LAAM
Fashion Week Season I

LAAM Fashion Week (LFW) is a Lahore fashion week built to sell what it shows. It was co-created by LAAM, an online marketplace for Pakistani and South Asian fashion, and Design651, a strategic management company. Every look that walks is meant to be on sale on the LAAM app and website as it appears, and every show is livestreamed, so most of the audience it is built for is not in the room. The organiser calls the format “runway to e-tail”, under the line “Made in Pakistan. Worn by the world.”

The idea answers an old problem for Pakistani designers: runway attention that rarely turns into orders abroad. LAAM says it serves 1.2 million shoppers in 184 countries, lists more than 1,000 brands and earns most of its revenue from exports, figures it publishes itself. The organiser describes LFW as twice-yearly and mobile, able to move between cities or countries. Reviewing the first season for Dawn Images, Foha Raza read it as a revival of the spirit of the Pakistan Fashion Design Council’s fashion weeks, which had lost momentum about a decade earlier.

LAAM’s co-founders, chief executive Arif Iqbal and chief operating officer Amir Iqbal, are co-founders of the week alongside Saad Ali, founder and chief executive of Design651, who The News identifies as also chief executive of the Pakistan Fashion Design Council. Maheen Kardar, Design651’s chief creative officer, leads designer experience and curation; in the first season she also returned to the runway after a decade with Dilruba, a collection for her own label, Karma.

The couturier HSY (Hassan Sheheryar Yasin) is event director and was show director of the first season, which the organiser credits with the pacing and choreography of its large shows. Fahad Hussayn directed the first LFW Presents showcase. Press accreditation runs through the week’s communications agency, Lotus, and designers apply through a registration form on the official site; registration for the second season opened in June 2026.

In the first season, high-street, prêt, manufacturing and retail collections went on sale on LAAM immediately after they walked, while luxury and bridal collections were released in phases, Daily Pakistan reported; Dawn Images noted that couture could be ordered through the app with free shipping. The organiser’s FAQ says every sale follows LAAM’s normal returns and exchange policy, with category conditions: bridal wear, for example, may not be returnable.

Manufacturing and retail brands reach the runway through LAAM’s Ramp Readiness Programme. The first cohort graduated onto the Season I schedule, and the second season’s Retail Runway is made up of 12 labels from the second programme. Before buying from a livestream, check whether a piece ships ready-made or is made to order, and read the returns terms for its category, since couture and bridal follow different rules from prêt.

Between seasons the week stages LFW Presents, standalone showcases away from the main runway. The first, in February 2026, was a solo show for Hussain Rehar in front of the red-brick Indo-Saracenic façade of Islamia College, Lahore, directed by Fahad Hussayn: more than 60 looks, mostly bridal, opened by the actress Resham on horseback and closed by Ayeza Khan, with Eman Suleman’s green mukesh sari among the most remembered looks, according to Dawn Images.

The second, Kaleidoscopic Karachi in September 2026, was the platform’s first event outside Lahore. It took place at the Nusserwanjee Building, a Parsi-heritage building from Kharadar that architecture students dismantled and rebuilt at the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture, and opened with a four-decade retrospective of the photographer Tapu Javeri. Deepak Perwani, Wardha Saleem, The Pink Tree Company and Khaadi showed, and Sana Safinaz closed with Mastaani on 20 models, Pakistan & Gulf Economist reported.

The first season opened on 31 January 2026 with LFW Presents, 26 signature pieces from 26 designers and brands shown as a museum-style display, followed by the LFW Hot List, ten capsule collections by recent graduates of the Indus Valley School and the Pakistan Institute of Fashion and Design, and runway shows by Tena Durrani, Zainab Salman and Ali Xeeshan. Rizwan Beyg closed the first night with an invitation-only show of Jashan, embroidered by women in rural Punjab through his Bunyaad network.

Across four days, more than 35 designers and brands showed, from high-street labels such as Agha Noor, KIBO and Bulbul to designer shows by Fahad Hussayn, The House of Kamiar Rokni, Nomi Ansari and Zainab Chottani. HSY closed the week on 3 February at Expo Centre Lahore with Musafir, a collection about journeys and Pakistan’s regional heritage. Thirty-three models walked, among them Mushk Kaleem, according to the organiser’s own list.

The organiser said the livestream reached viewers in more than 120 countries and 7,800 cities, and later put livestream views above 10 million; neither figure has been independently verified. Dawn Images called Mo by Mohsin Tawasuli the strongest collection of the week and asked for tighter show management, and for no shows on religious nights such as the 15th of Shaban, in a second season.