Some entertainment for the weekend: Hel Looks is a gallery of Helsinki street fashion, showing off the uniqueness of Finnish style.

The project is by Liisa Jokinen and Sampo Karjalainen and shows photos of ordinary people encountered on the streets of Helsinki. In a short interview the subjects share their inspiration and favourite sources of clothes, which range from famous designers to mum’s wardrobe!

More posts about the Baltic / Scandinavian region:
Norwegian design inspiration with Hei Astrid
Life in Sweden with Fine Little Day
Estonian cooking at Nami Nami

The Indian fashion industry is growing in importance as Indian designers are becoming more experimental, mixing traditional Indian clothing styles and beautiful fabrics with Western fashion influences.

In Stepping Out the Economist comments that although Indian designers are starting to attract the attention of foreign buyers, the enormous home market cannot be ignored.

Tags: global fashion, India,

Rageh inside Iran: Rageh Omaar, a Somalian born former BBC reporter visited Iran over the summer of 2006. While there he filmed this fascinating documentary about what life is really like for the Iranian people of Tehran, whom he describes as “dynamic, energetic and warm”.

This trailer gives an idea of the content if you are short of time. The full length version of the programme lasts for 90 minutes and is unfortunately only available in installments. (there is a full version available on Google Video but the picture quality is quite bad) If you have the patience to load them all it is well worth the watch!

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10

Link is courtesy of Mr Behi’s Iranian blog. As an Iranian himself he knows what he is talking about when he describes this as “a truly fair report” of his complex country.

Rageh Omaar writes here about his quest to follow the lives of ordinary Iranians.

http://www.thy.com/en-INT/corporate/skylife/article.aspx?mkl=265

Flat-heeled ‘yemeni’ slippers and colorful ‘kutnu’ fabrics are a dying art nowadays, victims of our changing consumer habits. The magazine Skylife of Turkish Airlines tells us all about it.