Superstar, Ema Savahl Delivers Another Winning Swimwear Show/Collection
Looking Back & Forward at Miami Swim Week
Written by Hope Gainer
Miami Swim Week History
Miami is the ‘Queen Bee’ when it comes to turning any event into a citywide extravaganza. Art Basel totally transformed Miami with an explosion of art and parties, then Miami F1 did the same. In between, something called Miami Swim Week came into being. It started as an offshoot of fashion shows coinciding with the Miami Swimwear Trade Show, the largest in the world, organized by The Swimwear Association of Florida, held at the Miami Beach Convention Center. Similarly, Art Basel is really an art trade show held at the Miami Beach Convention Center. All of the satellite art fairs, events and parties were all created to ride on the coattails of Art Basel. And eventually the first week of December each year got nicknamed Miami Art Week.
Continuing with the analogy, Miami Swim Week, came into being in Miami mid-July starting around 2002 or 2004 (good old google seems to supply both years). The leader in producing Fashion Weeks in New York City, IMG, came into the Miami market to professionally organize and produce the Miami Swim Week Shows. The historic Raleigh Hotel with its iconic swimming pool became bikini clad central hosting the shows and sponsors in the surrounding cabanas. Title sponsor, Mercedes-Benz dived in, and it became officially known as the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Swim until IMG left Miami in 2016.
Then Miami Swim Week became a ‘free-for-all’ with many smaller independent show producers jumping in to fill the gap. The shows stayed in July until recent years. Without any one central organizer, the dates kept moving and stupidly last year two different swim weeks came about in June and July. Then finally in 2024, these independents seemed to understand that it was beneficial to have one swim week set of dates. However, there are so many swim week shows, producers and venues that it still gets confusing for the consumers, trade and press.
Paraiso producers stepped up and produce consistently good swim week shows in their own tent in South Beach next to the W Hotel. Their attendance has grown to 30,000 generating about $75,000 in economic impact for the city of Miami Beach. Art Hearts Fashion came on the scene and did some great shows at Faena Forum. They had a sponsor area for mingling between shows and even a VIP Lounge. But this year, their venue, M2 was un-enticing as a “has been” nightclub setting. Maybe next year they will get back on track. Planet Fashion run successfully by Celia Evans has been in the Swim Show game for many years, not just in Miami, but also at the Cannes Film Festival and other places in Europe. A newcomer from Washington D.C. has tried to pretend they are the main show, calling themselves “The Shows” but merely produce their own version of Swim Week at SLS Hotel in South Beach. Meanwhile, Sports Illustrated has been bringing their own brand of shows to South Beach for many years. From the Mondrian to W South Beach, runways have been installed over pools for the Sports Illustrated strutters. This year SI had a sister theme with social media sensation, Alix Earle strutting the runway with her sisters. Also, the female Cavinder twins, Miami Hurricane basketball stars strolled simultaneously down the catwalk for S.I.
Political Correctness Invades the Swimwear Shows
Speaking of Sports Illustrated, they seem to have gone overboard on showcasing politically correct “models” on their runways lately. Sure, it is nice to allow women to know they are beacons of beauty at any age, weight or with a disability. But rewarding obesity or being grossly overweight sends the wrong message. Health is wealth. Why honor those women with a spot on the SI catwalk who have abused their bodies with overeating? This just seems so against what Sports Illustrated stands for…honoring athletes and their achievements. Most of the Miami Swim Week shows the past couple of years, have featured significantly overweight women. They should not be role models for mistreating their own bodies. Similarly, decades ago, fashion magazine pages filled with super skinny, malnourished models was equally wrong sending a bad message to women.
The Best Swimwear Show of All
The consistently shining star of Miami Swim Week has become Ema Savahl Couture. Born out of necessity during the pandemic when women were not wearing couture dresses, especially beautiful hand-painted couture dresses with a hefty price tag, designer Ema Savahl created and launched her first swimwear collection. It became an instant success and chosen as the “Official Swimwear of the Miss
Universe Pageant” in 2021. Contestants from 90 different countries wore Ema Savahl bikinis for the swimsuit competition aired on T.V. around the world to 150 countries. Influencers took notice and women everywhere became fans and customers of Ema Savahl swimwear.
In 2022, Ema Savahl did her first Miami Swim Week Show at SLS Hotel. The former Miss Albania, the niece of Ema Savahl, opened the show. The Ema Savahl Swimwear Collection mesmerized the audience, and her show became known as the hottest ticket in town.
In 2023, the Ema Savahl Swimwear Show went viral worldwide. Her super sensual, super revealing swimsuits with transparent strings holding them in place became known as the “V-String” (vagin* string), the next revolution of the G-String bikini.
And in 2024, crowds were wowed again by the Ema Savahl Couture Swimwear Show. Her show was named “The Garden of Muses” And the collection is called “In Goddesses We Trust.” Ema personally believes in elevating all women to Goddess levels. She designs with optical illusions to accentuate the female figure even more. Her designs are sensual rather than purely sexy. There is an air of spirituality in her collections that raise the female vibrations to an even higher level. There is so much more to her swimwear pieces than meets the human eye.
The Ema Savahl Couture Dress Collections as well as her Swimwear Collections have been created with her special hand-painted technique she has perfected over the years (almost 30 years now). She designs the collection silhouettes/styles, creates original artworks and selects optimal colors. However, in 2024, her special paint was delivered with some imperfections. Ema accepted the challenge and turned lemons into lemonade. Her never-ending creative mind came up with a new concept of 3D layering of fabrics rather than using paint for her 3D effects. She also selected metallic mesh fabric to work with for this new 3D styling.
Ema Savahl Swimwear Show 2024 showcased three concepts: 1) handpainted pieces on mesh fabric 2) handpainted pieces on lace fabric 3) 3D layered designs on metallic mesh. Pieces ranged from swimwear to coverups to corsets. And the overall themes were water and olives to seamlessly incorporate her water (Kopu) and olive oil (Toladi) sponsors in an uncommercial way. To represent the beauty of pristine waters, Ema selected colors of silver, light blue, aqua and white. For olive oil she chose shades of gold, green, brown and pink. Her lace capsule collection she named duch*ess.
Every detail of Ema’s shows is carefully orchestrated. The runway backdrop had moving bubbles imagery representing the ebb and flow of water. For music, Ema Savahl wanted sounds that were other worldly yet organic and earthy. She found Tulum tribal rhythms with hints of Ayuhusca spirit to be the right choice. Jewelry and accessories were handcrafted to further elevate the models as Goddesses. The artsy crowns were custom-made by Zula Khramov for Ema Savahl.
When casting her models, Ema looks for females that have harmony in their movement, confidence, self-love and self-acceptance to emanate an intoxicating energy. She prefers a healthy, fit look, with glowing skin. Ultimately, the chosen Ema Savahl models are gazelle-like gracing the catwalk effortlessly with positive energy comfortable in their own skin and with their own curves. Her runway is always only filled with healthy-looking sensual women.
Ema Savahl is a giver at heart and once again collaborated with Miami’s Little Lighthouse Foundation. She hosted underprivileged children for a day at her design workshop helping them create their own designs to wear in her show chaperoned by Influencers. It made for a heart-warming opening segment to the Ema Savahl 2024 Swimwear Show.
Separately, Ema Savahl also created a new collection called “Luminar 2.0.” She showcased it on Monday night of Miami Swim Week in a nightclub setting/venue. This collection is made with special glow-in-the-dark paint agents. She came up with this idea of ‘glow-in-the-dark’ fashions because she was aware of how color therapy and light therapy elevate people’s moods. She wanted to create a happy collection that elevates the human spirit. A large collection of 36 pieces were showcased in a variety of styles including nightclub attire, co*cktail dresses, evening gowns, swimsuits and mini tops. The dark nightclub setting was perfect for showing off the Ema Savahl glow-in-the-dark Luminar 2.0 Collection.
Until Miami Swim Week 2025, what will wow the audiences is anyone’s guess. But for sure, Ema Savahl will get the most oooh’s and ahhh’s when her models hit the runway in her latest collection.
Connect with Editor-in-Chief: Hope Grainer
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Connect with Fashion Designer: Ema Savahl
Instagram: Emasavahl
Connect with Publisher: Nataly Stuart
