In my new life at my old country, I am actually doing what I love as a fashion journalist for the israeli web-site Fashion Forward.

In the occasion of the new (jewish) year, we have asked 13 fashionistas to give us a list of their Top 10 local fashion designers. The winner of our holiday rank is Anya Fleet, a young graduate from Shenkar  (Israel’s most prestigious  school for fashion design). My interview with Anya was published in hebrew this week. I tried translating parts of it to post on issues but it doesn’t really make sense so i’ll just tell you about our encounter.

I’ve seen Anya’s work in a fashion fair just a few weeks before the rank. The high quality of her finish impressed me. Sadly, the israeli market suffers from lack of standards when it comes to fabrication. The reasons for that are mainly economic but also social, i’ll explain it all in a different post, I hope, once I get to the bottom of the issue. Anyway, Anya’s work is not a part of the problem.

She produces women’s ready-to-wear, jewelry and couture (evening and bridal)in small quantities in her studio. Her line is pretty somber, mostly black, and yet romantic with lace touches and applicated beads.

“A designer can not be a mass-production fashion chain and shouldn’t try to compete against it”, says Anya, “The two should complement one another. The market is saturated with everything, everybody have enough clothes and no one come to my studio because they need pants. So I try to do something more, something exciting, for self-expression. The people who buy my work do it in order to indulge themselves”.

In her current winter collection Anya took the idea to the next level, “I thought of the garments as if they were jewelry”. She calls it Unique Ready-to-Wear, “you don’t have to be nuts to wear with my stuff but every item has a statement”.

Photos by Michael Topyol for Fashion Forward