CIUDAD JUÁREZ, Mexico — The crowd toasted with beers as first-time models strutted the makeshift catwalk in princess wedding dresses and Tarahumara Indian-inspired flower-print jumpers, all produced by local fashion designers bent on showing the world that their troubled border city is as much about hemlines as homicides.

“The city has hope now,” said Eli Valle, one of the designers presenting her collection during a fashion show in Ciudad Juárez last month. “Businesses are opening. People have shed their fear.”

This is still a terribly violent city — at least eight people were killed over the weekend, including a man bound and left in the street with plastic bags covering his face. But over all, homicide rates have decreased significantly from their peak in 2010, and young people in particular are stepping out, joining art collectives around town and even partying after dark at reopened nightclubs.

The organizers of the fashion show, a group called Amor por Juárez (“Love for Juárez”), which has loosely based its efforts on the “I Love New York” campaign, are planning to open a clothing boutique in downtown Juárez next year.