Sri Lanka's bold and beautiful expats zoom in on Colombo for week of high fashion

Radhika Perera-Hernandez one of the headliners at the Colombo Fashion Week. (Pic courtesy: www.hi.lk)

COLOMBO: Colombo will host a high-profile fashion show and give the city its own Fashion Week, with various Lankans already big names in fashion from across the world on hand to showcase their talent.

The Colombo Fashion Week is now in its 10th year and will run from April 3-5, featuring designers from eight countries including Sri Lanka’s own Radhika Hernandez and Spain’s Agatha Ruiz de La Prada.

Also featuring will be fashion icon Bibi Russell spoken about as one of world’s 10 women who changed the face of fashion will be the main showcase  at the HSBC Colombo Fashion Week 2013 in April.

Fashion icon Bibi Russel  will also showcase her creations. (Supplied)

Here’s a look at the main stars.

Radhika Perera-Hernandez: Born in the United Kingdom to Sri Lankan parents, Radhika is the youngest of three siblings. Living in the UK with her family and grandmother who she was particularly close to Radhika excelled in Art and English and loved everything creative, including drama and music. Radhika counts playing with clay and drawing as her early childhood hobbies. Hernandez began buying Indian fabrics and mixing them with vintage finds.

Soon she began creating a fusion of British elegance, vintage sensibility and a touch of Eastern panache. Her natural talent for reconstructing vintage, led to the creation of Lois Lane Vintage, a website which fused her skills in sewing, photography and styling. Working with vintage re-construction, she gained a real understanding of pattern making and how to transform a women's body type through fit, structure and draping.

Moving to New York in her mid 20s, she worked in fashion for a number of years before beginning her own line of vintage inspired luxery kaftans and swimwear.

Bibi Russell: A very graceful, humble and modest Bibi has gained endless awards, respect and recognition for her achievements. Her creative talent and her social work have led various awards to the fashion designer, such as the ‘Freedom Award’ and the United Nations Peace Prize not long ago.

Her extraordinary passion and belief that fashion can be used for social good and for a positive movement has been touched by people around the world. Returning year after year, amidst a busy schedule that puts her at all points of the globe Bibi still finds time to come display the work that began as a dream to represent the vivid colours of Bangladesh, a recognition of heritage that they fully deserve and giving the crafts people the golden opportunity to enhance their considerable skills to achieve economic survival.

Bibi Russell entered the world of fashion at 18 as the first Bangladeshi to be selected to attend the London College of Fashion, and in 1976 at her graduation show Bibi was head hunted to begin her career as a renowned international supermodel that was the face of Vogue, Cosmopolitan, Marie Claire and many other shows and advertising campaigns for almost two decades since then.

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