TEHRAN - The Women of My Land international festival is scheduled to be held in July 2007 in order to select the women’s dress of the year, Farahnaz Ghandforush, the advisor to the Tehran governor for women’s affairs, said here on Wednesday.

Ghandforush made the announcement at the inauguration ceremony of the permanent secretariat of the Women of My Land festival, which was held at Iran’s second live fashion show of Islamic dress.

Although the design and production of women’s clothing has always been a great dilemma for officials, no proper steps have been taken in this regard, she pointed out.

The festival is being organized to support dress designers and promote their sense of creativity so that it blossoms and to lay the groundwork for the establishment of an artistic and cultural institute for developing policies on women’s clothing, Ghandforush explained.

The other goals are creating an information bank of dress designers, establishing a cooperative company in the field, promoting interactions between Islamic countries on the issue, and generating worldwide publicity, she added.

“Proper clothing is the most important sign of the culture and civilization of a society. Therefore we should make the utmost efforts for the design and production of suitable Iranian and Islamic dress styles,” she observed.

Promoting the construction of stores for the supply and sale of the productions of dress designers is one of the most important aims of the festival, which is going to be done with the cooperation of the Tehran Municipality, she said.

Tehran Governor Kamran Daneshjoo also spoke at the ceremony, saying, “Today, the role of culture and ideals in all societies is obvious, and our society is not an exemption, so we should try to find a proper model, especially for women and the youth.

“We should not force the women of our society to adopt uniform dress but should encourage them to observe variety in their Islamic clothing. This is our society’s attitude toward men.

“Variety in styles of dress is the women’s right, and wearing proper clothing is the right of society. These are equal rights of men and women, but putting them together is an art form.

“There are no restrictions in colors for women’s dress according to Islam, and I do not believe that we should encourage the use of dark colors for women’s clothing.”

In conclusion, he said, “Western countries are using women’s beauty as a tool, but we are trying to find beautiful variations of dress to promote women’s dignity.”