Organisers of Norwich Fashion Week have been boosted by the support of the new Norwich Business Improvement District to help increase the city's reputation as a leading retail destination.
Running from March 7 to 15, the event will also be followed up with the Norwich Fashion Wrap Weekend on March 16 and 17 with even more fashion and fun also aimed at boosting footfall for city centre businesses.
The week is dedicated to showcasing everything from next-season's trends, designers of the future, inspirational style and the must-have buys – all of which can be found nestled in and around the city of Norwich.
Peter Mitchell, BID chairman and managing director of Jarrold, said the event provided a welcome boost to the vitality of the city centre.
'I have been a big supporter since the idea for Norwich Fashion Week (NFW) was first brought to life by a small group of hard-working enthusiasts,' he said. 'For me it's a great way for Norwich to put on show its fantastic and unique fashion retail offer, its very talented students of fashion and design and its locally-based professional designers.
'It gives students a great opportunity to get involved in a major event and to work alongside the companies and the professionals who make their living in fashion, design and beauty. This is most obviously through involvement in the production of fashion shows but it might also be visual merchandising in store windows or website design.
'For Norwich City Centre's wider business community, as it has grown in ambition and scale over the last few years, we see it attracting more and more people to the city centre to take part in the fashion shows and other events.
'Norwich Business Improvement District wants to maximise the potential for that wider business impact and so has provided funding since the Autumn for NFW's first paid position, a part-time coordinator who has worked with the NFW Board to enlarge the NFW programme for March 2013. My view is that there is a really exciting potential to take NFW to greater and greater fashion platform.'
Emma Harrowing, chairman of Norwich Fashion Week said: 'Norwich Fashion Week 2013 will be the biggest week of fashion to date for Norwich with five catwalk shows, styling and shopping events, pop up fashion shows and exhibitions.
'Thanks to the support of the BID we have been able to expand on the week's activities by coordinating the Norwich Fashion Wrap Weekend which takes place on the weekend following fashion week and gives local designers and retailers the chance to further promote their business and increase sales.
'Norwich Fashion Week is also working with the Latitude Festival on the new Fashion Mash Up show which marks the finale of Norwich Fashion Week. This partnership has enabled us to raise awareness of Norwich Fashion Week outside of Norwich, encouraging people from outside the city to come to Norwich and see why Norwich deserves to be in the top ten fashion and shopping destinations in the UK.'
Interested in getting involved in Norwich Fashion Week? Contact Clare Millar, NFW Coordinator on 07908 730188, email clare@whoopmarketing.com.
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