Afterhours

Dear Reader,

I dont know who you are or if you actually even read what I type in here. But I know that you exist, because my little map of the world traces you to your city each time you visit me. I know I havn't been writing much lately, which is a bit sad on my part, but fashion wise there isn't much what is happening here as of now.

I normally don't visit new fashion stores,  its no point really, its the same garments and the same fashion statement which the designer is trying to make in their studio. Besides, there aren't any stores in the country which actually take fashion seriously-in terms of their decor or the window displays. They all stick with the tried and tested formula-give the customer what they want, not perk them up and treat them intelligently and give them something they 'might' want.

But all that is set to change with a new store which opened recently and of which I had the chance to visit. After hours in Hauz Khas Village is such a store which has single handedly taken upon itself to change the way we see fashion stores in the country.

Established by 6 designers themselves, there is no middleman to cheat them of the money which they will make from the sales. Also absent is the same boring mannequin displays with sales women who run around you all the time. Spread across three floors, with a quaint lake as the view, the store sells very quirky one of a kind pieces, with a made to measure area on the top floor. There is also a section for  beautiful yardages for your home and furniture pieces which are made on special orders.

So next time you are in the heritage village on this side of Delhi and feel the urge to spend some money on designer outfits which arent available anywhere else in the country,  drop by at Afterhours.

Designers at the store: 11:11, Azara,Mayank Mansingh Kaul, Morphe, Pèro and Peter D’Ascoli.

Mon-Sat 11 am to 7 pm
A-18, Hauz Khas Village, New Delhi
afterhours.in, info@afterhours.in

The Kingdom of Love

At the dawn of the contemporary Indian Fashion Scene...there were just a handful of designers. The first ones who came out of the fancy design institute - NIFT. Most of them went on to be stalwarts of the nascent industry.

JJ Valaya is one of them. He is someone who built his empire of fashion on excess and rich fabrics, designs which were inspired by royalty and the wealth of Indian kings. Wearing his outfits became a matter of pride for more brides and grooms at weddings as they wanted to project the image of being rich. JJ soon became stuff of legends as ge went deeper into his roots to fish out inspirations and some long lost traditions of making outfits and styles.

And then came a series of interesting designs which perhaps fell flat on the ground. Men in skirts. By no means I love a gorgeous hunk in a kilt but not the long flowy skirts which are so reminscent of the ghagra traditions. It began from a season and then went on to a repetitive nature of JJ's clothes. Now each of his shows are not complete without any of them..what began as a fantasy Kingdom of Love is today the crazy design guy who makes outfits for God knows who!

What I really want to know is who buys these weird outfits? Why does he make them? If you will notice JJ no longer shows up in any fashion magazine or is hardly ever talked about as a prominent designer.

What the hell happened?

Yet Another Fashion Week

Fashion seems to be everywhere we look these days. From the tiny, unknown lanes to the upscale luxury malls. It seems to be defining the way we look at people. We are increasingly becoming habitual of checking to see what the person is wearing, what bag is it or if the outfit was repeated before.

While all of this could mostly lead to something good - more business for the industry, there are somethings which could hurt in places where it hurts!

Take the case of the multiple fashion weeks in the country for example. We have the main bigger events - Lakme & Wills and now there is a Kolkata Fashion Week, Ahemdabad Fashion Week, Pune Fashion Week, Bangalore Fashion Week, Chennai Fashion Week and now an International Fashion Week!

While these will certainly provide a lot of oppurtunity to all those who want to show their creativity and talent, these events will also encourage enough of riff-raff to be in the lime light. Where is the safety valve which checks these people into showing their garments and torturing others in return? Maybe the IPC should now institute a new law which will put such creatures of bad taste behind bars!

Then ofcourse there is the case of what image of India do we represent to the world? With so many multiple events, how dot he buyers choose? Who do they choose? These multitude of events only end up creating chaos and confusion.

And even as I stop myself from going to yet another fashion week, I know I will be reading about it and wondering where does it stop? SIGH!

Front Row Queen

Every runway show at the fashion week has its media politics. Which magazine gets how many seats, who is a media partner and who is just way to important to supercede all. Its a slim hierachy which exists and is followed to the tip by the PR executives. Those sitting in the wrong places are unceremoniously asked to vacate and move on at the back, where all you can see is the heads of people and how much dandruff they've got.

But there is another thing to be said about the Front Row Royalty. Most of them have no clue of fashion, most of them dont even know what it means to sit or just how to sit in the front row. At one of the runway shows I saw one famous so-called-fashion-journalist masticating a big ball of chewing gum in her mouth as the models went by. It was her idea of being cool. Unfortunately for her in innards of her mouth were often captured in the pictures taken  by the photographers.

Another thing about the media Queens in the front row is how they rush to the loo right after the show. The first time it happened I thought the girl actually was bursting to go! The second time I caught her in the loo while I was washing my hands. The girl had no apparent bladder problem, she was infact rushing in to check her make-up and fix her hair. All this for someone who wont even get noticed, worse would not even be able to talk any sense if she was asked a pointed question about the collection.

India seriously lacks sensible fashion journos. All we have are the ones who are too busy doling out favors to their boyfriends, husbands, girlfriends, boyfriends who're girlfriends and sometimes just because they want to sleep with the designer! Sigh!!

To Be or Not To Be...

Sometimes, there are things you do for love. Those are things which you have no control over and you expect nothing in return. In the world of fashion too, one does similar things, for example you could walk the runway for someone out of love or sit in the front row or be backstage for moral support or just be there with a glass of Jack Daniels on the rocks in times of crisis. Recently, I too did something out of love. Sat through a torturous journey of clothes, worse through the hugely sad turn of events. The occasion you ask?  Designer Sanjana Jon's show.

 

I share my personal relationships of mutual admiration with a whole bunch of people, some of them are actors, directors, models, designers, artists and so on. One of them is the Diva Sushmita Sen. She was on the runway and I had to see her, more so because  I wanted to see the oodles of weight she's lost recently - of which I was being told constantly.

 

So, there I am waiting for the show and suddenly its the 3rd Degree! Hideous outfits bought from Lajpat Nagar reared their ugly head and took me by surprise. No sense of aesthetics or even a basic understanding of what is a collection was the obvious statement of the day. And more so, the celebs werent spared even.

 Then I heard the real Truth. The only reason Sanjana did  the show was because of a main sponsor, she bypassed the 'Jury' for selection because of the money shown. And then just bought clothes from wherever she could. If there were any celebs who looked even half worth their salt was because they were wearing clothes from their 'OWN WARDROBE'.

Well Sanjana surely gave the phrase Do It Yourself a whole new meaning.

Ashish's Own Brand of Feminism

Every now and then, there is a designer who becomes your favorite. You like him because of what he does, because of the way he carries himself, sometimes because of the way he interacts with you and a lot of times because of his charm. For Ashish has always been that designer. He is genuine, extremely talented and absolutely brilliant with his craft.

Each season that comes by, I wait to see what will be bring forth and long to sit through his show. His sense of structure and the finish with the classic understated appeal is for me, forever. This season he tried to reinvent his woman. She was more of a 'man' in her appearance, sporting men's spectacles and wearing clothes with sharp cuts with a color palette of predominantly black...the detailing was in the manner of delicate weaves and the tailoring with more emphasis on structure and cuts.

 

If I sound like am almost gushing about him, well I AM..and he of all people deserves it!

Rumour Has It!

I love Manish Arora!

I have always thought Manish Arora is class apart from the Indian Fash Frat. He can actually think different and do a presentation which many havn't on Indian runways. A season ago I had even heard rumors that he was perhaps going to be the first Indian designer to be taken over by the fashion giant LVMH. And then the bubble bust apparently.

It was recession and Manish did all color presentation, in Europe. His whacky sense of fashion played off the Euro market, only that no one bought color that season. And then I heard from someone that he was now broke. Apparently he only survived this season because Amby Valley became his sponsor for the show in Paris.

Manish didnt even show in India!

These are all rumors ofcourse, but then rumors too begin from some little truth dont you think?

Nimirta & Umesh

I love going to young designer's shows. For a simple reason, they're fresh, have newer ideas and sometimes are just brilliantly talented! But this time there were these two youngsters who seem to have put on a show to entertain only for themselves, because for some reason the world was ending and they HAD because it was absolutely essential they do!


I can't understand the Mumbai based designer Nimirta Lalwani. What was it, that she was trying to say through her clothes? I suppose the fact that she was completely spaced out and it was a last minute decision to do the show? Blank outfits, bad fits, bad structuring and to top it really loud sequins! Lalwani should just stay at home and look at her work and perhaps hone in what she wants to do with herself. It's all about that little extra effort which is needed to to introspect and see what your purpose in life really is, having lots of money and putting on a show to torture people isn't a good idea I'd say!

And then there was Umesh Vashisht. I had last season though to myself, that the boy seems to have some potential, only I think I said it too soon. He successfully quashed my opinion of him. Looking at his clothes, the first thing I thought to myself was, seems like a nautical theme with all the ships stuck to the models heads, but then what next? NOTHING it seemed! Apparently sticking ships and then doing a couple of outfits in white and blue is as far as his imagination went, in terms of what a nautical theme could be.

SIGH!

The Torture

It's very interesting how the Indian Fashion Weeks seem to have these good for nothing designers, showcasing the country's talent. Take for example the case of the disgusting duo: Pravesh & Jai.

I have absolutely no idea who gave them an entry into the fashion week? Not only the collection was particularly bad (swimwear!) they even topped that a screechy presentation of Shibani Kashyap(the Queen of fugly) on the runway. Out came on after the other absolutely rubbish and the garments made no sense whatsoever. Instead of the fashion week, it was more like I was sitting in the middle of lajpat nagar thrift shops with pesky lingerie.

I wondered to myself who gives them the entry? Every year there is a big show about how there is an independent jury who selects designers and that there are some extreme stringent measures which are put in place to check such rubbish. And yet guys like P&J slip through the mesh easily. But thats not all, the very next day they are even featured prominently in Times of India!!!(well that can perhaps be excused, since quite clearly they had bought the space on MediaNet)Cant help but wonder, if its just a case of innocuous mistake or if there is 'more than just connections' involved!

Fashion Week Ends

Another edition of the Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week ended last night. For most people am a permanent fixture at these events, owing to the fact that I've been to so many of them and also because I happen to know way too many of the Indian fashion fraternity.

But it was last night that the idea of this blog germinated in my mind, looking around the people and the usual crowd, everyone wanted to know just one single thing...what happened to FASHION? Why was there none at the event? Why were most of these designers selected? How? Do they even sell? Some of them I have to admit were so bad, that it was a pain to even sit through their show and then there were some who did the same old thing, repackaging stale wine. And then were the pièce de résistance of the event> the minuscule minority who were pushed into bad time slots, bad choreography and silly models, but had the spark to pull through and show some interesting fashion. Only, too little and too late.

No one ever writes about the agony it is to watch some of the lamest designs in the world or the real story behind this world of quicksand. And will be my endeavor to write. To tell these stories, with names and no mincing or sugar-coating of words.

So for all the gossip and behind the scene stories, keep reading...