Fashion designer Hina Butt wears many fedoras — the style equivalent of the hat. To many, she’s one of the most talked about socialites and trendsetters on Lahore’s fashion circuit while to others she’s a fiercely independent, single mother who chose to follow the path less followed by others in her Louboutins, borne to wealth and privilege. She’s a born again academic, a fitness freak, a family woman and, to add to the constantly growing list, she’s also a newly sworn in member of the Punjab Assembly. Feel like you need to catch your breath? Pique catches up with Hina Butt instead.
There’s a certain kind of pragmatism that comes with beauty and brains and another kind entirely when that same heady concoction is applied to the male-dominated playground of politics, particularly that of the Pakistani variety. Where we’re so used to catching unnecessary glimpses of pot-bellies and unflattering wardrobe cameos on most of the men (and, well let’s face it, plenty of the female folk) who have been ‘gracing’ the assembly floor, we are, at times, offered a red-soled peek into the world of glamour and politics.
A venerable 28-year-old, Hina Butt has been a member of the Punjab Assembly for only a few months now but she has been a constant fixture in the star-studded world of Lahore’s shark-eat-shark fashion industry for a good five years now, giving staying power a new face in a glad rags business that changes faces faster than it brings on fashion weeks. Dressed in immaculate white linen pants and a neon orange loose-fitted shirt, a combo that hits just the right note of casual indifference and stylised intent, Hina waltzed into her design studio all charm, elegance and, funnily enough, grounded candour.
The first thing you notice about her is just how effortlessly pretty she really is; while it might help to be adorned in everything from a Chopard timepiece to Gucci kitties, an LV tote and an outfit from her own label, you can’t help but imagine how its not the accessories but the method to her magnetism that makes her so incredibly flawless. “I’m sorry I’m late” (even though she wasn’t). It’s this persistent need to be polite that initially catches you off guard. Come on, how many moneyed silver-spooners of this generation actually recall that over-rated little nugget called courtesy?
One of the princesses of the Waves - ‘naam hi kaafi hai’ (pun intended) - conglomerate, Hina distanced herself from all the razzle dazzle of insane wealth to concentrate on her sole start-up fashion house Teena in November 2010, which is now a massive name in the industry; her studio buzzes with anxious clients, frazzled assistants running on short fuses and black coffees to keep up with the perpetual demands from society darlings and tailors and pattern makers distracting us every 15 seconds for a heads up or roman thumbs down from the designer.
There’s a reason Teena is doing so well: her intricately designed ensembles are feminine, pulsating with crisp sensuality and awash with carefully planted notes of courteous appropriateness, “It’s been a long winding road for me. When my life started again but with a child, who had only me in his life, and a renewed sense of needing to prove my strength in an adverse situation, I looked inwards, channelling everything I was passionate about into dresses that made women feel like women but with a higher degree of integrity and mystique.”
Hina is, of course, talking about the fact that she is a single mother who divorced not just from an unhappy marriage but also from the societal equivalent of women depending on their men for all financial reassurances, “And we’re talking all men. My father is a very well-to-do, respected businessman who has worked hard all his life and it is from him that I learned not to depend on anyone, which is why I started Teena - to bring me my own fulfilment without leaning on a shoulder that isn’t my own.”
That may just explain Hina’s surprise entry into the Punjab Assembly where she has been creating waves with, not just her impeccable fashion sense but also the fact that she has merged the tricky cocktail of politics, activism and fashion into a model that can be seen through from the design studio right to the assembly,
“I’ve wanted to empower women through a stronger belief in their capabilities no matter how limited or diverse. That is why Teena has always employed rural women who have a passion for embroidery but were isolating that talent due to lack of due opportunity. Now, as a member of the assembly I’m trying to look into ways to truly empower these women as small business owners of their own so that they need not depend on men for financial rescue. It is a model that can be applied to the lives of women across the social spectrum.”
Noble causes may betray the intentions of noble women but not everyone in the assembly comes from such refined deliberations. Recently, Pique did a cover story on how female legislators face a barrage of harassment quips from their male counterparts but Hina is surprised that such realities exist,
“So far, I haven’t received any unwanted attention and I don’t think I will. When a woman concentrates solely on her work and where she wants to be at a certain point in her life, she releases vibes that are very professionally oriented, and I think that’s how I am. Perceptions are changing about women in the workplace and while there will always be that one loner who thinks a woman’s place is only in the home, there will be thousands more now who will think otherwise. The assembly is the same.”
Hina wants to dabble in exactly the opposite to what she has. Her main driving force is to see women down and out, and to lift them up, and to see poverty eliminated through strong legislation that promotes education and business ownership without which there is no progression for all those destined to spend miserable lives because of miserable priorities of her predecessors. “Now that I’ve started a new role in politics I feel that every woman has a right to be discerning whether it comes to their fashion sense or their ability to earn and how they earn. I’ve been making clothes that define women for a few years and I can see that a certain segment of women in our society are now taking ownership of their bodies and how they feel. I want to see that same sense of ownership in women who have known nothing but strife and tragedy so that they too can feel a sense of fulfilment by attaining their independence, says Hina while nodding towards the pattern-makers furious gestures for approval.
Hina’s fashion house is a go-to mecca for the rich and famous but her heart lies with women who do not even realise they have a dream. While Teena is a staple in the industry for when class is required and elegance demanded, the social celebrity status accumulated by Hina over the years is now being used to raise awareness where previously there was hardly any focus. She may be beautiful and she may be talented but the girl’s got heart and in this industry and in politics, that amounts to more than almost all the assembly out together.
The writer is a journalist based in Lahore.
