Saris, Sherwanis, and Streetwear

Each September, New York becomes a theatre of style. The avenues fill with street photographers, editors crisscross Manhattan in black SUVs, and garment bags swing like pendulums on subway poles. With over 60 shows on the official CFDA calendar (September 11-16), Fashion Week is less an event than a ritual.

Michael Kors opens with his American Collections, Altuzarra and Jason Wu bring sleek city drama, and Luar reclaims Harlem cool for the runway. For six days, the world doesn’t just watch clothes, it watches culture, as trends transform into the language of the season ahead.

Within that symphony, South Asia continues to add its own notes of craft and color through established designers who have made NYFW their creative home. Prabal Gurung bridges his Kathmandu roots with New York tailoring, while Naeem Khan brings decades of eveningwear mastery in sequins and embroidery. Bibhu Mohapatra has consistently showcased sculptural silhouettes that honor sari drapes and chikankari craft on global runways.

This season also sees the continued growth of dedicated platforms like South Asian Fashion Week, which creates space for emerging voices alongside these established names, ensuring South Asian design perspectives are woven throughout Fashion Week's broader narrative.

Fashion in New York is lived as much on sidewalks as on runways. This year, the Punjabi jutti is the accessory to spot. Minimalist whites, boho tassels, metallic bronzes, styled with jeans in SoHo and skirts in Midtown. Jewelry and star power push the story further: Rihanna in Sabyasachi’s Constantinople necklace, Beyoncé in Gaurav Gupta couture, moments that mark South Asian design as everyday global glamour.

Expect lehengas reimagined as gowns, ajrak prints as bomber jackets, and sari folds as architectural skirts. Expect turmeric, sindoor, and neon streaking through the city like brushstrokes of celebration. And expect sustainability. RP New York’s handwoven fabrics, Archanna Kochhar’s Ahimsa silk, reminding us that heritage and future belong on the same runway.

New York Fashion Week has always been a mosaic. Parisian trenches beside Japanese streetwear, Milanese tailoring beside Latin American prints. In 2025, South Asia doesn’t “arrive”; it moves in rhythm, celebrated alongside the world’s great fashion capitals. The city that thrives on reinvention has embraced heritage as innovation, and this season, the runway becomes a global festival of belonging.

✨ The chai is poured, the lights are up, this September, New York celebrates not difference, but delight.

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