Steel Blue launches stylish work wear for women

Saturday, 22 October 2011 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

The collection is aimed at the modern Sri Lankan female executive who aspires for sophisticated, contemporary and fitting clothing. The much anticipated collection includes formal wear, and smart casual wear with a key focus on shirts.

At the launch, Steel Blue Founders Shabina Mahuroof and Jeeshan Mirza stated: “Steel Blue now offers very stylish work wear for fashion forward women. Everything you find here is something different and has that wow factor. We can also proudly say that Steel Blue has the largest collection of women’s shirts in Sri Lanka.”

Having launched in April 2011, Steel Blue has already acquired a reputation in the menswear market with its innovative designs, fits and colours.

The brands move to the women’s work wear segment was initiated by repeated requests from female customers who admired the flair and the verve in their men’s shirts, they said.

Shabina Mahuroof explained the foray in the women’s market, “The Sri Lankan women’s work wear market is very fragmented with very few retailers focusing on it. You will only find bits and pieces here and there. And even in these stores you will rarely find more than a dozen types of shirts or something that is uncommon and stands out. From the time we started Steel Blue our female customers have been asking us to start a work wear line. Now they have a place which specialises in women’s work wear particularly shirts.”

Steel Blue offers women’s shirts in a variety of colours, fabric patterns and designs available in long, short and quarter sleeve. These shirts come in regular fit, slim fit and have numerous style variations in neckline, collar, cuff, and placket to name a few.

As with the men’s shirts, Steel Blue uses a multitude of non-traditional designs such as extensive use of contrast and artistic stitching to give each and every shirt a different look. Every shirt comes in limited edition to give exclusivity to the customer.

Besides shirts, Steel Blue also offers a variety of woven blouses, shirt dresses, pants, skirts and waistcoats. A clearly noticeable factor in all these clothing items is the quality and the level of workmanship.

Jeeshan Mirza stressed, “We give a lot of emphasis to quality. Our attention to the finer details ensures everything is stitched perfectly to give an impeccable look and finish. We also use exclusive imported fabric for all our clothing. For example for our pants and skirts we are using cashmere, micro-lite and extra fine wool-I don’t think you will find any clothing in Sri Lanka using such premium fabric.”

Besides formal wear, Steel Blue has also tried to introduce the concept of smart casual wear.

Shabina and Jeeshan explained, “For those who don’t prefer dressing too formally we have some smart casual lines. For instance we have introduced roll up, double pocket shirts which can be combined with our clean jeans, chino pants, Capri pants or even casual skirts. These are ideal for Friday dressing or for offices which permit a more relaxed dress code.”

Steel Blue plans to introduce new categories in future such as suits, dresses and accessories to provide a complete work wear range for its female customers.

The company also continues to introduce innovative clothing in the men’s category with new designs almost every week. Steel Blue plans to expand to more stores in the coming months to reach a wider customer base.