SFK Bridals accuses Republic Menswear of plagiarism
Fashion insiders know that designers often talk about their work being plagiarised.
They will vent about it at the fashion week after-party, rant about it off-the-record with the press and, when thoroughly incensed, take to Twitter or Instagram, talking about how brands are unabashedly copying their work.
They usually do not, however, name the errant brand that has been copying them rampantly. Often, in fashion’s claustrophobic, clustered world, naming names leads to being ousted from a certain ‘it’ fashion circle or getting one’s name scratched off the guest lists of certain exclusive parties. On the rare occasion that a brand actually decides to name names and make official statements against their work being copied, it sends shockwaves running through the industry.
This is precisely what happened when, over the past weekend, SFK Bridals, a relatively young brand, alleged that the quite established menswear label, Republic by Omar Farooq, had replicated a design of theirs. As proof, SFK Bridals put up a post on their official Instagram page, of their own sherwani design, worn by the brand’s ambassador, actor Fawad Khan (who is also the designer and owner Sadaf Fawad Khan’s husband) in a shoot from June 2018, and a similar version of it that was posted recently on the Republic Menswear Facebook page.
The caption posted with the image pointedly condemned what they said was a ‘blatant replication’.