Women in high-heeled shoes and plenty of make-up strut down the catwalk amid clouds of artificial smoke.

It is the first time live models have been allowed to appear in a fashion show in post-revolutionary Iran.

Iranian fashion

The only unusual aspect is that they are all wearing Islamic dress; including some draped from head to toe in the all enveloping chador. It's part of a new drive to give women more attractive choices of Islamic dress that allow them to express their individuality, while remaining within the letter of the law. Not everyone in the all female audience was happy.

"I don't think ordinary people will like this show because everything comes from Arab culture," complains Faranak who says she wants something more Iranian and indigenous. Her friend agrees: "Here we didn't see anything interesting - in terms of colours and designs we have much better stuff; just look on the streets of Tehran they're wearing much better clothes".

'Western dolls'

Many of the women on the streets of Tehran do indeed look more like Western fashion models than the models on the catwalk.

We want to guide designers to meet the needs of society, not to get ideas about fashion from satellite television   Sardar Ansari, Iranian police force

In skimpy tight overcoats and high heeled shoes and token headscarves perched on the back of their dyed hair, they are what the authorities call "western dolls". Many young women born after the revolution do not seem to have accepted the official idea of Islamic dress. Conservative MP Rafat Bayat, who always wears a black chador, believes the problem is the state never educated young people properly.

"The generation born after the revolution has grown up in families that do not believe in these principles and they are estranged from these laws," she says. "We thought there would be no problem because we had an Islamic Republic and we thought everyone knew the constitution," says Mrs Bayat with regret. According to the law, a woman who does not cover her hair and body in public can be fined or imprisoned for up to two months.

But there are hundreds of shops throughout North Tehran selling glamorous strapless dresses and low-cut, beaded tops for women to wear at parties.

Heavy-handed

During the reformist period, restrictions were relaxed to allow women to wear bright colours for the first time since the revolution. But right-wing conservatives are outraged by what they see as western permissiveness now creeping into Islamic dress.

Rules apply to all mature females, but interpretations differ sharply

There is also a growing awareness that heavy-handed police action like raids, arrests and closure of fashion boutiques simply do not work. And interestingly, though he is an ultra conservative, President Ahmadinejad did not bring about the crackdown on un-Islamic dress that many feared.

"Observance of hijab has got worse since the new government because Mr Ahmadinejad is not that strict on this issue," complains Mrs Bayat. "Mr Ahmadinejad thinks we should not use force when acting on this issue so as a result hijab has become weaker" she says.

New models

Aware that imposing Islamic dress by force hasn't worked, Iran's police decided to hold their own fashion exhibition recently to educate women about what they should be wearing - though there were no live models.

"We want to guide our designers to meet the needs of our society," explained Sardar Ansari of the Iranian police force. "We don't want them to get their ideas about fashion from satellite television."

What not to wear - according to Iran's police authorities

The police exhibition included displays about what is considered un-Islamic dress and an attempt to convert young women to wearing the chador. For many older women it's a symbol of their commitment to the revolution. But young women are increasingly turning away from the chador - it's expensive, hot and difficult to wear. So chador designers have come up with new models to make them more stylish and practical, for example a chador with sleeves.

"The traditional chador is a semi circle of cloth, and keeping it on your head is really hard and you absolutely have to wear something underneath - an overcoat and headscarf - to complete your Islamic dress. "But by wearing this new type of chador it's not necessary to wear an overcoat underneath," says designer Fahimeh Mahoutchi Increasingly there is a recognition that women - rather than men - should be the ones who decide what kind of Islamic dress they wear.

"Clothing is not something you can impose from outside; it is something you should accept willingly and instinctively," says Mrs Ghandforoush from the provincial governor's office. "Each person has his own particular background and attitude to dress."

In other words, the establishment realises that the children of the revolution are rebelling against drab, uniform-style clothing, and it wants to keep them in line by offering a little glamour.

Are you a woman living in Iran? What do you wear and how important is fashion to you?

Your comments:

Look at the children of the ministers and government employees' families, then you realise if they could make this wearing-forces to happen, they would do it for their families. but you can see their children are wearing so-called western fashion..
Jami, Masjed Soleiman, Iran

Here is another negative report about what is happening in Iran from the BBC's reporter Frances Harrison. Why can't she report on something more positive in Iran? We certainly do not question what is worn by the average person on the streets of London, Paris or Berlin? So why is there such a great interest in Iran? The Iranian revolution is now some 27 years old and Iranian women have no issues in Iran on what they wear. In my opinion there is more styles and fashion and less personal restrictions on what can and can't be worn in Iran than what is worn in the West.
Farzaneh, Isfahan

What's the point of being 'fashionable'? At the end of the day you've got to enjoy the life. I know many people who wear clothes that they are not comfortable in, but they still wear it to be 'fashionable'. And I think some of the so-called fashion dresses (both for men and women) are foolish and it doesn't look any good, and yet some people pay a lot money on them while they could get better looking cloth at a cheaper price, to be fashionable???
Ali, Mazandaran

I really do believe that because we are Muslims, we should obey Islamic rules in its real way. You cannot claim you are Christian while you are breaking Christian rules. Anyway, the veil is an Islamic rule to be obeyed by all real Muslims. It's good to have a look at other Islamic countries, such as Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, ... to see what is the real Islamic wear.
Solmaz, Tehran

Iranian women have always had a great sense of fashion, after the revolution there were many restrictions on what to wear and the women worked around it. Later with the reforms during Katami's era we had more freedoms and developed a fashion style that is unique to Iran, it is not necessarily western not Arabic or Islamic, it is a mix of many styles. If we work on these instead of trying to make us look like Arabs, Iranian women can develop their own sense of style and maybe in the future western and Arab women will look to Iran for their fashion inspirations.
Haydeh, Tehran, Iran

Why do the government and police need to tell people what to wear, doesn't Iran have enough problems or is there no crime in the street that they need to worry about women's clothing? Why shouldn't Iranian women follow the fashion, why should they cover their hair, why should they be dictated what to wear? This is another scheme by the failing government.
Reza, Shiraz

The issue of hejab occupies the minds of women and men alike since the Islamic revolution in 1979. A woman convinced of the necessity of hejab feels that she does not wish to attract the stares of strange men by exposing her body and hair and stressing the beauty of her face. She wants to be valued as a person, not as a beauty. In many Islamic countries, women wear hejab, but with much more variety. While I like to cover up, I think that the authorities, when imposing hejab shortly after the revolution, went too far and were too restrictive. Thereby, they created sensitivities in men that it is now difficult to get rid of.
Madleine, Tehran, Iran

Here in iran every kind of clothes that are formal in humanitarian values can be worn. But many women do follow western mode (unfortunately) and it's the biggest problem in Iran about women.
Fatima, Iran - Tehran - Pasdaran Avenue

Our government's offering a little glamour is like their giving us freedom of speech or giving us our right to have peaceful nuclear energy. I have to wear headscarf and coat in summer while my husband wears T shirt and jeans, although I do not believe in Islamic code of dressing (Hijab). Like any other women around the world, some Iranian women love fashion - they do everything and spend time and money and energy to be fashionable - some like it and some simply pay no attention to it. What really bothers me is that we don't have freedom to choose our own style of dressing.
Faranak, Tehran/ Iran

I wear uniform and scarf, fashion is not something that matters to me. I wear clothes that look good on me.
Somayeh Bakhtiary, Tehran-Iran

Hundreds of women have been arrested for "bad hijab"

Thousands of Iranian women have been cautioned over their poor Islamic dress this week and several hundred arrested in the capital Tehran in the most fierce crackdown on what's known as "bad hijab" for more than a decade.

It is the talk of the town. The latest police crackdown on Islamic dress has angered many Iranians - male, female, young and old.

But Iranian TV has reported that an opinion poll conducted in Tehran found 86% of people were in favour of the crackdown - a statistic that is surprising given the strength of feeling against this move. Police cars are stationed outside major shopping centres in Tehran. They are stopping pedestrians and even cars - warning female drivers not to show any hair - and impounding the vehicles and arresting the women if they argue back. Middle-aged women, foreign tourists and journalists have all been harassed, not just the young and fashionably dressed.

Individual choice

Overnight the standard of what is acceptable dress has slipped back.

I want the whole world to know that they oppress us and all we can do is put up with it   Tofiq, 15

Hard-won freedoms - like the right to wear a colourful headscarf - have been snatched away.

It may sound trivial but Iranian women have found ways of expressing their individuality and returning to drab colours like black, grey and dark blue is not something they will accept easily.

"If we want to do something we will do it anyway, all this is total nonsense," says a young girl, heavily made up and dressed up. She believes Islamic dress should be something personal - whether you're swathed in a black chador or dressed in what she calls "more normal clothes". Interestingly many women who choose to wear the all enveloping chador agree - saying it's a personal choice and shouldn't be forced on people.

"This year is much worse than before because the newspapers and the TV have given the issue a lot of coverage compared to last year; it wasn't this bad before," says Shabnam who's out shopping with her friend.

Permission denied

At the start of every summer the police say they will enforce the Islamic dress code, but this year has been unusually harsh. Thousands of women have been cautioned by police over their dress, some have been obliged to sign statements that they will do better in the future, and some face court cases against them.

Even shop mannequins considered "too revealing" are dealt with

Though the authorities want coverage internally to scare women - they don't want the story broadcast abroad.

The BBC's cameraman was detained when he tried to film the police at work and the government denied us permission to go on patrol with the police.

"Really we don't have any security," complains Shabam's friend Leyla.

"Since we came out this morning many people we met have continuously warned us to be careful about our headscarves and to wear them further forward because they are arresting women who are dressed like this," she says. Boutique owners are furious. Some shops have been sealed - others warned not to sell tight revealing clothing. One shopkeeper selling evening dresses told us the moral police had ordered him to saw off the breasts of his mannequins because they were too revealing. He said he wasn't the only shop to receive this strange instruction.

Respect

There's even been less traffic on the streets because some women are not venturing out - fearful they will be harassed. And it's not even safe in a car. Taxi agencies have received a circular warning them not to carry a "bad hijabi".

"They have said we shouldn't carry passengers who wear bad Islamic dress and if we do we have to warn them to respect the Islamic dress code even inside the car," said one taxi driver. And it's not just women who are being targeted this year. Young men are being cautioned for wearing short sleeved shirts or for their hairstyles. Morad - a hairdresser whose gelled hair is made to stand straight up - says it's necessary for him to look like this to attract customers.

"These last few days I don't dare walk down the main roads looking like this case I get arrested," he says. "I use the side streets and alleys."

Morad is scared because his friends have told him they've seen the police seize young men and forcibly cut their hair if it's too long. Fifteen-year-old Tofiq who'd also gelled his hair to stand on end said he too was afraid but he wasn't going to change.

"I want the whole world to know that they oppress us and all we can do is put up with it," he said. Some parents have complained that harassing the young over their clothing will only push them to leave the country. But one MP has said those Iranians who cannot cope with Islamic laws should leave. Some commentators have suggested that the government is conducting this crackdown to distract attention from the rising cost of living in Iran and increasing tension with the international community over the nuclear issue. If so, it's a strategy that risks alienating people who've got used to years of relative social freedom and do not want to return to the early days of the revolution when dress rules were much more tightly enforced.