Indias budding fashionistas finally have a place to share wardrobe secrets and favourite looks Don't log on to Facebook and Twitter to check young Indias fashion pulse. Style mavens these days get their trends and fashion fixes on StylePile,a fashion networking website. Not only do they post pictures of themselves in their favourite looks and comment on other members posts but also enter contests every month and win gift vouchers of brands like French Connection,Lady Bug and Remanika. Though there are other such online fashion communities like lookbook.com and chictopia.com,StylePile is being touted as Indias first such venture. Officially started in May 2010 by Delhi-based couple Noopur Chaudhary and Anant Chaudhary,the website has garnered a lot of curiosity over these months. I am obsessed with fashion and Anant is a technology freak. So this website seemed like a great idea. We expected two kinds of people to log in the expressers and the explorers, says Noopur,who is currently in USA. Thats exactly what has happened. The website has over 7,500 members. With military jackets,high-waisted shorts,flowy floral dresses,studded shoes and neon nail colours in vogue on the site,the site is gaining quite a fan following on social networking websites. While some members are fashion bloggers,budding designers and stylists,others are just fashion enthusiasts and express their passion through this website. I want to be a designer and very soon I will be posting pictures of my creations on my blog so that people can order clothes through this site, says 19-year-old Delhi student Yanam Wagahe. She takes pride in the fact that she won StylePiles style icon contest in August and Short & Sweet contest in the following month. Both the wins got her gift vouchers from Lady Bug. The website features regular people like you and me. As an insider,I feel that Bollywood style is aspirational,not realistic. Sites like these make us aware of the amazing street style around us, says 24-year-old freelance stylist,Nidhi Jacob. She adds that even though internationally known fashion communities like Lookbook are more popular,their members are too widely scattered across the world to be able to really relate to one another. Members have found other uses for the website too. Mumbai-based duo Jasleen Kaur and Sonu Bohra of the fashion brand Jsos find the site useful for popularising their brand. Because we can post our blog on StylePile,a number of people check it out and we get more hits. We also post a number of pictures of the accessories we have designed for our brand, explains Bohra,who believes that the site is a great networking site for like-minded fashionistas. However,with the popularity of the website,privacy issues may become a major concern in the near future. Everyones profile and pictures are easily accessible. They can be copied and probably misused. While other social networking websites like Facebook and Orkut have added a whole lot of privacy settings,StylePile needs to buck up. There is also a dearth of men on this site. Mens fashion is as intriguing as womens and it will be a pleasure to see some stylish boys raising temperature levels online.
