Think of a designer; anyone – yalla.......…..who did you come up with? Valentino, Giorgio Armani, Elie Saab, Tom Ford, Jean Paul Gaultier, the legendary Yves Saint Laurent..? The list is pretty endless no? Now think of a female designer of the same calibre………………............. not that easy huh?

Donatella Versace and Stella McCartney are the first two that come to my mind. I think a bit harder and come up with Zandra Rhodes, Gharani Strok, Amanda Wakeley, Vera Wang, Temperley, Colette Dinnigan but even Donatella was underground and only came into the spotlight once her famous; now infamous brother Gianni was murdered. Gharani Strok are now in administration, Zandra Rhodes reaches only the perimeters of the UK before disappearing and to be honest, I would not class the others even near the same category as Christian Lacroix, Karl Lagerfeld and the genius that is Jean Paul Gaultier. Where are the women in Haute Couture? The Elie Saabs, Georges Chakras, Zuhair Murads, Rabih Kayrouzs and Basil Sodas of the world. Milia M IS cool, Aisha Ramadan is making her way fast but the biggest piece of the cake in the couture world is had by the men.

Why is that? Interesting to think about. Rasha and I were debating. Do men perhaps appreciate the female form and understand its subtleties better? Is it that we just live in a biased world and are seeing remnants of days gone by when young boys had to play the part of women? Or could it be that stereotypically speaking, men in fashion are just more ‘in tune’ with their feminine side and subconsciously are more aware of what a woman wants to feel like when adorning such creations? Over to you ladies..why cant we catch up with our counterparts or are we more suited to strutting our stuff down the runway?