise Radio. I'm not going to be too critical of this policy, as those sponsors have obviously paid to put the whole show together, but I will say that a lot of their guests didn't look like they were shopping for wedding outfits!

Anyways, onto the photos! I will be posting more photos from each designer, but in the meantimes here's a little preview:

RDC opened and closed the show, here are two of my favourite outfits from their catwalk collection.

Having visited their store (on Ilford Lane - East London) in the past I've found their outfits to be quite reasonably priced and being a bit of an online-addict I like that they keep the RDC facebook page regularly updated with their latest designs.

Kyles Collection were second up on the catwalk. My camera struggled to get photos of all the pieces close up but I managed to get a clear-ish photo of this set. I wore a shingar patti from Kyles Collection on my wedding and if I got the chance to dress up as a bride again I would definitely wear another of their head-pieces like this one.

Traditions showcased a collection of bright white registry-style gowns, followed by a few red, more indian-style bridals - all with matching menswear. I liked the addition of orange in the outfit below.

Looking through my photos from Mongas collection, as beautiful as the outfits were from the front, I really loved the backs too - so here's a pic of the back of 3 outfits! I promise I will be posting pics of the front of these too in a future blog post :)

Cakes4U presented some of their cakes on the catwalk, alongside outfits by Arinder Bhullar. I like cake, and I like dresses, but sometimes I think you can get a bit too matchy matchy!

Harkirans

Frontier Raas had some really bold single coloured outfits. I really liked this yellow outfit. I don't think my photos do it justice, but in person it stood out on the catwalk and looked very vibrant. As far as I remember, this was the only yellow outfit on the catwalk.

Make-up artist for the show, Jawaad had a small segment in the show to demonstrate the hair and make-up efforts of his team. The outfits were provided by Mona Vora.

Khushboos by Chand presented a catwalk full of reds:

Ziggi Studio were up next with their menswear collection. I think this was one of the most popular segments of the fashion show as there was lots of eye candy for the largely female audience!

Ekta Solanki's collection was one of the most popular from the 2011 Asiana Bridal Show and this year's collection didn't disappoint. I must admit I do have a bit of a weakness for hot pink lenghas and green is also another of my favourite colours so you can probably see why I liked this outfit!

The fashion show was put together by Naseeba and the Ooops team and the beautiful backdrop was created by Maz of Leicester.

One of the dressers/backstage team has written up her views from the other side of the catwalk which you can read here: Asiana Bridal Fashion Show-Behind The Scene: Rehearsal. Momtaz from the Asiana Team has also written up her initial thoughts on the show here: Catwalk Highlights: Asiana Bridal Show 2012

Did you attend the show? What did you think?

Uzma Rafiq Hair Academy at the Internation Asian Fashion Awards

Alongside all the beautiful outfits at the 2011 International Asian Fashion Awards was a showcase to promote the Uzma Rafiq Hair Academy. The headline for their section of the show was: "sensational hair sculptures, timeless fashion, elegant beauty"

I'm not totally convinced by the concept of this "hair catwalk". I see hair sculptures but I don't quite see the "timeless fashion" and "elegant beauty", especially in some of the more outlandish sculptures like the ones below.

What do you think of this hair catwalk and do any of these looks inspire you?
Thanks to Rafyl Photography for these photos.

Charmi Creations new asian bridal showroom launch

This month Charmi Creations celebrated the launch of their new bridal showroom in North London.

I didn't get a chance to attend in person, but from looking through the photos, the new showroom looks like the perfect intimate setting for choosing a bridal outfit.

Guests in attendance also had the opportunity to see Charmi's new bridal collection for 2012, including their "fusion" line which you can view in the catwalk video below:


For further details about Charmi Creations' new showroom and book an appointment, visit the Charmi Creations website or get in touch via the Charmi Creations facebook page.

Ruby Rani - Indian Babywear Online

Childrenswear isn't something I tend to write about a lot here on asian fashion blog, but since becoming an aunty again at the end of last year it's something that's back on my radar. So when I received an email about an online Indian babywear company called Ruby Rani, I jumped at the chance to review their products.

Ruby Rani was founded by Kit Bhatti, who after having her baby struggled to find suitable indian-style outfits for her daughter. One of her key objectives when setting up the company was to make outfits that were comfortable - I can totally relate to this, some asian outfits even I find uncomfortable to wear (despite how pretty they look) so imagine how babies, with their delicate skin, feel in them!

The product range at Ruby Rani, includes slogan tshirts, churidar outfits for the girls and kurta/sherwani-style outfits for the boys. I picked out the "Rohan Kurta Suit", a t-shirt and waited for my package to arrive!

Both my items were wrapped in blue crepe paper and each item was further packaged in its own bag. I thought it was a nice touch that the plastic bags used were recyclable (I like companies that make an extra effort to be green!)

I was really happy with the way these garments looked and felt in person. You can't always tell when buying something online but these items were true to the website images and felt good quality to me.

From my personal experiences of attempting to dress a baby I can tell you it's not always an easy task! The outfits in the Ruby Rani range have plenty of buttons so that they're easy to get on and easy to change nappies with.

You can view the full range of outfits on the Ruby Rani website, prices range from £12 for the tshirts to £35 for the girls churidar-style outfits and boys kurta suits. However all prices have been discounted this month so if you buy before 1st February 2012 you can make a saving - there's also free UK delivery available at the moment too!

My nephew hasn't had a chance to wear his outfit yet - waiting for him to hit the 3-month mark before he will fit into the t-shirt, and he should be the right size to fit into the kurta outfit for the summer wedding season. I'm sure he will work the look and more importantly, feel comfortable in it too!