FW
The latest edition of Milano Unica was held February 4 to 6, 2020, Italy. The fabric fair which brought together 477 exhibitors saw a two per cent drop in its visitors. The number of visitors from the United States, Turkey, Poland, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Romania, Portugal, China and the United Kingdom rose, whereas the number of visitors from Germany, Italy and Japan experienced a decline. Milano Unica has been created through the tradition of five Italian exhibitions, Ideabiella, Ideacomo, Moda In, Prato Expo, Shirt Avenue.
The project is held twice a year and presents the finest quality products from both Italian and European textile manufacturers. The name Milano Unica represents the three essential characteristics of the textile fair, singular, exclusive, united. Milano Unica has launched an online marketplace. The initiative is intended to promote the textile-apparel fashion sector by extending traditional trade show activities to the digital world, including marketing, contents and promotions, making it possible for companies and their clients to stay up to date year round.
Revenues of the Italian textile sector rose 4.7 per cent in 2019. The year 2019 was a difficult one for the sector. This year does not present itself with the best hopes, weighed down by the Chinese epidemic and drought and fires in Australia.
Mimaki will launch a brand-new hybrid digital textile printer, the Tx300P-1800. Uniquely designed with versatility at its core, the new printer enables both direct-to-textile and transfer printing, with interchangeable platens and three different ink combinations – providing unrivalled flexibility within a single system and opening new doors for print service providers. The capability to fulfil diverse applications from fashion textiles to interior fabrics and wallpaper within one system makes the printer an ideal entry-level solution.
The ability of the printer to switch between direct-to-textile and transfer printing is enabled by its interchangeable platens. When printing direct-to-textile, excess ink penetrated through the fabric is drained by a platen with an ink-receiving channel. When printing on heat transfer paper however, this platen can be quickly and easily exchanged for a vacuum platen needed for paper printing – without the need for service engineers. The hybrid printer is also able to facilitate either a traditional one-way ink set, configured with any one of five ink types, as well as various combinations of inks, providing unparalleled flexibility. Users are able to select from three different ink combinations – textile pigment/direct sublimation, textile pigment/sublimation transfer, or direct sublimation/sublimation transfer – to provide the best results across various applications.
Mimaki is a manufacturer of wide-format inkjet printers and cutting machines.
The outbreak of Coronavirus in China is impacting cotton growers in Vidarbha as farmers in the city largely depend on government purchase at minimum support price (MSP) of Rs 5,550 a quintal. As private traders in the city continue to buy at lower rates, chances of open market rates crossing MSP are slim due to absence of Chinese buying, which has been hit by the coronavirus outbreak.
China is one of the major buyers in international market. The virus outbreak has hit logistics in China, even blocking exports of cotton consignments from India. This has in turn further dampened the rates in India. Traders said Chinese demand could have taken the rates up, at least crossing the MSP in the private market.
A major chunk of cotton supply has been taken away by the government procurement mechanism, which is still not being offloaded in the open market. Though sizeable supplies have been sucked out of the market, rates of raw cotton have not inched up, leaving the farmers to settle at MSP. The price is even less if a farmer goes to private traders who are not offering more than Rs 5,200-5,300 a quintal.
Apparel and made-ups exporters in India are facing an acute liquidity problem. Huge amounts of their funds are blocked under a rebate scheme for state levies and an export incentive program. Most apparel exporters are from the MSME sector and some of them are already in the process of closure and default.
Around Rs 6,000 crores of duty refund claims have not been disbursed under the Rebate of State and Central Taxes and Levies (RoSCTL) and the Merchandise Export from India Scheme (MEIS). Many exporters have paid statutory taxes also on RoSCTL and MEIS benefits. MEIS was also stopped from August last year for the apparel and made-ups sectors. Apparels and made-ups is one of the largest employment generation industry particularly supporting women.
India is already fast losing business to other countries like Vietnam, Cambodia, Myanmar, Bangladesh. India’s textile and apparel exports fell by eight per cent from April to November 2019. Exports were severely affected by the trade conflict of the US with China, the EU’s struggle with Brexit, growing geopolitical tensions in the Middle East and the removal of GSP benefits to India by the US. Under GSP, developed countries grant import duty concessions, in addition to prioritising purchase of textile and apparel products from some countries.
The company announced that its three textile fairs in Shanghai will be postponed from March to a later date due to the Novel Coronavirus outbreak. This includes Intertextile Shanghai Apparel Fabrics – Spring Edition, Yarn Expo Spring and Intertextile Shanghai Home Textiles – Spring Edition which were due to be held in Shanghai from 11 – 13 March at the National Exhibition and Convention Center. This follows the recent announcement that the company’s other fairs to be held in China in the coming two months – Prolight + Sound Guangzhou, SPS – Industrial Automation Fair Guangzhou (SIAF) and Asiamold in Guangzhou, and Toy & Edu, Baby & Stroller and Licensing China in Shenzhen – have also been postponed until later in the year.
“Messe Frankfurt has been an active player in the China market for over 30 years now, so we stand fully behind the government’s efforts to control the outbreak,” Ms. Wendy Wen, Senior General Manager of Messe Frankfurt (HK) Ltd outlined. “This includes the recent suspension of large-scale trade and economic events in a number of cities, so with this and the wellbeing of all our stakeholders in mind, we have made the decision to reschedule our upcoming textile fairs in Shanghai to a later date. Our teams are making every effort to find suitable alternatives, but we will only make the decision to go ahead with these fairs when it is deemed safe to do so.”
APLF-Leather, Materials+ and Fashion Access, originally scheduled for March 31 to April 2, 2020, at HKCEC, Hong Kong, will be held June 1 to 3, 2020.
The reason is the Novel Coronavirus. Hong Kong is making efforts to control and limit the spread of this infectious disease and WHO has declared the outbreak a global health emergency. Meanwhile APLF continues to monitor the developments of the Novel Coronavirus, and the safety of its customers and staff is always its top priority. The information on its websites (including Visitor Registration Page, Official Hotel Booking etc) is now being updated.
Held in Copenhagen, the CIFF Fashion Fair, focused on sustainability. Besides the regular brands that showcased clothing lines made from organic cotton or other recycled materials, new brands like Tomorrow, OFFT, 1331 and Cult Studios also incorporated sustainability as a part of their DNA.
The Special Project area focused on the theme: ART - Alter, Repair & Transform. It enabled visitors to up-cycle and renew their old jeans with unique embroideries at the denim tattoo bar. Expert menders and designers assisted the visitors and also coached them on how to repair and renew own clothes.
New facilities planned for the sporting area
Young London designers Bethany Williams showcased unique denim pieces conjured up from leftover fabric.
Together with Lee, each of them designed eight denim items, which were exhibited at the Special Project area.
New this season was the Sporting area where labels such as Arcteryx Veilance, Veja, Kavu, Petra Design and Doya presented their new collections. Kristian Andersen, CIFF Chief Innovation Officer had announced last season that it had planned bigger things for the Sporting area in 2020/21. It also plans to build sports facilities for the community.
Setting the trends for F/W 2020-21
CIFF also showcased trends for F/W 2020-21. Sand and earth tones will dominate in color while sporty minimalism, technical and functional details, straight lines, simple silhouettes and wide cuts were translated into the collections by countless labels. In terms of fabrics teddy fur, cord, knitwear and flannel were highlighted.
Kolkata Fabric Expo will be from held June 13 to 14, 2020. The trade show will provide a common platform for textile and accessories manufacturers and buyers. Around 80 exhibitors are expected to showcase textiles and fashion accessories to an estimated 4,000 visitors. The two-day business-to-business trade show will cater to garment manufacturers, wholesalers, and buyers to facilitate networking, ideas exchange, and trend forecasting for the coming season.
A fashion expo will be hosted this year with a number of traditional wear-focused runway shows to promote clothing brands, with a focus on brands from around Kolkata. Kolkata fashion expo is eastern India's biggest fashion event aimed at bringing together the brightest and the best fashion minds from the country. This event has been created to provide an ideal platform where leading manufacturers, wholesalers and buyers will come together under one umbrella to idea and exchange thoughts on enhancing the fashion culture of India. The fashion expo is a one-stop facility with the best technology and creative ideas, a combination of quality, technology, and exemplary customer service. The aim is to launch a fashion renaissance in Kolkata. The fashion expo was launched in 2015 to showcase the region’s garment industry. Since its inception, the event has held multiple editions both in India and abroad.
The schedule for largest textile machinery trade fair in Bangladesh ‘Dhaka International Textile and Garment Machinery’ (DTG) has been changed from February 20-23, 2020 due to Coronavirus outbreak. The new schedule is for the trade fair to be held from June 11 to 14, 2020. This exhibition will connect local apparel and textiles manufacturers and exporters with global manufacturers, dealers and suppliers. It will also focus on the untapped markets that are flexible and important for Bangladesh.
DTG visitors can access diverse distinct exhibits and strong offerings from around the world, while also enjoying one-stop procurement exchanges at the best platform for seeking ideal suppliers on a comparison basis. DTG has annually kept bringing world-class professional brand suppliers for Bangladesh’s textile and garment industries and has been likened to a ‘mini ITMA.’
Leading exhibitors ranging from textile machinery, auxiliary equipment, accessories for textile machinery, bleaching and washing machinery, chemicals and dyes, cloth processing machinery and accessories, embroidery equipment, felting needles inspecting, measuring and folding machinery, knitting machinery, laundry equipment looms, spinning machinery and accessories will participate at the exhibition and showcase their latest technologies for the textile industry.
Many participants in the fair will showcase their latest tech solutions for the first time. The estimated participation would about 36,000 visitors.
With fabric stores of yesteryear falling off the map, a new industry is rising up to meet the modern demands of young ‘sewists’. In the past 10 years, sewing clothing is experiencing a surge of popularity among these generations. The sudden interest is spurred, in part, by recent and widespread criticism of fast fashion.
These new sewists are coalescing on social media, learning new skills through videos, taking part in online sewing challenges on Instagram, and creating podcasts to share tips with one another. Sewing patterns, the paper blueprints home sewers use to create clothing, have changed dramatically in the past decade. Once dominated by brands birthed in the 1800s such as Vogue and McCalls, the sewing pattern business has ballooned to include countless online-only startups, such as Friday Pattern Company and Grainline Studio.
These newcomers are led by young women who are drafting modern, easy-to-understand patterns that can be downloaded and printed at home.
