The 33rd Bangkok International Fashion and Leather Fair, which took place in extremely hot temperatures at Bangkok’s Muang Thong Thani exhibition centre from 11 to 15 March 2015, featured around 700 national and international (predominantly Asian) exhibitors. Organised by the Department of International Trade Promotion (DITP) within the Ministry of Commerce, the exhibition concept focused on “Catching the Creative Spirit” emanating from the ASEAN region. As a rule, Biff &Bil predominantly attracts trade buyers from the nearby countries of Japan, China and Singapore, but also the USA, South Korea, South America and South Africa.

However, it is currently struggling to engage the interest of European visitors. This can perhaps be explained by rising wage costs and the weak Euro (at the current exchange rate, the Euro is worth just 35 Baht). The devastating floods at the end of 2011, which consumed many factories, and the political unrest at the beginning of last year may also have had a role to play. Their absence certainly had nothing to do with the creativity of the exhibitors, which can be described as frequently inspirational and refreshingly different. The attractively presented fashion shows and the various trend areas bore witness to the wealth of creativity this country has to offer. The spectrum of products extended from fabrics, trimmings and machine technology to clothing, leather goods, jewellery and scarves. A glance at the TIFF furniture fair, which was staged concurrently in the second exhibition hall, provided visitors with an additional and interesting insight into Thai craftsmanship. Read more online on textile-network.com. Our exhaustive report on Thailand’s textile and apparel industry, the Biff &Bil trade fair and the companies we visited in Bangkok in our next printed edition.

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