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Business News/ Mint-lounge / Excerpt | Sex and Swarovski
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Excerpt | Sex and Swarovski

Excerpt | Sex and Swarovski

Illustration by Jayachandran/MintPremium

Illustration by Jayachandran/Mint

Raakesh had earlier told me how the rich women of Hyderabad would buy traditional Kanjeevaram saris and send them to designers like him to further embellish them with crystals. ‘I create Kanjeevaram sari sets with sexy blouses and belts. Babes, South India wants to glam up!’ he said. To meet his customers ‘who count Swarovskis before agreeing to the price of a lehnga’, Raakesh invited me yet again to his Noida studio.

There I saw a would-be bride and her mother arguing hotly about where the girl would tie her wedding lehnga. The duo had flown in from another city for the fitting of the bridal ensemble, which would cost them 5 lakh. The ensemble consisted of a lehnga which had to be fitted at the waist and a choli created from only about 60 cms of cloth, I figured. ‘Isn’t it too sexy for a bride?’ I whispered to Raakesh. ‘There is nothing like “too sexy" anymore,’ he responded, patting me on the back reassuringly. ‘From Meerut to Hyderabad, every bride including those from Marwari families only want backless itsy-bitsy cholis. That’s why I have to give wine to the mummies,’ he said winking. ‘I want my tattoo to show, so I will tie it here,’ the young girl yelled, indicating where she wanted the lehnga, way down below her belly button.

‘How can you tie it there?’ said the mother losing her cool. ‘What will people say?’

Illustration by Jayachandran/Mint

Raakesh smiled indulgently but didn’t intrude. Such slanging matches were a routine in his studio and he had learnt not to leap into the battle. Instead, he had smartened up his selling tactics and ordered wine and pizza when he expected rich customers for fittings. ‘They spend a few lakhs on each ensemble, I can’t have them driving out of my studio for a good lunch. So water to begin with then wine and Italian food, that’s the least I do when I have clients shopping for lavish weddings,’ he said.

Most affluent weddings in India now are like the Baroque court where wealth, power, and status are served up in a flaming pudding of excess. The lehnga, the sartorial centerpiece of this ritual of profusion, is the show stopper. Its materials are sourced from all over the world. Then come the embellishments on it—new stones riding piggy back on old embroideries. It is couture in the way it is handmade, involves intensive labour, days of work on one garment, fittings and intimate designer-client interaction. Raakesh was right, it must be sampled over food and wine in a studio setting that attempts to replicate a luxurious palace. These garments were a rage even in the Middle East market where crystal studded couture made the Sheikhs swoon.

Raakesh was one of the most avid users of Swarovski crystals. But he could not afford to buy genuine Swarovski pieces. Instead, he bought his sequins, stones, crystals from private vendors abroad who sold them for 30 percent cheaper than the Austrian company and also gave him a credit of forty-five days.

When I asked Tarun Tahiliani what drove Indians to look like Karan Johar baraatis, he defended India’s obsession with bling. TT had recently even created a jewellery line in association with the Austrian crystal brand. ‘Bling is in our tradition. The nouveau riche prefer it because they think it makes them noticeable. Taste comes with time. But why look only at embellishments? Look at the way we measure, sculpt a sari, gown or lehnga around a customer. It is not as if we are only stitching crystals on to saris. I have French tube tops with sari drapes; I have hired specialists to do this job, so that a wedding ensemble is cut like a global garment but made from Indian fabric. The vocabulary is Indian, the cut is European. This is the definition of contemporary Indian couture. Once you accept it, even if grudgingly, it is easy to see why the multi-hued Swarovski crystals mirror the story of our transition."

*****************

Powder Room—The Untold Story of Indian Fashion: Random House, 352 pages, 399.

If anyone simplified life for Raakesh and understood, supported, nourished and accepted him as he was—besides his older sister—it was his partner Apurbe G. Tewari. A mild-mannered, middleaged gentleman, who can easily pass for Raakesh’s elder brother, he took him home to live with him, his wife and kids. Apurbe may formally be Raakesh’s partner and mentor, but he is actually his anchor and friend, and really the only reason why Raakesh can still call himself a designer.

‘Anyone else would have thrown me out after the number of temperamental outbursts, anger fits, drinking and drug binges that I got into,’ says Raakesh. He had flitted from having a girlfriend to having male sexual partners and was taken for psychological counseling by his older sister and Apurbe. But it was the latter who held him through when he completely broke down. Business suffered severely.

Raakesh wasn’t just doing drugs but after having quit working with Tahiliani in 2005, he floated on as a derivative designer. He had no individual statement, nothing to distinguish his USP in fashion. One day, Sabyasachi walked up to him at a Lakme Fashion Week stall and advised him to dump his western silhouettes and obsession for western wear and create what India wants.

‘Had it not been for Sabyasachi, I would have battled with silly esteem issues, believing that Western wear is edgy and Indian wear meant being regressive as a designer,’ he said. ‘I was inspired by Sabyasachi, look at how Indian his clothes and silhouettes are, how true he is to himself, to the craft of our country and by that to his customers,’ said Raakesh. ‘If Valentino can remain loyal to gowns and Karl Lagerfeld can make Chanel jackets and Fendi dresses; if Roberto Cavalli doesn’t change himself for anyone, why should an Indian designer make a living out of Western wear?’ said Raakesh to me at his factory.

This made Raakesh change his design focus towards Indian garments, making sequined saris with sexy cholis, kurtis, tunics, and lehngas. Having learnt construction at Tarun Tahiliani’s he was always good at it and now included draping in his design. To stay afloat and grow, he would invest in a two dimensional plan: embellished garments and use of fluid fabrics that draped well.

‘I made leather bustiers and dresses for two seasons but I went bankrupt,’ he said.

Excerpted from Shefalee Vasudev’s book Powder Room: The Untold Story of Indian Fashion.

Write to lounge@livemint.com

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Published: 13 Jul 2012, 10:02 PM IST
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