London world's fashion capital; Mumbai is 38th

New York: Buoyed by the emergence of Kate Middleton as a top fashion icon, London has been crowned the top global fashion capital, edging out New York and Paris in an annual ranking that has Mumbai in the 38th spot and New

Delhi in the 48th.

The Global Language Monitor’s ranking of the top 50 fashion capitals saw London edging out New York for the second year in a row with Barcelona, Paris and Madrid in the top 5. Rounding out the top 10 are Rome, Sao Paulo, Milano, Los

Angeles and Berlin.

Mumbai’s ranking slipped from last year’s 24th while New Delhi was striving for relevance on the global stage with a fall of nine slots from last year’s 39th.

“London’s two-year run has been has been propelled by two rather extraordinary circumstances – the emergence of Kate Middleton as a top fashion icon, and the recent completion of what have been hailed as an extremely successful Summer

Olympics,” said Bekka Payack, fashion director of GLM.

“In recognition of the significance and growth of regional capitals with their distinctive styles and contributions to the fashion industry, GLM expanded our list to some 55 cities on five continents.”

Prior to London’s two-year reign, New York had reclaimed the crown from Milan. Previous to this, New York had been the top fashion capital for five years running, taking the crown from Paris.

The ranking is based upon GLM’s Narrative Tracking technology which analyses the Internet, blogosphere, the top 250,000 print and electronic news media, as well as new social media sources such as Twitter as they emerge. The words,

phrases and concepts are tracked in relation to their frequency, contextual usage and appearance in global media outlets.

Six Asian cities are in the list – Hong Kong (12), Singapore (19), Tokyo (20), Shanghai (22), Bangkok (29), and Seoul (34). The world fashion trade is estimated to be over USD 3 trillion.