This year's theme is "The Monarchy of Fashion in Moscow," and visitors can see the whole gamut of local designers from veterans such as Valentin Yudashkin and Igor Chapurin, who will open and close the week, to up-and-coming designers like Max Chernitsov and Antonina Shapovalova, who has designed pro-Putin bikinis for the Kremlin-backed youth group Nashi.

There was no word on who was queen, king or even a simple baron, 227th in line to the throne, in this Moscow fashion monarchy. Among the other Russian designers on display are Alexander Terekhov -- who trained under Yves Saint Laurent and has had shows in New York -- Alexander Arngoldt, Elena Teplitskaya and Sergey Sysoyev.


Alexander Natrushkin / Reuters