Event procurement · designer showroom kits · press gifting · lookbook and catalogue printing · runway collateral · Armenia

Showroom Kits and Press Gifting for Yerevan Fashion Week

Name: Yerevan Fashion Week
Start: 2026-10-29T19:00
End: 2026-11-02T22:00
Location: Yerevan, Armenia

Yerevan Fashion Week is a five-day runway and showroom programme staged in the Armenian capital twice a year, with designers from the South Caucasus, the wider post-Soviet region and a steady flow of buyer delegations and fashion press from Milan, Tbilisi, Moscow, Istanbul and Dubai. The merch challenge is genre-specific. Production has to clear three different rooms at the same time: the runway, the showroom and the press kit. Quantities are small by corporate standards, often 60 to 400 garments per label, the aesthetic tolerance is tight, and the calendar compresses sample approval and final delivery into roughly ten working days before opening night. This page describes how a corporate procurement team or a design-house operations lead plans a Yerevan Fashion Week merch programme against that brief, including the showroom and press gifting split, the lookbook and invitation print run, the staff and model apparel layer, and the VAT and e-invoicing paperwork that closes the order.

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Programme facts for the production calendar

Programme window: Five days of runway shows, showroom presentations, press appointments, buyer meetings and a closing industry brunch, held twice a year in Yerevan
Typical dates: Late October to early November for the autumn season; the announced programme dates are published by the organising committee roughly six to eight weeks ahead of opening night
Working lead time: Sample runs in 7 to 10 working days from approved artwork; bulk decoration and print delivery 10 to 14 working days before the first show
Venue: Yerevan, Armenia — the exact venue, hall and press-room configuration per the organiser’s schedule card
VAT: Standard 20% VAT applies to all B2B orders delivered into Armenia; the buyer’s Armenian e-invoicing platform account is requested on the purchase order so the invoice can be filed correctly
Currency: All quotations priced in Armenian dram (AMD) for local settlement; reference rates in USD and EUR are available on the quote header

Four merch lanes for a Yerevan Fashion Week programme

Designer showroom kits

Lookbook or catalogue for each buyer seat, an invitation or press-card wallet, a branded carrier in cotton or non-woven, and a sample-size garment or accessory chosen to anchor the collection narrative. The kit has to read as a coherent piece in the showroom and as a clean carry-out at the end of the appointment, so paper stock is a soft-touch coated 150 to 200 gsm with a single-hit or two-hit brand mark, the carrier carries the same artwork at a smaller scale and the garment inside is folded to the same orientation for every seat. Quantities per label typically run 80 to 250 kits, depending on the buyer list size and whether the designer wants one kit per seat or one per attendee.

Press gifting and editorial seeding

Curated boxes for fashion editors and stylists who visit the press room: a printed editorial card, a branded accessory chosen to extend the collection (a scarf, a pouch, a small leather item, a piece of ceramic), and a one-piece fragrance or candle, depending on the brand licence. Garment-piece press gifting is handled separately as a runway or showroom drop. The press run is the most artistically controlled line of the programme, and the brief usually references the collection palette directly so the box, card and ribbon match the lookbook rather than the corporate identity.

Runway and backstage apparel

Booth and stage staff apparel, model backstage kits, dressing-room signage and numbered wristbands for the show flow. The standard backstage kit is a black cotton tee with a small inverted print on the back, a long-sleeve crew for crew members who stay on the line overnight, and a numbered Tyvek wristband for show order. Staff jackets are an upsell line for houses that want a stronger backstage identity: a coach-style jacket or a fatigue overshirt in cotton twill, branded on the chest and back, available in three sizes and packed flat in a labelled poly bag per role.

Buyer and VIP kits

Numbered folders for the front row and the VIP room, a buyer workbook with the collection order codes, a roll-up of the press card and the venue map, and a premium accessory to take away. The folder is the most important printed artefact in the room because the buyer takes it back to the studio, and it carries the order codes, the size run and the delivery terms. Production is A4 portrait, 250 gsm coated cover with a 4 + 0 print and a debossed or hot-foiled mark; inserts are uncoated 120 gsm to take handwritten notes.

Production windows, sampling and the split-shipment problem

The hard constraint on a Yerevan Fashion Week programme is that the showroom opens before the press kit goes out, which means the production calendar is not a single line, it is three lines that converge. The showroom line has to be packed and delivered five to seven days before opening night so designers can stage the room. The press line runs a day or two behind because press appointments are scheduled around the press room opening, not the showroom opening, and the press list is finalised later than the buyer list. The runway line has to be at the venue twenty-four hours before the doors open, which gives decorators a tight window at the end of the programme.

The standard mitigation is a split shipment. Showroom and buyer kits ship in one consolidated carton to the designer’s hotel or studio in central Yerevan. Press kits ship to the press room or the brand’s press agent the morning of the press-room opening. Runway backstage apparel ships directly to the venue on the agreed hand-off window, usually the afternoon before the first show. Each line carries a separate packing list with a content count and a per-piece position, so the unloading team at the venue can verify the consignment against the rider without opening every carton.

Sampling sits at the front of that calendar. A digital or screen-printed fabric strike is the reference for colour and finish on every garment line, and it must be approved before bulk rolls are cut. For the lookbook and the buyer folder, a single printer proof on the actual paper stock is mandatory because coated and uncoated stocks shade the brand mark very differently. For accessories, an empty or unbranded prototype is the reference for shape and dimension, with the brand mark applied on a second unit once the shape is locked. Standard turnaround on a sample run is 7 to 10 working days from approved artwork to couriered delivery in Yerevan, which means artwork has to be finalised roughly six weeks before opening night to leave a clean two weeks for approval, sampling and any corrections.

Stock sourcing inside Armenia runs through a small number of wholesale corridors in Yerevan: Kentron and the Kond district for cotton blanks and accessories, the wholesale lanes near Saryan Street for paper and print finishing supplies, and direct imports for items not held locally. Where the brand wants a specific blank (a particular fleece weight, a particular zip pull, a particular cotton count) the order should be opened earlier than six weeks out because the wholesale cycle for imported blanks is longer than the domestic cycle. For paper, the print supplier in Yerevan typically stocks the standard 150, 200 and 250 gsm coated and uncoated sheets, and custom stocks are sourced through the supplier’s import channel with a 10 to 14 working day window.

Planning timeline: four checkpoints from brief to delivery

T minus six weeks: Brief finalised, garment blanks and paper stocks confirmed, artwork locked at vector or 300 dpi, packing list and per-line quantities agreed
T minus four weeks: Sample strike on the actual garment or paper stock couriered to Yerevan for approval; press list and buyer list sizes fixed to set the press and showroom runs
T minus two weeks: Bulk production underway, split-shipment plan confirmed, press room and showroom addresses locked, e-invoicing details exchanged with the buyer’s finance team
T minus five working days: Showroom and buyer kits packed and delivered to the designer’s staging point in central Yerevan; press kits and runway apparel queued for their respective hand-off windows

VAT, e-invoicing and cross-border settlement on a Yerevan order

Every B2B merch order delivered into Armenia carries 20% VAT, and that line drives the procurement paperwork as much as it drives the unit price. For orders placed by an Armenian-registered company or by a foreign brand with Armenian VAT registration, the invoice is filed through the Armenian e-invoicing platform and the buyer’s tax account is debited in AMD at settlement. For orders placed by a foreign-registered buyer with no Armenian VAT account, the supplier typically applies the reverse-charge mechanism and the buyer self-assesses VAT in its home jurisdiction; the supplier invoice then omits Armenian VAT and the cross-border paperwork is reduced to a commercial invoice, a packing list and a CMR or airway bill. Either way the supplier needs the buyer’s legal entity name, legal address, tax identification number and the receiving warehouse or studio address in Yerevan before the first carton ships.

Currency is a second settlement lever. The base quotation is in Armenian dram for local settlement, because virtually every domestic supplier (decorator, garment source, printer, courier) prices in AMD and the FX exposure on a small-volume order is not worth hedging. A foreign buyer can request the quote header in USD or EUR with an AMD-equivalent line for invoicing, and the FX rate is locked at the quote date for fourteen days. Payment terms are standard 50% on order confirmation and 50% on delivery for new buyers, with net-30 terms offered after the second settled order; the supplier does not run a credit line for first-time buyers and the first-time- buyer term is non-negotiable during a compressed fashion-week calendar.

Delivery into Yerevan from the supplier’s production point typically routes through Yerevan’s Zvartnots airport for air freight on garments and printed paper, or through the Georgian border crossing for ground freight on heavier consolidated cartons. Air freight from the regional production hubs (Tbilisi, Istanbul, Moscow) lands inside one to three working days for express and three to five for standard, with customs clearance through the Armenian customs broker integrated into the supplier’s courier chain. Ground freight is slower but materially cheaper on consignments above roughly 80 kilogrammes, and the supplier typically switches the routing at that weight threshold. For Yerevan Fashion Week the air lane is the default because the calendar cannot absorb a five-day land transit, but the buyer should know that the supplier’s quote will flag the routing so the cost is visible.

Customs treatment of apparel and printed paper into Armenia is straightforward for B2B consignments with a commercial invoice, and the duty line for most finished garments and printed matter under the Eurasian Economic Union tariff schedule is zero or low-single-digit. The paperwork the broker needs is the commercial invoice, the packing list with HS codes, the contract or purchase order, and a CMR or airway bill. The supplier prepares these documents in the format the buyer’s broker expects and the lead time on paperwork is two to three working days, which sits inside the four-week bulk production window described in the timeline above.

Print and finish technology for a Yerevan Fashion Week kit

Paper choices dominate the printed artefacts in the room, and the choice is driven by what the kit has to survive in transit. A coated 200 gsm silk or satin stock is the standard for the showroom lookbook because the photographic plates print cleanly on a sealed surface and the stock folds without cracking along the spine. An uncoated 120 gsm bond is the standard for the press card because it accepts a fountain pen and a soft pencil without bleed-through, which matters when the press card doubles as a working document. A 350 gsm uncoated cover stock is the standard for the buyer folder cover because it debosses cleanly and it carries a four-colour litho print at line-screen resolutions that hold detail on a flat surface. Where a foil or a debossed mark is part of the brand identity, the cover stock is upgraded to a cotton-rich 350 gsm with a vellum finish, which is the working baseline for a premium fashion-house kit.

Apparel decoration in the backstage kit follows a different rule set because the pieces are washed and worn, not handled once and discarded. Discharge water-based screen print is the standard for the staff tee and the long-sleeve crew because the print sits inside the fibre rather than on top, the hand is soft against the skin during a long styling session, and the colour does not crack after a dozen wash cycles. For a one-off press drop where the design is photographic, direct-to-garment pigment print is the right answer, because a four-colour screen setup on a 60-piece run is not economical and the soft hand of the DTG print reads better against a premium cotton blank. Embroidered marks are reserved for outerwear and for heavier pieces (the coach jacket, the fatigue overshirt, the backstage robe) where the embroidered surface reads as part of the garment rather than as decoration.

Accessories in the press box and the showroom kit follow a third rule set, because the size of the mark relative to the surface area and the wear profile of the piece drive the finish. A printed cotton ribbon, a debossed leather patch and a foil-stamped box are the standard reference set; embroidered accessories are reserved for pieces where the stitched mark complements the material (canvas totes, denim carriers, structured cotton pouches). Hot-foil stamping holds detail better than debossing at small mark sizes, and a registered foil is the right answer for any monogram line or any small legend that has to reproduce at a thumbnail size on the press card.

The colour-separation question runs through every print line in the kit. Coated paper holds four-colour process and spot colour alike, and a Pantone reference can be hit reliably on a coated sheet at Delta-E 1 to 2 from the named standard. Uncoated paper holds four-colour process, but spot colours shift to a wider Delta-E tolerance because the uncoated stock absorbs the ink unevenly. Fabric decoration has the third colour profile: discharge ink mixes to a Pantone reference within a Delta-E of roughly 2 to 3, plastisol ink within a Delta-E of 1 to 2, and DTG process colour is an approximation rather than a hit. For brand identities with a single named corporate colour (a specific brand red, a specific collection accent) the print specification usually defaults to spot Pantone on the paper lines and to a mixed discharge or plastisol on the apparel lines, with the DTG line reserved for photographic content where process colour is acceptable.

Sampling order is the practical closing of the print specification. A paper strike on every coated stock and every uncoated stock, a printed and laminated badge sample, a discharge-printed strike on the actual garment blank, a debossed or hot-foiled strike on the cover stock of the folder and a single unbranded prototype of every accessory in the kit is the working baseline. Sample turnaround on the full baseline is 7 to 10 working days from approved artwork, which is why the brief should fix the artwork at vector and the paper and fabric choice at the start of the production window rather than mid-window, where a stock change can set the calendar back by a full week.

Frequently asked questions on Yerevan Fashion Week procurement

What lead time does a Yerevan Fashion Week merch programme need from artwork to delivery?

The clean envelope is six working weeks from locked artwork to delivered showroom kits, with sample turnaround at the front of that window. Below four weeks the run is feasible but the press line or the buyer folder line usually absorbs the time pressure, and below three weeks only the press gifting lane can be guaranteed. Runway backstage apparel is the last lane to lock because the venue and the show order both move during the announced schedule.

Can the showroom run and the press run share artwork but differ in finish?

Yes. The typical brief is the same mark on a coated 200 gsm stock for the showroom and an uncoated 120 gsm stock with a thinner finishing pass for the press room, because the press card sits inside a larger envelope and the weight matters. Accessories can also be split: a heavier cotton carrier for the showroom and a lighter non-woven for the press drop. Artwork is shared and only the stock and finishing differ, which keeps the brand mark consistent across rooms.

What fabric and finish choices hold up under runway and backstage use?

Mid-weight cotton at 180 to 220 grams per square metre is the standard backstage tee blank because it takes a discharge or a soft-hand water-based screen print cleanly and survives repeated laundering between shows. Crew sweaters and overshirts are usually 320 to 400 gram cotton fleece or cotton twill, with a debossed leather patch rather than a printed mark on the body. Numbered wristbands are Tyvek with a single-colour print, packed in numbered order so the dressers can hand them out by show sequence without sorting on site.

Is Corp-Merch an official partner or supplier of Yerevan Fashion Week?

No. Corp-Merch is an independent corporate merchandise and apparel production supplier. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of Yerevan Fashion Week or its organising committee, and we have no role in designer selection, venue booking, press accreditation or the buyer invitation list. The event details on this page describe the procurement context in which exhibitors and their production teams source merch, lookbook printing and backstage apparel. Tickets, credentials, press accreditation and venue contact are matters for the organiser.

Corp-Merch is an independent corporate merchandise and apparel production supplier. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of Yerevan Fashion Week or its organising committee. References to the event on this page describe sourcing, lead-time and procurement context for exhibitors and their production teams. Engagement with the event, designer applications, press credentials and venue access are matters for the organiser.