This was an exciting week at IFD — we went backstage at a professional fashion show put on by Small Boutique Fashion Week (SBFW)! We’ll be bringing you insider insights and interviews from the backstage connections we made in the weeks ahead. Are you wondering if SBFW is right for you? Here’s everything you need to know about this amazing opportunity.
Created in 2012, Small Boutique Fashion Week is a fashion show tour that strives to help upcoming indie designers showcase their products for boutique owners, buyers, and even the general public. SBFW is a way for new designers to make influential fashion connections to make their design dreams come true. This week’s event in Atlanta, GA was their second largest fashion show on the tour with twelve designers showing new lines.
Small Boutique Fashion Week offers three extremely beneficial perks for designers taking part in their shows:
Experience
Most small designers and boutiques have never taken part in a high-end fashion show. SBFW gives these designers their first taste of how to show their designs to an audience correctly and effectively. Fashion shows let designers experience first-hand whether an audience is drawn to their designs or not. If the audience isn’t drawn to them, they won’t be buying them. Designers need their designs to stand out on the runway in order to get customers shopping!
Brands from SBFW from left to right: EFABB, Zaki’s Tutu Tops and sandals from Arrogant Queen
Exposure
Many of the designers featured at SBFW are based in small cities throughout the United States. Without a major presence in LA and NYC, it can be hard for buyers to know you even exist. The exposure brands get from a showcase like this is incredibly helpful. With social media rising as a means of shopping, getting their brand on SBFW social media feed and website gives them the exposure they need to take their brand to the next level!
Connections
Fashion enthusiasts—from consumers to store buyers to fellow designers—from all over the world attend fashion shows to see new lines, designers, and inspiration for the upcoming seasons. Mingling after the show is a one-of-kind opportunity for designers to connect with these enthusiasts and build support for their designs. Strong connections are forged backstage too, as professionals of all kinds expand their networks and find new people to call on when they need collaborators, photographers, makeup artists, and models for future collections.
Are you ready to show your work? Apply online to become a designer for Small Boutique Fashion Week. You will be invited to take part in one of their smaller scale fashion shows with a chance to work your way up to New York Fashion Week. You can also register for either New York Fashion Week and the fashion shows, but there are specific registration requirements and costs that can be found here.
A couturier must be an architect for design, a sculptor for shape, a painter for color, a musician for harmony and a philosopher for temperance!”
~ Cristobal Balenciaga”
Good Luck out there and Go for it!!! Looking for more advice and design expertise? What would help you the most? Let us know at: design@insidefashiondesign.net
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