Surat is a small city with a big story. It is an old city that has been continually reinventing itself and is uniquely connected to the outside world. It’s perhaps no surprise, therefore, that a Giorgio Armani yarn about the Italian fashion guru’s obsessive practice of approving every last detail to do with his brand, springs up over chai at an export trader’s office.
Shree Vallabh International, three flights up a paan-stained staircase in a textile market where lifts overflow with synthetic textile yardage, isn’t the place you would normally expect chatter about Armani.
The reason Vishal Arora, chief fabric sourcing head of Triburg, a Gurgaon-based textile export firm, is privy to anecdotes that usually come up at fashion weeks is because he has sourced mill-made fabrics for Armani ready-to-wear lines for several years. “Triburg also sources for American brands such as Kenneth Cole, Nordstrom, Calvin Klein and American Eagle Outfitters from Surat,” says Arora, on a business trip to Vallabh International, one of the top 5% companies of Surat where “fashion fabrics” are created for the export market. Ninety-five per cent of the mills sell to the domestic market, the remaining 5% cater to exports.
