“Fashion is a people business, a physical business,” says Marcus Kurz, head of the event agency Nowadays. “In the future, it will be even more important to focus on emotionality and real connection,” adds Mandie Bienek, who runs the PR firm Press Factory. In this interview, the two founding members of Fashion Council Germany describe why it was important to the organization from the very beginning to provide stages not only for its members, but for German designers in general.

Mandie Bienek, Marcus Kurz – making not only its members, but German designers in general visible and tangible — that was a declared goal of Fashion Council Germany from the very beginning. So have considerations about the Berlin Fashion Week as a central stage for German fashion design already played a role when the Council was founded?

Marcus Kurz: When we founded the Council, Berlin Fashion Week had already existed for almost ten years. It started with the Bread & Butter and Premium trade fairs, then came Michael Michalsky’s first show at Rotes Rathaus, and eventually the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week, which began in 2007. So there was already a lot happening — something that had been created out of nothing by visionary people and had become quite serious for the European market, a real momentum. At the time of the Council’s founding, however, some of the big players who had been essential to the Fashion Week had either disappeared or moved on to other international formats. At the same time, Christiane Arp had started to focus on supporting emerging talents through her Vogue Salon. So the idea that there was much more to German fashion than just the big brands — and that this deserved to be nurtured — had already begun to take shape. Fashion Council Germany was founded within precisely this constellation.

Mandie Bienek: We were also very aware that, despite the peak Marcus just described, the Fashion Week in its form at that time perhaps didn’t fit Berlin very well. It felt as if an international concept that worked wonderfully elsewhere had simply been imposed on Berlin. The city lacked a clear USP in that sense — the fashion relevance on the runways was missing, the Fashion Week was much more about the social scene, who was sitting in the front row, and so on. Around that time, many great young labels like Perret Schaad or Mongrels in Common disappeared also — designers who could have strengthened that relevance. So, among many other things, our early discussions about founding a Council also revolved around how the Fashion Week could be developed or reoriented — that it should become a stage for these young talents, but that there should also be many other strong platforms for them. Soon after our founding, we were already in Paris for the first time with a group of designers, presenting them there as part of Der Berliner Salon.

So, back then, your main focus indeed was on making German design more visible?

Mandie Bienek: Yes — from the start, it was a core mission of the Council to offer platforms both to our members and to other talented designers. But always under the premise of supporting them year-round, not just pushing them toward a fashion show and then letting them fall afterward. What designers need most definitely isn’t to overstretch themselves financially for a show without having a solid economic foundation. It was clear to us that there needed to be an overarching institution that could provide guidance and support. That’s not something a trade fair organizer, a sponsor, or a single agency can do. It requires an entity that can connect all these players and the designers themselves.

I remember conversations from that time where Council representatives were very clear: “We are not the organizers of the Fashion Week — and we don’t want to be, at least not yet.”

Marcus Kurz: That’s true — it wasn’t the right moment then to get more directly involved. But many key players of the Fashion Week — like Anita Tillmann, who was head of the Premium fairs at the time, or Christiane Arp and myself, who were already organizing Der Berliner Salon — were part of the Council from the very beginning. So Berlin Fashion Week was always deeply present within the Council.

Why are stages for designers so important, even beyond traditional fashion weeks?

Mandie Bienek: Especially during COVID, there was often the question of whether visibility could be created digitally — whether physical events were really necessary. But what we kept seeing, again and again, was that physical experiences are irreplaceable. You simply can’t create the same level of emotion and connection online — not to mention that fashion, as a sensory experience, can’t be fully conveyed through a screen. You have to see fabrics live, ideally even touch them, to truly understand them. So yes, physical platforms remain crucial for designers to convey their ideas — but they’re only one piece of the puzzle. It’s just as important to think about distribution structures, networks, and customer bases. Designers need to master that whole spectrum in order to make real use of a stage. And that brings us back to what we saw as the Council’s role from the beginning: identifying funding opportunities, building partnerships and alliances to create potential — and then bringing that potential into visibility.

Marcus Kurz: Fashion is a people business, a physical business. It’s about meeting, exchanging, connecting, experiencing clothing as a whole, even touching it.

But it’s not always possible to really get your hands on what’s being presented — just as you wouldn’t run onto a theatre stage to shake hands with the actors, you also can’t reach out to touch the coat being carried past you on the runway. Is it therefore just as important to create other formats that allow people to engage more directly with the garments and with the designers themselves?

Mandie Bienek: Absolutely. It’s essential to create accessibility that a distant runway setting can’t offer. That’s something Der Berliner Salon has provided since it first launched in 2015 — and something that’s being further developed through new formats organized by the Council like RAUM.Berlin and the panel series Metamorphosis.

Marcus Kurz: And what’s also great is that these events have increasingly opened up to the public. For example, we’ve recently kept Der Berliner Salon in the Gemäldegalerie open for longer — giving everyone in the city a chance to experience it.

Mandie Bienek: That’s also a key communication task of the Council — making fashion as a cultural asset accessible and tangible in its entirety. And that works best when there are not only fashion shows, but also presentations, exhibitions, and panel talks.

To reach as many people as possible — including consumers — digital formats are also important though. Should analog and digital events be more closely connected in the future?

Mandie Bienek: Definitely. There are so many positive sides to digitalization, especially for fashion and its visibility. Better linking those possibilities with physical experiences is one of the big challenges for the future — for fashion as a whole and for us as a Council. Because the more sophisticated digital tools become, including AI, the more important it will be for us to focus on being human, on emotionality and real connection. We should absolutely aim to reach as many people as possible — but not only digitally. That brings a recent example from Paris to mind, where this connection has been taken to an almost absurd new level: during the Fashion Week there, the influencer Lyas organized public viewings of major runway shows. In doing so, he essentially reversed today’s norm — the option to watch a fashion show comfortably and alone at home on the sofa — and turned it into a new kind of live event and shared experience. And it’s been incredibly well received.

Marcus Kurz: Exactly. And one reason why that worked so well is because there had been a physical source — a real show happening in that moment. If you go to the shows in Paris, you’ll see thousands of young people outside, hoping to get in. There’s a real desire to experience fashion physically. And now, thanks to things like these public screenings, more people can be part of that. That’s great.

Back to Berlin and the visibility of German fashion here — we’ve recently seen designers’ work at Der Berliner Salon in the Gemäldegalerie, at RAUM.Berlin in the legendary Kranzlereck, and in fashion shows at some of the city’s most iconic venues — from William Fan on the TV Tower to SF1OG at Rotes Rathaus to Haderlump in the BVG train depot. How important is it to showcase German designers in these symbolic locations across the capital?

Marcus Kurz: Extremely important. That’s a USP of Berlin Fashion Week — it’s what makes it the central stage for designers from Germany. And international guests really appreciate to experience German fashion right in the heart of the country. I’m glad that lately we’ve been showing all the different facets of the city — not just club and underground culture, but also sophistication, elegance, and cultural relevance.

Which show or event from recent years in Berlin stands out most in your memory — the moment when you thought, “we’re on the right track”?

Mandie Bienek: One show that completely blew me away was Namilia’s in July 2024, in the disused S-Bahn tunnel at Potsdamer Platz. It was charged with so much emotion, joy, and excitement — it really carried everyone along, and it took me a couple of hours to come down from it. And more recently, Buzigahill’s show in July 2025 left a deep impression on me as well. It took place on a construction site, and the designer Bobby Kolade — marking his return to Berlin Fashion Week — opened the show with sounds recorded in Uganda’s capital, Kampala, overlayed with a reading of the United Nations Manifesto. It was incredibly moving for me, and for many others in the audience. When a show creates that kind of emotional resonance — that’s magic.

Marcus Kurz: What’s moved me most recently are the moments when I see Germany and especially Berlin getting international attention. That includes Saint Laurent’s show at the Neue Nationalgalerie in June 2023, or Anna Wintour’s visit for Vogue Germany’s Forces of Fashion conference in Berlin in September 2024. But also events like Der Berliner Salon, which we staged for the first time at the Gemäldegalerie in February 2025. That presentation recontextualized German fashion in an entirely new way — making it visible as a true part of German culture. And, as it’s been said, it even inspired Jonathan Anderson’s first menswear show for Dior — he reportedly modeled its museum-like setting after our presentation. When portrayals of German design resonate like that internationally, it’s a very positive sign indeed.

  This text is an excerpt from our 10-year Fashion Council Germany booklet, in which we reflect on a decade of shaping and advancing German fashion. Discover the full booklet and explore all the stories and highlights HERE.

Interview by Manuel Almeida Vergara