Antwerp is now a major trendsetter in the European world of fashion and the list of internationally celebrated designers from Antwerp is growing all the time.
The driving force behind the Antwerp fashion scene is its Royal Academy of Fine Arts fashion department.
After Antwerp fashion designers had scored a number of successses in the national Gouden Speol (Golden Spool) competition, the Antwerp fashion world really took off in march 1988. That was the year six young designers, namely Dirk Bikkembergs, Ann Demeulemeester, Walter van Beirendonck, Dries Van Noten, Dirk van Saene and Marina Yee took part in the British Designer Show in London. To everyone's surprise, they were the indisputable revelation of this international fashion trade fair and they soon became known as the 'Antwerp Six'. And they created a furore.
Their successors from the Antwerp Academy are also doing extremely well. Raf Simons, Anna Heylen, Sarah Corynen, Stephan Schneider, Kristof de Muynck, Veronique Branquinho to name but a few, are since long familiar names on the international catwalks.
Moreover, the young, up-andcoming designers choose Antwerp as the fashion capital of Belgium and most of them have their atelier, showroom and shop here.
Designers with a collection under their own name are: Ann Demeulemeester, Martin Margiela, Dries Van Noten, Dirk Bikkembergs, Walter van Beirendonck, Dirk van Saene, Kaat Tilley, Eva Lacres, Jan Welvaert and many others.
The annual fashion show organised by the Antwerp Academy is a veritable feast of fashion that brings together something like 6.000 spectators from Belgium, France, Great Britain, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, the USA and Japan, who are looking not only to judge and admire the students' collections but also to savour the unique atmosphere of this great event.
It is held in the Oude Beurs in the Twaalfmaandenstraat, the world's first commodity exchange, where trade has been conducted since the Middle Ages. Once a year, the building is filled with friends, fashion enthusiasts, producers, former students, fashion designers, fashion agencies and, of course, the press. Their interest and appreciation are the reward for the years of sustained effort on the part of the students and their teachers.
The planned Flanders Fashion Institute is bound to further enhance the name and fame of Antwerp as a fashion city.
The number of new fashion shops in Antwerp continues to grow and the exciting range of boutiques makes for pleasurable shopping and window-shopping.