Taiwan is becoming the newest go-to place for emerging design talent. 

At the recent Taipei in Style (Oct 4-6), both young designers and established brands presented collections that were both innovative and had good market potential.

The event included the annual Fashion Design Awards that showcased the work of some of the nation's upcoming designers.  We were pleasantly surprised by the maturity of the design talent. Most recognized the need to balance creativity with commercial viability.

Taiwanese designers present collections with smart casual through to sporty themes.  Most collections feature clean lines, yet with enough detail to be interesting.  Color palettes pulled from nature, with pops of sharp colors as accents.  This is exactly what consumers want - a look that is natural, but also fashionable.

Fabric choices reflected Taiwan's strength as a producer of sophisticated, high end fabrics - both for performance/function, as well as interesting fashion fabrics.