Scandinavian Fashion Battle
Beautiful shows, extravagant parties, exhibitions and events – fashion weeks bring the glitz to the industry and everyone is fighting for their share of the publicity cake. Scandinavia’s two largest fashion cities, Copenhagen and Stockholm, both gain attention internationally, but the approach to the fashion week differs. Copenhagen just finished its turn a couple of weeks ago, while Stockholm is just entering its second, and final, fashion week with Mercedes-Benz Stockholm edition. Which is the right way to go, and – who is the customer to please?
With over 2 700 brands represented, Copenhagen Fashion Week can count themselves as the second largest fashion city after Paris, if one solely measures it on the number of brands. By creating an all-in-one week, where the designer runway shows and four competing trade fairs are getting along and are sharing the attention of press and buyers, the biannual fashion week in Copenhagen surely is Scandinavia’s largest fashion gathering. Though, even if Stockholm’s fashion events might be minor to numbers, the city isn’t far after when it comes to publicity for its fashion scene. Stockholm has become famous for its sleek design aesthetics, recognizable all around the world.
That Stockholm doesn’t reach the same numbers of attending brands, buyers and press in one single event, might be the fact that Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Stockholm has just started, just over a week after the Stockholm Fashion Week ended. Add a special week for retailer collections, and Stockholm is counting six fashion weeks per year, in comparison with most cities doing only two. Which is the right or wrong way of carrying out fashion weeks and events might be up to the individual stakeholder to decide, or the amount of actual business carried out, but it remains to ponder if the separate weeks are a strategy of dividing the scene into more manageable blocks, or is it a sign of organizations not being able to collaborate? “We’re proud of being based and showing in Stockholm, but it is for sure confusing that Stockholm chooses to organize multiple fashion weeks. Not only for the press and buyers coming from abroad, but for the own market as well,” said two designers that The Blogazine spoke to.
Copenhagen’s well organized and collaborative intense one-week, or Stockholm’s separated events arranged by different organizations with slightly different focuses; if the ending point is all about business, who gains the most at the end of the day? The buyers who are getting it all-in-one or the brands sharing the time and space? Or is the most important thing to bring attention to the cities and their fashion as a whole? Whichever is right and whoever wins the battle of numbers, both cities are bringing a large amount of publicity to the growing Scandinavian fashion. This week, The Blogazine is following the runway in Stockholm while preparing for a month of nothing but fashion. September is almost here.
