the printed imagination/ concept and technology
At the beginning of my journey, in 2014-15, I was looking to find fresh ways to explore fabrics and surface techniques. The aim was to produce new surface designs. Something that could stick out, perhaps even in a somewhat eccentric way, while appealing to the rich traditions of sensibility already available in Indian fashions. I thought, instead of embroidery work on the surface, it would be best to paint directly on the fabric. But then I realized it would be quite time consuming and difficult to scale up at the time. So I went on to explore different printing techniques and discovered the new aesthetic avenues opening up through screen printing and digital printing of the kind of designs I really wanted to see on the garments. Instead of hand painting on the garment, therefore, we did it on paper and then transferred it onto the computer. Then we processed and edited it (without adding extraneous elements to the hand painted design), and prepared to print it digitally to create the impression of an original painting on fabric. And that was that! I decided then that we would plan at least one original print for every collection. It was less cumbersome and quicker to scale, even if the process did involve a few closely worked stages; so once we opened up to the intervention of new technologies of planning and production, it became simpler to come up logically with a new way of doing a collection too.
It became our aim then to tell the diverse stories hidden in the textures of print and Indian fabrics. There is of course no dearth of inspiration in historical cultures of the past that are still with us- so we borrowed liberally from architectural styles, poetry, painting and sculpture- ranging across the worlds of Europe and India. There is a desire to find new echoes from the past and a creative will to use them for new forms and patterns that are fun and feminine, using the broad surfaces that are available in Indian fabrics, and making something that will catch your eye. So we create a print- or two!- every season for our collections since the very beginning and these new surface designs eventually became our style signature.