India, Feb. 16 -- If Paris is heritage, Milan is manufacturing, New York is commerce, and London is experimentation - what is Dubai? On my visit to Dubai Fashion Week's seventh season, I found myself circling the rather loaded question: Is Dubai positioning itself as the fifth fashion capital? And if so, what exactly is it offering? The cues surfaced quickly: luxury logistics as baseline; proximity to the Gulf's formidable retail infrastructure and high-net-worth clientele; and a cross-continental bridge binding South Asian creativity to Middle Eastern capital and global visibility.

How Dubai is engineering its own fashion capital It was my first time at Dubai Fashion Week, though the Week itself was entering its seventh season. That asy...