The October edition of Lakme Fashion Week X FDCI, held in Delhi, saw four Calcutta-based designers showcase their creations. While Ajay Kumar played around with his signature clashing prints, Kritika Murarka explored chic layering. Label Rahul Dasgupta and Richa Khemka played around with textures, with elements of sporty cool and sophisticated chic, respectively.

Rahul and Ajay shared a show. Ajay sent his The Wild Monarch on the ramp, which was an explosion of colours, prints, character and drama. Bold and how! Red, yellow, gold, dark green, with tiger, peacock, lotus, phoenix prints splashed across jackets, bombers, pants, parkas, suits, silk kurta sets and “engineered kurtas” made for a high-on-visual-impact collection. There was zardozi and appliqué on silk cotton, linen, silk linen, seersucker and cotton.

Rahul’s Co-existence was all about grace, subtle drama and festive with an element of laidback smart. The all-red looks were delicious. “The kind of red... so beautiful. There is so much detail. People tell us your prints are so detailed, and there is a story to tell about each print, but his garments are so detailed. You need an eye to merge things together,” Ajay said of his peer from Calcutta.

“I consider myself a very safe designer. All my colours are like blue, white. And I’m like, I have to give something which is not so safe. So, then the red came. But I wish I could put more colour in that,” laughed Rahul.

He enjoyed how Ajay put together his prints. “I wish I had an eye like he has for prints. I mean, hats off to him, the way he pulls it off. There is print all over, and it still works and on so many levels,” smiled Rahul, when we met both of them, post-show.

Ajay said there was no formula to fashion or right and wrong. “Don’t be afraid to experiment. A model at the show was saying he never thought he’d look good in prints. So you can imagine. People are so scared of experimenting, but I am so happy people are now wearing our clothes. You can see in Calcutta also. People are wearing prints from head to toe. They are asking for it,” he said.

With The Wild Monarch, Ajay once again drew from nature and married them to elements of the royal vibe. “This time, we have gone for a more structured look. We have done different kinds of bags which are not available anywhere. We are entering into a different kind of world right now with our accessories,” he said.

The collection had tones of leisure and travel. At the heart of it all was fun. Ajay played around with sequins and sheer. “Last time we tried sequins, it was a hit,” he smiled.

With Co-existence, Rahul tried to show “how two people, two different things, kind of live together”. “So, we live in a world right now where tolerance as a word is quite alien, right? So, this collection celebrates the mutual tolerance. So, here if you see, I have used two extremes in every sense. I have practised surface development techniques, but I have fine-tailoring. I’m juggling. So Chanderi against this denim. And, you know, it is modern, but it has this traditional angarkha styles. I loved juggling these two extremes. So that’s the mutual tolerance,” he explained.

There were pants inspired by the dhoti, which we loved. “I thought about what to do about this dhoti, because my last collection also had a dhoti. So, I was just thinking how we can kind of, you know, reincorporate this here. So, yeah, that’s how I came up with these high-waisted dhoti pants,” he said. Open thread texturing and his USP, shibori, lent the pieces a certain dreamy quality.

Richa Khemka celebrated 10 years of her label with Vantage, drawing from nature. She incorporated velvets and sheer organzas in her pieces with embroidery. Overall, a glam eveningwear collection. The Ba***ds of Bollywood actress Sahher Bambba debuted on the ramp in classic monochromes, exuding old-world retro glam. “I wanted to not go extremely young, but I wanted to keep the vintage glam alive. Yet I was like, let’s do something flirty, a little glamorous. Let’s try something new, classic but with a modern twist,” said Richa.

Sahher loved the look. “When I first saw the outfit, I was amazed. And like she said, this is a beautiful hand-embroidered pearl corset with velvet,” she smiled. Though she had butterflies in her stomach, once the music started and “adrenaline kicked in”, she felt at ease. Post the release of The Ba***ds of Bollywood, Sahher’s life had changed “in every way”. “Everybody’s loving the show and the characters, and I’m very happy and grateful that what Aryan (Khan) actually envisioned, people are enjoying it. And I mean the show was out, I think three weeks back, and till date my phone is like buzzing non-stop.

I don’t think I’ve slept like a single day properly if I may say so because even in the middle of the night, I just pick up my phone just to read comments and check DMs and mentions. And the industry has been really amazing and a lot of support from the industry, so I’m very grateful,” said Sahher, a Shah Rukh Khan fan, who loves all SRK films, and has a soft spot for Piku.

Richa shared how the journey had been a “constant learning curve”. “You should never stop trying,” she smiled. “I started off from a finance background. So getting into fashion and it’s been a learning curve all the way for the past 10 years. I’ve always learned on the job. And fashion week kind of makes you challenge yourself. Every time you want to put something out there, you’re challenging your own creativity. You want to bring in your best. You want to try new things. So it’s a great platform to demonstrate things that you’ve learnt over the years. And this year, we wanted to do something which was based on landscapes and the layers of nature, because, you know, when you’re standing at a vantage point of 10 years and you look down from a point, you see the emotional and mental landscapes that you’ve been through over the years. You’re looking at what will happen next with your label. So the entire collection was based on layers,” she added.

How had Calcutta impacted her creativity and shaped her psyche as a designer? “The workmanship in Calcutta is very neat. Whatever you have in mind can only be translated if the workers can translate that for you. I’m so lucky that everyone who’s working for me has that skill to translate it so beautifully. I’ve not experienced other parts of India, but I would hands down say that I’m very lucky to be based out of Calcutta,” she signed off.

Kritika Murarka, who launched her label in 2018, showed at LFW x FDCI for the first time. We loved the edgy-coolness and fluid charm of the pieces that drew inspiration from the quaint Mata Ortiz pottery. Kritika titled her collection Terravive. “Terravive is the ability of the earth to renew and sustain its own sense. This whole selection was supposed to be a tribute to organic textures that we have in our country, but again grounded since we are very grounded in the silhouette. The silhouettes are basic. We wanted to, of course, make it look runway-friendly, which is why we have layered it completely to make it look different. We’ve used a lot of craftsmanship from our country, like kantha, handmade crochet, hand-cord embroidery, Bengal khadi, Bengal silk, Bengal handloom tissue and moonga silk. There were handmade tassels and potli buttons happening as detailing. All of this just added to the entire collection, to add that texture,” explained Kritika.

We loved the play of stripes and checks. “The first collection that we launched with also had stripes, and ever since then, we have realised that we have a little knack for stripes and somewhere or other we end up going back to it. So even though we have these Mata Ortiz pottery-inspired prints, we have combined it with our personal touch of ajrakh stripes that we do from Kutch. We also have these vintage houndstooth checks,” she said.

The art of layering is a personal choice. “We layered a sari with a high-neck top, and then we have a skirt over that sari, and then we also have an overcoat over that sari. So, quite a few things are happening there. What you do should define you as a person,” she smiled.