MariaB's owner Afia Mansoor's blog

Maria B. the woman is a fine confluence of art and enterprise. Her fashion house by the same name is the only one in Pakistan that has a standardized sizing system, comes up with 5 new collections each year, exports 3 product lines, does textiles and couture bridals under one roof, markets 5 different product lines and is headed by Maria; a trained designer.

The enterprising woman knew what she wanted since the beginning. In 1994, she was offered a place at the prestigious St. Martin School of Fashion in London but chose to be at the Pakistan School of Fashion Design where she went on to top for four consecutive years. The staunch patriot defends her decision back then saying, “I wanted to stay in my country and be close to the people and fabrics I was to work with later. The PSFD was also syndicated with the La Chambre Syndicale in France which is the best fashion school in the world, so I didn’t need to go elsewhere.”

Her brilliance manifested while she was still in school. As a third year student in 1997, Maria represented Pakistan along with some of her batch mates at the prestigious ‘Les Etoiles de la mode’ – World Young Designers Award held in Belgium. Competing against 22 countries, Maria finished among the top three in the final world rankings. The five outfits she showed there were according to her a ‘symbolic representation of Pakistan’s evolution over the last few centuries’. One of the jurists who had worked with Versace had commented that ‘her portfolio was the best he had seen in years.’ The dye of her success was cast then, perhaps.

Back then Maria’s vision was ‘to become Pakistan’s first International brand in fashion’ and she had to start out in a country where her field of specialization was nascent. Her unique selling proposition and her individual philosophy has been in her words, ‘to provide high fashion with affordability’. According to her, “10 years ago fashion in Pakistan was in its infancy. I was the first graduate from a fashion school and my vision was to develop the ready-to-wear market. I wanted to make fashion accessible to women and not be a garage studio aunty designer making bridals. I graduated with honors from college and decided to make a difference. I went for daring cuts, international silhouettes and incorporated the latest trends into our traditional clothes. It was instant success mashaAllah. I became so confident that I opened my second shop in Karachi and that became a better commercial success than my first shop in Lahore. The key was to educate the clientele in Pakistan and it was not easy back then. There was no media exposure and no FTV. The biggest hurdle was to train women to look beyond embellishments and focus on trends and cuts that suited them. One success led to another and today Maria B. is the largest retailer of women’s designer wear in Pakistan.”

Her success is phenomenal from a business point of view. What started out ten years ago as a shop in Lahore with 10 employees is now a million dollar company; the only Pakistani designer label to have reached out to the maximum number of women through its diverse product range, affordable pricing and distribution across 4 cities in Pakistan with more outlets in the pipeline.