MONTREAL, Sept. 5, 2013 /CNW Telbec/ - In light of global competition and to strengthen their position on the international stage, the presidents and founders of Groupe Sensation Mode, Chantal Durivage and Jean-François Daviau, announced today that starting in 2014 the Fashion & Design Festival (FDF) will be enhanced with the MFW Spring-Summer event, which will continue to be dedicated to industry creators and stakeholders.
The announcement was made during the 25th anniversary edition of MFW, taking place this week at the Arsenal in Montreal, in the presence of public and private partners, as well as numerous designers.
Increasingly unique on the world stage
"This decision was necessary," said Chantal Durivage. "The FDF is a unique event and it continues to attract more and more visitors from America, Europe and Asia, and present partnerships with major names in design like Jean-Paul Gaultier and Jean-Charles de Castelbajac. It was a natural move to seize this opportunity and offer this world-class event a media, promotional and commercial showcase more impressive than ever before for designers and other industry representatives that participate. This will allow them to increase the opportunity to reach an international audience and consumers, who are imperative to their progress. The shopping component of the FDF, as well as the heightened participation of retailers, will also benefit the designers greatly."
"The MFW event we organize at the same time each year to promote designers' spring-summer collections to the media, partners and professionals will join forces with the festival, held just weeks earlier," said Jean-François Daviau. "We believe this will be a more effective approach that will increase the benefits for the designers. The synergy between the two events will be incomparable to anything else in the world of fashion. Quebec designers will have all of the benefits of the annual fashion shows, in addition to enjoying the expanded outreach of the festival."
The FDF, which takes place each August on McGill College Avenue in Montréal, has enjoyed steady growth each year hosting more than 100 fashion designers and major brands, hundreds of industry representatives, and over 500,000 spectators each year. By making the decision to add a "collection launch" component, Quebec fashion will be able to more intently participate in the major cultural and tourism atmosphere that grips Montréal every summer.
"We have been considering this option for several years now," continued Daviau. "We were encouraged by the recent words of Élaine Zakaïb, the Delegate Minister for Industrial Policy in Quebec, who had been seeking an industry event that brings everyone together. We believe in this strategy and are now bringing the means to make it happen."
An even stronger fall-winter MFW
"Following a recent meticulous strategic planning exercise, we have already started to modify our structures to consolidate our activities and prepare for new ones," explains Daviau. "We have a Board of Directors to guide us and have made numerous decisions regarding our future. We have also decided that in February, we will continue to offer a fall-winter collection launch to showcase Quebec-based designers. As early as the next edition of MFW, we will offer participating designers e-commerce options and are presently contemplating a variety of different formulas, which we hope to announce in November."
Groupe Sensation Mode
For over 15 years, Groupe Sensation Mode has specialized in the organization of events in related to fashion. To date, the company has organized more than 30 major fashion events in Montréal.
SOURCE: Groupe Sensation Mode
Valérie Marcoux / Marie-Emmanuelle Khoury
Torchia Communications
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