Huemn shows it human side as they foray into the capital with their characteristic sports luxe and a pinch of leather and layering.
By Asmita Aggarwal
They began their journey as classmates in NIFT, Bangalore, but soon became business partners in their label Huemn, launched five years ago. Pravav Mishra and Shyma Shetty are quite different, the former reclusive, the latter gregarious. Maybe its got to do with the cities and upbringing, with Pravav from Lucknow and Shyma from an industrialist family in Bangalore.
Huemn is a mix of the word hue (colour) and emotion, so it is a bit of wordplay that they indulged in while looking for a label that encapsulates their design algorithm. Pranav had worked for Abhishek Gupta and Nandita Basu, while Shyama honed her skills at Nitin Kartikeya. We are both very different but somewhere our aesthetics kind of merged, therefore in our core you will see poetry and books that form an effective muse for our collections, she says.
Easy to wear, yet stands out, Huemn experiments with sports luxe and in every collection till date they have used a new or improved embellishment techniques.
In 2014, they were also one of the few designers, who put sneakers on the runway and were mesmerised by American novelist Charles Bukowskis heady socio-economic and political commentary in the form of poetry, on to their line, almost metaphorically. We got exclusive and evocative images from the ace lensman Mark Hanauers and converted them to prints, she explains.
Shyma believes that women want to feel happy now and that makes it a very exciting time in fashion, where everything is being accepted with a fistful of salt (here a pinch wont work). We are also using winter fabrics for summer, like velvet for spring. Layering has been a constant in our line along with separates, which we design and then mix and match before the show, she adds.
Leather inserts have been a used by the duo and this time they are introducing patent leather (which is 100 per cent silk and lightweight), along with 3D textures in a softer manner. It started with the gorilla, which was used as a motif to show the animalistic side, he is also the leader of the tribe and it fit in with the very alpha look we did. We will take it forward this year too, but in a fresh way, she confirms.
One of the few designers who wants a critical media, Shyma also urges for stores to be more supportive as she plans to venture into e-commerce soon. We launched the Huemn Project, a separate line, which is not bound to seasons with a capsule collection of 10-15 shirts, and some fun trousers and jackets. In the future we would like to collaborate with artists, she concludes.