Back stage at Fashion Week

Petite and fashion forward Garg knows her Sabyasachi from Issey Miyake. She is the go-between the model and the coordinator. Her days are spent tagging shoes,organising jewellery and fetishising over zips. “Zips are important. Once a model’s zip broke just before the show. Naturally,she didn’t get her turn,” she says. Her ultimate dream? “I’d like to be in front of the camera just once,” she says.

The Illuminati Bhiku Chaudry,45,electrician

Chaudry can make you glow. He’s got the electrical touch — that lights the runaway. Chaudry can’t just take control,it’s the designers little minions who sit next to him,whispering blue,amber,green. With 20 years of experience with lights one fashion show left Chaudry agog. A model’s outfit unraveled,she stood exposing all and Chaudry had to turn the lights off.

Mr Dimensions Pawan Kohli,stall designer

Associated with the fashion week since 2006,his brief is to design stalls with uniformity. “According to the organisers,all designers are alike. So all stalls look similar. They are all of the same size,three metre by three metre,though most top-notch designers combine two or three stalls,for a bigger space,” says Kohli. This year,he has set up 182 stalls.

Project Runway Mahesh Sharma,set designer

He is on the speed dial of designers Sabyasachi and Namrata Joshipura,whose sets he designs. A graduate from NIFT,he has been in the business for 10 years. “I always design the set for Sabyasachi,” grins Sharma. This year,he is also designing sets for all the sponsored shows.

Green Your Scene Anuj Sharma,37,installation designer

Faculty at the National Institute of Design,Ahmedabad,and one of the industry’s bright lights,he is more art and textile than fashion. He has created sustainable furniture for fashion week lounges made of tin boxes,utensils and plumbing pipes.