MahmoudElMokadem

"We haven't reached any agreement [on dates]," said LC:M chair Dylan Jones. "As far as I'm concerned, we've offered so many olive branches. [The Italian organisers] seem to be intransigent and don't appear to be particularly interested in working with London, so we're just going to go ahead. If people want to go to Pitti, then obviously they will go to Pitti. There is enough room for everyone, and if some of the other fashion weeks were prepared to squeeze a bit or compromise, they'd probably make it easier for themselves. But we are where we are."

Jones hopes that the situation will improve in 2015 as the calendar changes. Pitti Immagine - the Italian company that organises the trade fair - is keen to find a solution.

"It's a subject that has to be tackled with intelligence and common sense to support the system," said Raffaello Napoleone, Pitti Immagine CEO. "The dates as they stand do not provide a good service. We are in talks with London to discuss this matter in order to co-ordinate them. One fixed date should be decided upon, and then have Florence begin one day after London. We have faith that the issue will be resolved."

The line-up has also been criticised for not having enough of a commercial focus, although Jones says that his goal for the event is "to grow to the extent where it has as much commercial clout as Milan or Paris or New York. This has never been a whim, or a vanity exercise."

Jones is currently in talks with the London Mayor's office, the Victoria & Albert Museum and the ICA to help widen awareness of the industry-only event and British menswear.

"Short term is having various pop-up events, and medium to long term is actually having exhibitions," he told WWD. So when you come to London, perhaps you go inside the V&A, and there will be an exhibition that's devoted to menswear or to a particular strand of menswear. Those extra strands, consumer and culture, I think are very important."