The situation was even more miserable during the show at the Ray club. First, there was a terrible queue outside the club, then a crush to get into the main hall and after that a fight to find somewhere where you could view the catwalk. I nearly fainted on the third floor as the ventilation system could not cope with the numbers of fashionistas.

Still, the show was great; I can't complain about it. But I think it was more pleasant for those who booked tables and paid several thousands of rubles... By the same token, parking seemed to be an invitation-only affair: drivers had to pay 2,000 rubles to leave their cars! To offset all these nice surprises, wonderful coffee was free of charge, and of course there was the satisfaction from the exciting shows. In all, a typically Russian feature: bad organization, but amazing artistic output.

The conferences held over Fashion Week pointed out some interesting features of the local look, chiefly that there are no trend-setters in Moscow. This occurrence is common for the West, but not for Russia. Though fashion lives in this country and Moscow has already gained importance as a world fashion capital, Russians depend on the West for setting trends.

At one of the fashion shows I met a colleague who conveyed this discomforting message - the influence of money in the fashion world is a well-known fact, but I had at least some lingering hope that it might be untrue until I heard that one of the participating designers' shows was "prepared" in advance by his well-heeled relatives. That is how the world of fashion works - at least to some degree.

Unfortunately, I haven't had an opportunity to attend fashion shows abroad, but I don't expect things to be similar there, taking into account what my friends have told me. Fashion in Russia seems to be similar to politics - Cinderella stories rarely come true by chance. And in general, I may conclude that it is worth attending fashion shows only if you can stomach all the little aggravations. But if you can't, you could do worse by looking through countless reports and photo reviews on the Web. You will, of course, never feel the soul of the show, of the hard work of those behind the catwalk: organizers, designers and models.