Fashion Scout’s showcase: House of MEA

During London Fashion Week, the city plays host to multiple fashion events alongside the major ‘on schedule’ shows. Fashion Scout is the UK’s largest independent showcase for emerging and established design talent during LFW. Fashion Scout is renowned for championing, nurturing and showcasing creative design talent in London and Kiev.

The Freemasons Hall close to Covent Garden plays host to both a static exhibition of selected ‘designers to watch’ alongside a schedule of fashion shows that are visited by key fashion press and buyers, including Anna Wintor, (Editor in Chief, US, Vogue) Hilary Alexander, (OBE, Fashion Journalist) Suzy Menkes, (International Editor, Vogue Online) and Lucinda Chambers (Fashion Director, Vogue)

I had the opportunity to attend the show featuring the House of MEA designers; Annderstand, Studio HJ and Nivedita Saboo.

HOUSE OF MIDDLE EAST & ASIA is a platform to promote and incubate emerging and established designers taken from across the Middle East, Asia and India.

ANNDERSTAND’s wearable aesthetic leapt out at me when I visited the static exhibition. Founder Ge Yu graduated from Parsons School of Design, NY.  She has experience in design, luxury retail and buying and this translates into collections inspired by the modern independent woman. Her work includes a lot of functional design elements, and she is very focused on wearable items that really can be understood by women internationally.

I found the individual pieces themselves extremely wearable, sensual and elegant but unfortunately felt this was over played with the final styling,  a sleeker , more elegant polish would have in my opinion appealed more to the idea of a modern, independent women than the messy bed hair and off the shoulder ‘sexy’ look. All in all though, a great collection and one i’ll add to my fashion wish list. Instagram: @annderstandworld

Studio HJ is created by Hema, a fashion graduate who sells her collections privately. She loves to to travel the world looking for inspiration and purchasing materials she can tinker on and mix and match to come up with her masterpieces.

Her collection was very beautiful, with clear ethnic references and stunning details, the collection included some very elegant pieces.

for more on Hema check out http://www.studiohj.co.uk

NIVEDITA SABOO design journey began over a decade ago, and her experience showed with a fantastic collection that shone. She showed Men’s and Women’s wear together and both were captivating, with incredible detail and workmanship. Each of the evening wear pieces were red carpet ready and given the opportunity I would love to wear her designs.

Nivedita is a gold medalist from the prestigious National Institute of Fashion Technology, she has taken her brand internationally by showcasing at showrooms during Paris Fashion Week, at Bridal shows in London and Hong Kong as well as on the red carpet in Cannes and at the Asia Model Festival in South Korea.

Nivedita’s experience includes costume design for Indian Movies and Television, dressing up Bollywood celebrities like Karishma Kapoor and Akshay Kumar and most recently she was the fashion director for Mr World.

This experience was clear with the designer’s menswear collection, which was equally as strong as the women’s, featuring military and geometric details.

With over 100 in-house skilled craftspeople, her designs are brought to life sustaining indigenous indian heritage techniques, whilst innovating and presenting magnificent pieces that exemplify perfection everyday.* source: www.niveditasaboo.com

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