Aibek Bekturganov: Making Olympic outfits for our athletes is a great honor for us (PHOTOS)
ALMATY. KAZINFORM - Making Olympic outfits for our athletes is a great responsibility, but it is also very prestigious. It is like virtually creating the image of the country. Traditionally, the Olympic opening ceremony is watched globally. This year, Kazakhstani company "Kazlegprom-Almaty" LLP was responsible for making Olympic uniforms for the Olympic athletes of Kazakhstan.
Director of "Kazlegprom-Almaty" LLP Aibek Bekturganov told what it was like to work on such an important project.
It should be noted that the final version of the outfit was approved at the congress of the National Olympic Committee of Kazakhstan on March 16, 2016.
"We were offered this opportunity to make Olympic outfits. There were several companies competing for this right. We all presented our products, and we were selected to work on this project. This is our first experience in such sphere," Aibek Bekturganov said.
According to him, the approval process took quite long.
"The approval process took quite long. We had to demonstrate the design we created, then we had to make an example for consideration. The Ministry of Culture and Sport decided to involve a commission in the decision-making process. Olympic champions and independent designers were among the members of the commission. They expressed their suggestions as well. We took into account all the recommendations and suggestions and created an outfit. The commission also came to our company to familiarize with the working process, etc. When we made the first outfit we had to change it several times according to the recommendations. At the end, everybody was happy with the final result. Outfits are in Brazil already. Now, we just have to wait and watch our athletes march at the opening ceremony on August 5," Aibek Bekturganov said.
The director of the company also emphasized that the quality of the fabric is very high.
"We always use the best materials. Moreover, it was a serious project for us, and our image also depended on it. So, we paid a lot of attention to this issue. As a result, we used Italian fabric of the highest quality," he added.
"I would like to repeat it was the project that our image depended on. We wanted our athletes to look beautiful at the opening ceremony in Brazil. Therefore, we used individual approach to each athlete when making uniforms. There were difficulties, obviously, because many athletes were in training camps in foreign countries, and our designers even went there instead of waiting for them to come back to Kazakhstan. As of today, there have been no complaints and everybody is happy. Our Olympic athletes in new uniforms also met with our President and he said he liked the Olympic uniforms a lot. In total, we made 234 uniforms," A. Bekturganov said.
"This project is a great honor for us. Besides, as I already mentioned our image also depended on this project. We are a young company. People just begin to recognize it, especially after the visit of Nursultan Nazarbayev. He liked our products, and now we have to keep this level. Over 80% of our employees are young who are eager to learn and develop," he added.
Aibek Bekturganov also wished our Olympic athletes good luck at the Games.