Rahul Mishra’s bridal fall collection is more ethnic with ancient chintz motifs and resham and metal kasab work. He tells Shrabasti Mallik that designs are composite and can be teamed up with other couture creations
The opening of the second day of the ongoing Amazon Indian Couture Week was nothing less than a surprise when designer Rahul Mishra displayed his fall bridal fall collection focussing on Indian silhouettes, which was a diversion from his signature intricate handwork on Western silhouettes.
Titled Tree of life, the collection had a lot of hand embroidery on Indian handloom and fabric. “I have paid attention to a lot of detail to the work,” he said and added, “The collection takes inspiration from the multitasking modern women, in terms of strength and fragility. It bears testimony to our commitment of working with handlooms. And the intricate hand embroideries are an outcome of concerted efforts to reverse the migration of craftsmen back in to their villages from urban dwellings, to take a new step in producing slow fashion.”
The collection strongly highlighted the use of handloom textiles. The embroideries were inspired by ancient chintz motifs with resham work, metal kasab work, and multicoloured Parsi embroidery in most their most tailored avatar. The collection had separates like sweatshirts, bomber jackets, tailored jacket kurtas and capes.
Mishra calls his designs ‘functional costumes.’ He explained that they are not the regular bridal designs which have to be stored away for the next generation to use. “The designs that I have made this time are more composite. They can be teamed up with multiple coutures. It is trendy to be used separately on various occasions. There’s a lot of volume in the clothes. I have used colours such as white, black, beige and pastel shades, with a touch of silver and gold,” he pointed out. For the past year-and-a-half, Mishra has been so caught up with shows at the Paris Fashion week that he has had no time to design and participate in any fashion shows in India. Now that he is here, he calls AICT a natural progression. “Shows in Paris are very taxing as it demands much of your time. Every work, every bit of fabric requires detailed work and minute observation. So, it was a natural progression to be back in India and to debut at AICT,” said the designer.
The response from the international buyers has been very positive. “A lot of pieces that I have showed here, they all go into my showroom in Paris and we will book orders. We are going to sell this collection all over the world, Mishra said..
“We’ve struck Dior, Stella McCartney Balenciaga because I got the messages from their buying directors. We are selling at 1,500 pounds- 2,000 pounds which comes to around Rs2 lakh.