IN PICS: 16 HOTTEST designers at LFW

Meet the sexy fashion designers who could give the models a run for their money

More often than not, it's the models who steal the thunder at fashion weeks. Designers who dress these very models are often in the backdrop stepping out at the very end to take a bow and walk away.

Increasingly though we cannot help notice a stunner walk past us only to be told that she isn't a model but a designer. Here are 15 such cuties who will be at the Lakme Fashion Week this season.

Jewellery designer Suhani Pittie has been a regular at the Lakme Fashion Week since 2009. That year, she also won British Council's Young Fashion Entrepreneur Award and showcased her collection to an audience that counted Prince Charles, Camilla Parker Bowles, Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex and Maharaja Gaj Singh at the Bal Samand Lake Palace in Jodhpur.

Among those who have commissioned Pittie is the prestigious Museum of Arts and Design New York.

We did quite like Ruchika Sachdeva's collection from the last season. The pretty designer had used unconventional print technology with high-density silicon to create futuristic garments. Drawing inspiration from architecture, history and machinery, Sachdeva's silhouettes were boxy and rectangular.

The designer has graduated from London college of Fashion and has worked with design houses such as Vivienne Westwood, Giles Deacon and Nitin Bal Chauhan among others.

We probably should be thankful to something that happened at Miranda House College in New Delhi that made Priyal Prakash turn her attention to fashion designing.

Daughter of a general manager of SAIL, Priyal Prakash would have been happily graduated sociology and probably would've become a career bureaucrat had she not heard of NIFT while studying at Miranda House.

Thankfully she did and after managing to crack the entrance exam -- she stood first --Prakash graduated and started out with Rs 1 lakh that her father lent her to start her studio in September 2010.

Choosing rather to focus on her business rather than opting for a master's degree, Priyal Prakash has managed to break even and promises to show some of her best creations at the Lakme Fashion Week.

Daughter of the music baron Gulshan Kumar, Krushali is an NIFT alumnus who has exhibited in fashion weeks in London and Paris and retails through more than 50 stores across the world.

It'd be a surprise if she wasn't a stunner. Komal Sood was a Miss India and a television host before she turned to fashion designing and studied at the National Institute of Fashion Technology in Kolkata.

Thanks to her talent, bolstered by the backing of her family business -- she comes from the family that runs Burlingtons in Kolkata -- she runs a brand that her website describes as one that 'epitomises refinement and luxury in fashion'.

Nitya Arora runs Valliyan, a four-year-old accessories label, one that she started when she was all of 21. After studying fashion at Parsons in NYC, Arora returned to Mumbai to work here. Valliyan creates handbags, headgear and everything in between.

The sexy Neha Agarwal made a stunning debut in the fall-winter 2009 season where her collection focussed sought inspiration from the innocence of a child.

An NIFT Kolkata graduate, Agarwal was also a national finalist at the IYFE (International Young fashion entrepreneur awards) organised by the British council. Based in Kolkata, Agarwal retails out of stores in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Ahemdabad, Bangalore, Chennai and Kuwait.

We quite liked what she did back in 2010 and are looking forward to her new collection too.

The petite Paromita Banerjee's initiation into the creative arts is said to have been fuelled by her passion for photography. A graduate of the National Institute of Design, Banerjee has been a regular at the Lakme Fashion Week and counts amongst her clients industrialists, politicians and performing artists who she caters to from her boutiques from Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, and her hometown Kolkata.

Having made her debut only a season ago, the shoe designer is already making heads turn for the right reason. Payal Kothari's Veruschka is the 'brand of choice' for Femina pageant contestants and seen by many designers and celebrities alike.

Kothari studied Fashion in New York and shoemaking in Florence before launching a label in 2002. She now retails in Dubai and Manila as well as in Italy and India. and also retails at the top fashion boutiques across the country. Partner Shubha Sethi is involved in making Veruschka a pioneer in the footwear industry across the globe.

The pretty-looking NIFT graduate who made a splashing entry on the Lakme Fashion Week ramp a few seasons ago as a Gen Next designer will showcase her collection this season again.

Pooja Kapoor's pret line caters to the urban Indian woman is one of the many we're looking forward to see this season... besides of course the designer herself!

Eina Ahluwalia is India's first conceptual jewellery artist who calls it 'her way of communicating with the world'.

Having trained under pioneering conceptual jeweller Ruudt Peters in Holland, Ahluwalia is also an alumnus of Alchimia Contemporary Jewellery School in Florence where she is now an India Advisor.

Among her many achievements, she has been selected by David Lamb MD, Jewellery at World Gold Council as one of the hottest talents to watch out for. We, among others, surely are.

A protegee of another sexy designer Surily Goel (where is she anyway), Ritika Bharwani is hoping to make a splashing debut at the Lakme Fashion Week this season. A post-graduate in Fashion Entrepreneurship from the London College of Fashion, Bharwani is all of 25 and runs her own studio in Mumbai.

On her website Bahrwani writes that 'fashion begins somewhere on the streets of Europe, and then inspires a designer to make an entire collection'. Ah well, we do hope that's good enough for our desi ramp.

Payal Khandwala was a painter before she decided to change her canvas, literally.

Seeking inspiration from the human form, the pretty designer's metamorphoses from a painter to a fashion designer seems somewhat obvious.

The talented and pretty designer has interned with Krishna Mehta in Mumbai before she moved to NYC to graduate from the Parsons School of Design in Fine Arts and Illustration.

Soon after, she also completed a diploma at Metafora, an international workshop for Contemporary Art in Barcelona.

Having exhibited her paintings in cities across the world, Payal Khandwala is one of the designers we are looking forward to seeing at the Lakme Fashion Week.

Deepti Purthi arrived with a bang on the Lakme Fashion Week ramp exactly a year ago as part of the GenNext designers.

The pretty Mumbai-based designer has been making getting all the right kind of attention as she returns to the fashion week third time in a row, without having missed a single season.

Indira Baikerikar Ghosh isn't new to fashion weeks -- she's shown at the Kolkata Fashion week before -- but this is the first time the pretty young designer will show her collection at LFW.

Coming all the way from Assam Ghosh's designs are colourful yet elegant and simple yet stylish, seeking inspiration from nature and the river Brahmaputra.

Definitely one of the few young designers we're looking forward to seeing.