Magazines Archives - 2007 March

Singapore Fashion Festival to celebrate Asian beauty
Story 13

THE Singapore Fashion Festival (SFF) will place Singapore as one of Asia’s foremost fashion retail hubs, said assistant chief executive (leisure) of the Singapore Tourism Board (STB), Dr Chan Tat Hon.

“Bolstering Singapore’s standing as a fashion hub is an integral part of our tourism strategy towards achieving our vision of attracting 17 million visitors and recording S$30 billion (US$19.55 billion) in tourism receipts by 2015,” Chan said.

“We will continue to focus on efforts to host signature events such as this and to develop the overall shopping landscape as well as Orchard Road.” Speaking at the media launch of the Singapore Fashion Festival, Chan said a total of S$12 billion was spent in 2006, of which 25% was used on shopping. Of this percentage, one-third was spent on fashion and accessories.

He added that the STB projected visitor arrivals to reach 10.2 million this year, up from 9.7 million recorded in 2006. The board is targeting tourism receipts to hit S$13.6 billion this year, a 10% increase over 2006 revenues of S$12.4 billion.

The SFF this year, which will run from March-April, will celebrate Asian beauty, and will bring some of the world’s top models such as Ai Tominaga and Anne Watanabe to grace the events.

It will also showcase the latest from internationally renowned designers such as Matthew Williamson, who will make his full scale fashion runway debut in Asia at the SFF, and Vivienne Tam.

Designers from around the region will also be invited to showcase their designs, including Shanghai-based couture and ready-to-wear fashion designer Lu Kun, and India’s Savio Jon and Priyadarshini Rao, among others.

This year, SFF will also celebrate the dress, paying tribute to the season’s more internationally acclaimed catwalk favourite.

Singapore will also be the first country in the region to host the Red Dress Campaign where designers will create a red dress — in hopes to raise awareness of heart disease, one of the major killers of women around the globe — to be auctioned off, with all proceeds going to the Singapore Heart Foundation.