It was an awards night but you would have found it very hard to find style even if you looked with a magnifying glass. Those very few who looked sharp at the Hum TV Awards – like Mahira Khan, Sanam Saeed, Syra Shehroze and Rubya Chaudhry – were stars who have a standing association and understanding of fashion and so know how to dress the part.
From Left to Right: Mahira Khan, Syra Shehroze, Sanam Saeed and Rubya Chaudhry were the few stars who looked every bit fashionable and dressed the part at the Hum TV awards, last weekend.
FashionForward
Recently held award shows throw light on the fact that celebrities need help when it comes to dressing up for the red carpet.
It was an awards night but you would have found it very hard to find style even if you looked with a magnifying glass. Those very few who looked sharp at the Hum TV Awards – like Mahira Khan, Sanam Saeed, Syra Shehroze and Rubya Chaudhry – were stars who have a standing association and understanding of fashion and so know how to dress the part.
Between the four of them, Mahira wore Feeha Jamshed, Sanam and Syra went with Shehla Chatoor and Rubya Chaudhry chose a sophisticated look from Adnan Pardesy. Beyond that, the fashion police were as perplexed as anyone else; who could they hold responsible for this train wreck of a red carpet?
Understanding the red carpet
TV stars, very simply put, don’t know how to work the red carpet simply because it’s still a very new concept for them. The PTV Awards – that magnificent show that we watched as children – was hardly a yardstick for style and only celebs with personal style stood out. The Lux Style Awards came in around 2001 and they were so intricately defined by style that teams (usually led by Nabila or Tariq Amin) were put in charge of working with TV and film stars to ensure a glamorous red carpet. It would take 3-4 months of hard work to develop individual looks and wardrobes for each one of them. And it worked like a charm. Recently held award shows, hosted mostly by TV channels, aren’t that involved in the red carpet (by choice or ignorance) and the stars are left to their own devices. Not the best idea as when it comes to style, they’re not the sharpest of tools in the drawer.
Go East or West: the fusion confusion
One of the biggest challenges that TV stars face when preparing for an awards show is to choose between a desi or a foreign look. Should they appeal to their mass audience and do desi, or appeal to the fashion and international audience and go Western? It’s not an easy choice to make because if they go western and wear risqué and revealing outfits then the moral brigade comes out in arms against them on social media. If they go traditional then they may end up looking like a wedding guest or worse, the frosting on a wedding cake; they become the subject of style snob-scorn. Stars like Mahira and Sanam Saeed, who are equally at ease in both stand out but so many of the rest just suffer the confusion.
“Channels and celebrities borrow clothes but we’re not always sure what they’re being borrowed for,” Umair Tabani, CEO at Sania Maskatiya shared with Instep. “Runway looks don’t necessarily work on the red carpet; performances require bling and vibrancy that also doesn’t work on the red carpet. We’d like to be more involved in the process so we can ensure the right clothes are worn at the right time.”
The solution
The smartest of celebrities work with experienced, tried and tested stylists that put their looks together. Mahira Khan often works with friend/stylist Amar Faiz (he’s even done the Feeha Jamshed lawn campaign with Mahira) and Fawad Khan has an Indian stylist, Abhilasha Devnani, who organizes his looks for most of his public appearances in India. The trick is to look the part while maintaining a certain sense of individuality. When celebrities go on a shopping/borrowing spree then the risk is that they end up looking the same and not necessarily their best. And they also don’t essentially know what’s best for them. Going with professional advice is the safest bet and if the biggest stars all over the world can seek the assistance of experienced stylists, then why can’t ours too? At least we’d have a better looking red carpet.
