In a recent interview with Flare Magazine, Business of Fashion founder Imran Amed gave some advice for emerging Canadian designers who are seeking an international audience. Imran, aCanadian expatriat (and McGill graduate) based in London, has established himself as a leading voice in the global fashion community in a few short years by venturing into blogging, fashion business and social media.

Since the international fashion markets are outside Canada, it makes sense that Canadians would seek out those markets to pursue their careers and dreams, just as they might go to Hollywood to pursue a film career, Wall Street to pursue finance or Silicon Valley to pursue technology. Thinking about fashion within a Canadian geographical context only is a mistake. The best thing Canada can do for budding fashion designers is to provide a platform for them to develop and test out their interest in fashion, educate them on both the business and creative sides of the industry and ensure that they have the confidence and global outlook to work in what is a competitive, global business.

While there may be an occasional article about an expat making it big outside of Montreal in our dailies, I believe the city is a little too focused on the local talent and not looking towards the homegrown designers who are making a name for themselves outside of Canada. Not that the designers aren’t trying. There have been recent efforts in reaching out to a broader audience by collaborating a cheaper line with fast fashion chains like Bedo and Simons with limited success.

L-R: Rad by Rad Hourani, Mackage RTW

The best known expats from Montreal today are stylist-turned-designer Rad Hourani, and outwear company Mackage, both whom regularly show at New York Fashion Week (Hourani also shows his main collection in Paris).

But across the Atlantic, something has been brimming and stirring in the capital of fashion incubators. London is headquarters to world reknown fashion schools such as Central St. Martins and Royal College of Art. Their graduates are often on the must-watch list, the cream of the crop come here to refine their skills from womenswear to accessories. The popularity of these schools have attracted the likes of a new generation of Montreal-native designers such as Thomas Tait, Jean Pierre Braganza and Erdem, all of which have made a significant splash in the London fashion scene with their bold creations in recent seasons.

Eventhough Montreal’s LaSalle College and Cégep Marie Victorin are not on the same level as New York’s Parsons or London’s Central St. Martins, they are sometimes part of a crucial step for these burgeoning designers. These small Canadian fashion schools are limited in resources, so it’s important for locals to support these future expats with their dreams of forging a successful path in fashion.

While it is commending for local designers to show only at local venues, there are times when it feels like our designers deserve a broader platform to showcase their work. Andy The-Anh used to show at Montreal Fashion Week, but with his desire to appeal to the Canadian woman and not just the Quebec woman, he has sauntered off to show at Toronto’s LG Fashion Week for the past couple of years. The same can be said for Renata Morales and Nadya Toto, though on occasions they do come back to their native town to show their work.

It is not enough to simply look into our own city for talent, we must expand our horizons, cheer on our homegrown talents when they are abroad, and spread their presence through the local media and social networks.

London Fashion Week has kicked off just Friday, and you can see the latest collection from Jean Pierre Braganza already up on their website. Be also on the lookout for other Canadian designers such as Mark Fast and Todd Lynn in the upcoming days.

The Spring edition contains the usual suspects – Marie Saint Pierre, Denis Gagnon, Christian Chenail, etc – and a handful of newcomers to the show: Claude Bouchard, Dimitri Chris, Micalla,  and Annie 50.

The highly successful Le Showroom, a sort of trunk show, will be showcasing other local designers’ collections since many are not choosing to run on the catwalk. Curiously, the CIMM is MIA in this edition, where usually the more commercial designers like Simon Chang would showcase the more wearable collections to the public. I would’ve thought they had finally made some sort of business connection with MFW, but I guess that has dissolved?

One has to wonder though how the recession has affected local Canadian fashion industries. More and more companies are outsourcing their workload to Asia, with a very select few companies who still produce in Canada (to my knowledge Tristan and Le Chateau are still hanging in there). The sole and only press conference that could possibly address this issue will be on Tuesday, Oct 15th, the inaugural opening day of Montreal Fashion Week SS10, but I’m afraid it’s nothing more talking fluff to reassure designers.

I do certainly believe that a fashion conference in Montreal is severely lacking in addressing these important business issues. And perhaps it would be to the local designers’ benefit if the industry would stop trying to brush it off by replacing it with more talks about pushing creativity, which frankly is not necessary. Think of all the past talents that have appeared and disappeared under the radar: Yso, Renata Morales, Rush Couture, Nadya Toto, Marisa Minicucci, Philippe Dubuc, and for a time Denis Gagnon. Top tier talents like Dubuc and Minicucci are struggling to keep afloat, or in Minicucci’s case, have to rethink their business strategy altogether. Montreal also has to contend with Toronto, which often has some of our best talents migrating to show such as Rudsak, Andy, Aqua di Lara, Travis Taddeo, and Morales, and our cream of the crops are showcasing in Paris or New York, like Rad Hourani and Mackage. It seems that Montreal is too small for designers who are aiming higher.

If Montreal is supposed to be so axed on promoting local talent and encouraging to buy local, they will certainly need to rethink their strategies to influence shoppers. Because the fast fashion giants down on Ste-Catherine are eating up the local industry’s sales with cheap “chic” like Forever 21, H&M, and Zara. While the talents of the likes of CIMM is totally capable of wowing us with commercial and sometimes innovative garments, yet they are nowhere to be found this season.

Like I’ve said before, Montreal has great potential as a fashion hub, but lacks the direction and support it needs to establish itself as true player among fashion capitals.

Image credits: Jimmy Hamelin, Montreal Fashion Week

This goes the same for the beautiful buttons who are unraveling before my eyes at lightning pace.

Is it too much to ask to have properly sewn buttons? How many more dollars can you save on having poorly sewn buttons, because I would like to know. How many more dollars do we need to spend to have buttons that will stay on forever with high quality threads? $100? $200?

Do I really have to reach for $1000+ coats just to get a button fix?

Next time you’re looking for a coat with buttons, pull on them. If you’re too afraid of testing them on the spot, then you know your confidence on those buttons isn’t very high, nor would it be worth your money to spend no matter how nice they are. Unless you don’t mind sewing the buttons back on once in a while.

Image credit: Mackage Isa wool coat