Mannequins wrapped head-to-toe in whites dot Anamika Khanna’s Outram Street studio. Before you start wondering if she’s working on installations modelled on Egyptian mummies, Anamika tells you that it’s actually a “teaser” of her collection for the Lakme Fashion Week Summer/Resort 2015 finale slated on March 22 in Mumbai. 

Anamika will be interpreting Lakme’s beauty statement of the season — Sculpt, and the designer promises an “interesting interpretation of sculpt”. “The whole take is not what you expect. I’m sure people are going to expect sculpt, I’m going to do a very interesting interpretation of sculpt,” she tells t2. Over to Anamika... 

As Lakme Fashion Week celebrates 15 years, there is such a strong Calcutta presence this year. Like the two most prestigious shows — the opening (Sabyasachi Mukherjee) and the finale are both by Calcutta designers. How does it feel?

It feels quite proud. People are lining up for Calcutta, otherwise it’s always about Bombay and Delhi designers. I think we’re making a statement, it’s a proud moment. I am an Indian first... all these Calcutta, Bombay, Delhi doesn’t matter... but yes, it’s a proud moment.

How has LFW impacted your career over the years?

My first show was Lakme (fashion week). The minute we started doing these fashion weeks formally, we started organising our collections. Before that we just used to make random clothes, there was no organised fashion. That was one impact in my life. Then we started working according to the seasons, spring-summer, fall-winter... of course in India we do wedding clothes in between, festivals, Diwali, that’s a different matter, but we definitely have spring-summer and fall-winter collections that we come out with, that was one of the most important things. We also learnt to categorise our collection, to edit it. Besides that, what happens is when you are showing, you automatically start to look at trends, worldwide, you start looking at what’s happening in the Western world. You start researching a lot more. It’s not just about making clothes anymore.

When Lakme and FDCI split in 2006 and both did their separate fashion weeks, how did you handle that? Especially since you were on the board of both the fashion weeks...

I ran away (laughs)... I disappeared from the scene, it was like I can’t deal with this scene. Because it was very hard for us to choose sides. Then I realised, for me to do couture (week) made a lot more sense... that is my main collection… and I stuck to that. And after a long time I’m actually doing Lakme….

So is it like you’ve decided you’ll do fashion weeks only if you get a finale?

Not really. You know I feel that couture is what my collection really is, but if I see that there is a line that requires a fashion week, I will do that... not like I’ll only do a finale.

What about international fashion weeks?

I actually gave it a break after my last one. A little bit of settlement happening at home with the boys moving, they going to university and all that. All this while life has come around in different ways... I’ll start venturing out once again.

Coming to your finale collection for LFW, what is the story?

It is an interesting story, it is a chaotic story... chaotic might not be the right word, but its a very edgy, experimental interpretation of sculpt. You know what happens is, the minute you say sculpt, all of them, the whole team started thinking of constructed clothes, tailoring, sharp lines, all sorts of moulded things and stuff like that. I am like why should I be doing that sort of sculpt? I had to bring my own interpretation... also the fact that I can’t change my style completely and do what someone else is doing. So what we decided to do is bring a very interesting twist to the sculpt story. We wanted to take something that is softer and more fluid and work on sculpt with that. So the lines are sharper, everything is more constructed but in a very deconstructed sort of way. It’s almost like I lived in Paris for 100 years and I designed an Indian collection from there.

We can see only whites all around, is the collection all about whites?

That’s not it... but you know how it is... with me, I sleep white, drink white, dream white, think white, wear white... so that always becomes a very important part of the collection. But here we have black, we have gunmetal, we also have a lot of pastels, so it’s very interesting.

But Lakme’s shadecard for this collection has a lot of reds... how do you bring that in?
This is the idea. When you are wearing red on your lips, you don’t want to be wearing red clothes. If your hair and face is fully sculpted, you don’t want to wear top-to-bottom sculpted clothes. That’s the balance I’m trying to bring. So if my lips are dark burgundy or a deep coral, if I wear a coral outfit I don’t know what I’m going to look like. I’m trying to offset the two and make them work together rather than do sculpted clothes in the same colour.... I’m just turning it on its head and making it work my own way.

One would obviously expect Sonam Kapoor as the showstopper in such an important show of yours. Why Kareena Kapoor Khan?

Sonam is L’Oreal (smiles), but I’m quite happy. We’ve been dressing Kareena too, Sonam is a die-hard (Anamika fan), so everybody is like Sonam, Sonam, Sonam, but yes there are others who wear the clothes as well and look gorgeous as well. It’s an edgy collection and Kareena is herself a very edgy person, she’s not one of those typical filmi people... she’s very smart. Even in her dressing she’s stylish, she’s smart, she knows her body... her attitude, the way she talks... I feel it’s going to work. I’m keeping my fingers crossed, I hope she likes what I’m doing.

Any favourites from your LFW collections over the years? Or any one show that always comes to your mind first?

Does it have to be LFW? Otherwise I can say my Couture Week collection we did two years ago in Delhi at the Leela, that is one of my most famous collections. It’s again a very edgy interpretation, the maangtika like a Mohawk. It was one of those collections I just remember in my head, every garment, every look… the models were screaming, shouting, the models from the other shows... you know it was like very high-energy. Then of course there was the Bvlgari collection... it was just so sexy, so ethereal, the jewels, the flowers.