By Dimithri Wijesinghe
In celebration of Women’s Day and with Colombo Fashion Week (CFW) just around the corner (18-21 March), we caught up with the mastermind behind Colombo’s biggest fashion event; a power woman, if there ever was one – CFW Chief Executive Officer (CEO) for the past five years Fazeena Rajabdeen.
Rajabdeen, who comes from an entrepreneurial upbringing and has a background in business and IT, initially took on a management role at CFW. Having always wanted to do something in the fashion industry and looking to take a break from her kids, the timing felt right for her to take on the role of organising and co-ordinating the event. And just in her second year with CFW, she had gone on to manage the entire event by herself.
With regard to her rise to the top, Rajabdeen said it hasn’t been a convenient journey; having started things off from an operational position and moving up to a more strategic and creative role, she was afforded the unique opportunity to experience the “jungle gym version of the industry”, thus allowing her to have a hand in just about everything as opposed to a linear climb.
Speaking about CFW, Rajabdeen said: “The beauty of CFW is that it is not an event-based system. It is something we work on throughout the year because there are a lot of stakeholders. Unlike other fashion weeks where you are hired to host an event, here, fortunately, everything is from the ground up. So, we think through the whole design system – the featured designers, sourcing and training them, and even photographers to stylists.”
She said they are fortunate to have grown to become a platform through which everyone starts their career and has a space to evolve, which then contributes to a lot of work throughout the year.
CFW has always been lauded for their efforts to be a dynamic body along with their dedication towards growth each year. In 2020, they set another massive goal – their new programme “Responsibility in Fashion” – and Rajabdeen took us through the thinking process behind CFW’s green commitment, which isn’t all too new to the organisation.
Responsible meter
With the beginning of 2020, CFW had pledged a green friendly commitment in an attempt to enhance the value of the garment, for which they have come up with three key mechanisms that do not interfere with the brand or how they earn profits, therefore keeping things financially viable for the brand.
According to Rajabdeen, the parameters are to increase the lifespan of the garment and for it to be carried out by the brands in their own ways. However, she said the specialty and advantage they have here is that the nature of CFW dictates that the organisation has a rapport with its designers, which as a result allows these processes to be implemented as well as them to be able to make such a pledge collectively.
“CFW has always been an incubation system for responsible fashion. We didn’t suddenly put out the responsible meter for our designers to adhere to,” she said. “We have been planning and toying with this idea for a couple of years now; we have had knowledge partners and designers in many sessions to try to streamline the process in order to take actionable measures and produce results.”
Rajabdeen said it was certainly an investment from the designers’ side but at the same time wasn’t hard for them to do. “Together as a fashion platform, we are able to do it because it comes from the fact that CFW, unlike other fashion weeks all over the world, started from the ground up. We have that relationship with our designers. We started together – they were groomed and launched on this platform. Therefore, we are able to initiate something like the responsible meter and say ‘hey, let’s do it together’.”
Can we do it?
Rajabdeen shared that we as Asians do not feel challenged with such a concept and the struggle to cut down on irresponsible hyperconsumerism. She said it doesn’t stem from this part of the world. “Therefore, this concept of sustainability comes naturally to us. We do not throw away clothes – we pass it down to our sister or we pass it on to the domestics. We are not a wasteful people and so that whole circular system is already a part of us.”
She also said that we work with cottage communities and empower women as a result. It is almost a lifestyle for us to use nontoxic products from cooking to how we eat to how we live, and it has come down from generations. Therefore, Rajabdeen believes that we are more geared to launch something of this nature than people in the West.
Streamlining and designer development
Rajabdeen shared that when she first joined CFW, while there was a substantial number of designers showcasing their designs twice a year (resort edition), it was still one body that focused on fashion week as an event and since then, they have made efforts to expand it into multiple disciplines of the creative industry, including arts, film, and even food.
“As we evolve, and with digital taking centre space in most parts of the world, we have looked at the various touch points where we can bring in effective engagement with the consumer and expand into other elements which also bring a tourism aspect to the space,” she noted.
Most importantly, since she’s been involved, they have strengthened their Designer Development Programme. In this regard she said: “We didn’t have a step-by-step approach on how we developed these designers, but now it is so systematic that we are able to bring out at least 10 new designers a season and put them into a whole retail space. Earlier, designers would take good six years to get on with a collection and have a strong retail point, but now they are able to do it in a season, which is in three months.”
The strength of the process has developed so much that they now know how to choose the designers, how to develop them, where to send them, and how to see them through to the main platform.
Swim Week
While CFW Summer season has always taken the main stage, CFW Resort Week has slowly gained prominence, and since the introduction of Swim Week and with it being launched independently in 2015, it has shot up in fame, with most people lauding Swim Week with the same level of significance.
Swim and resort is an internationally accepted space, and according to Rajabdeen, it had been easy to connect to that market as it represents Sri Lanka well internationally. “We have such strong manufacturing capabilities here and we wanted to showcase that.”
However, she noted that for the longest time, these resources had not been accessible to local designers; swimwear designers had not been able to go to these manufacturing plants and say they want to create swimwear because they didn’t have the strength similar to that of companies like Nike, Calvin Klein, or Victoria Secret in their production lines, with over hundreds of outlets. Nevertheless, CFW as a body was able to get that opportunity for these designers, and it started this initiative with a strong, sustainable setup.
Lady boss
In playing a leadership role in an industry that is so impactful for an island such as Sri Lanka, Rajabdeen shared that the role of a female leader has been an interesting one. About her experience in her position, she said: “I feel that decision-making skills and competence are crucial to any leader. It’s important to be able to take responsibility and be reliable, have competence, and know your subject matter well enough to make those decisions and lead.” She added that despite having these skills, societal perspective is such that women are expected to be mothers, daughters, and primary caregivers. However, she believes that these roles are what make women ideal for these leadership roles.
“So what stops us from doing what nature expects us to do? I think society has made us believe that leadership roles are not meant for us. But it is important to unlearn those beliefs and have the conviction that as a woman, you are just as capable of managing these roles and high-pressure situations, and that your gender does not stop you from being a good leader,” she said.
During her time with CFW, Rajabdeen has made some major changes in the system and has shown her value as a leader in the industry. In closing, we asked her if she could say one thing to young women who dream of being captains of the industry in a world that might not be so supportive of them. “What I’d say to young women is to speak up. It’s important that you don’t second-guess your opinion or ideas. There’s no better time than now to speak up and be heard.”
Photos Eshan Dasanayaka
