Reluctantly Fundamental

SS24
‘Reluctantly Fundamental’
SS24 ‘Reluctantly Fundamental’
Photographed by Abhishek Khedekar

For this season we wanted to explore notions of Indian masculinity through looking at two key
figures from India’s past. The Maharaja of Indore incorporated Western tailoring and Indian
traditional attire in his wardrobe and some of the embroideries in the collection were inspired
by his traditional attire. He was perceived as a rebel, finding freedom in London and Paris
where he dabbled in his interests in fast cars and jazz, concepts that weren’t very accepted in
Indore. The palace he constructed in Indore took influences from French interior design
blended with local craftsmanship. It was extravagant and intentionally navigated the gauche
with the refined. The balance of opulence and wearability comes from this.

The second person we looked at was former Indian cricket team captain, Sourav Ganguly. I
found a 1999 India cricket team jersey being sold on Ebay in the Ukraine and we hand
embroidered and upcycled it. This was the same kit that Ganguly wore when he scored 183
runs against Sri Lanka in the World Cup, the highest score by an Indian at a world cup. Growing
up as a kid playing cricket, he was the man. He was well spoken, a great batsman and a real

piece of shit. When India beat England at Lord’s he took his shirt off and started celebrating.
There’s something unapologetically Indian about his attitude that we tried to channel literally
and figuratively through the collection and through a cricket inspired sneaker collaboration we
are launching with Stepney Workers Club.

Personally, this was the first collection I designed since moving back to India from the States.
there was a focus on returning to our roots and returning to the brand’s core values of
championing craftsmanship and local heritage. We shot the collection at an abandoned palace
in rural Rajashtan. The arid landscape, rocky deserts and saturated local village juxtaposed
against the magisterial palace portrays the proximity of chaos and romance that can only exist
in India. Rooms in the palace were entirely hand tiled in the 17 th and 18 th century and have been
preserved by the local royals to this day. Some of the block prints and embroideries were
inspired by images of the palace we found when designing the collection.
Silhouettes morph codes of traditional Indian and Western tailoring with new perspectives on
the Sherwani and the Bandh Gala being introduced through Kantha fabrics. 90% of the
collection is woven on handlooms, requiring no electricity in the production of fabric. All the
embroideries are done by hand and the dyes for our block prints are extracted from vegetables.
We developed heavily textured linens with women weaver cooperatives in the Himalayas. The
knitwear in the collection is also produced by a hand-knitting women owned cooperative in the
Kumaon region of the Himalayas. This season was also the first time we block printed on wool.
Using a handloom wool from Gujarat with a lot of character, we were able to create prints that
are desaturated and look as though they have been sun faded for years. New hand painting

techniques using indigo and madder pigments are used to recreate antique chintz fabric for
shirting.
The collection more elaborately displays the extent of the craftsmanship that we have to offer,
acting as a vessel to India for our customers, helping us get closer to our goal of building a global Indian heritage brand.

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