Picadors and Baderilleros spice up the WIFW Autumn-Winter 2014 game for Pankaj and Nidhi
By Asmita Aggarwal
It has been a conscious effort to reinvent the proverbial fashion wheel, for husband-wife duo Pankaj and Nidhi, and they say in unison that complacency is not something thats in their design vocabulary. So the focus of the brand changes direction every 2-3 years by incorporating different techniques as the language remains the same, but the story evolves.
We went for the International Woolmark competition last year and that kind of brought immense perspective to our thought process. We understood what shift we had to make. Our clothes due to the hand crafting sometimes get heavy, and thats just what Donatella Versace and Diane Von Furstenberg told us after seeing our collection. When you are selling to an international audience the feel has to be super luxurious; plus, it must have a whole lot of desirability in terms of visual appeal. We had both, but the garments needed to be lighter, this was the turning point for us, says Pankaj Ahuja.
Growing up as an Army kid, Pankaj imbibed all the discipline you need to put together a line from his dad, who till today after his retirement is active. Though he does admit that sometimes its hard to be everything—-look after retail, marketing, sales, plus, the creative aspect. That I would say is my biggest weakness, not being able to just create, he smiles.
Looking at three important aspects in his line—-symmetry, movement and length along with techniques, it is Nidhi his soulmate, who brings in the balance. I sometimes tend to fly off, making imaginary airplanes, Nidhi is more practical, she knows what will work, he laughs.
Given a chance to be a time traveler, Pankaj is sure that it isnt in the past he would like to journey, rather it will certainly be the exciting future, where fashion will truly be cutting edge. Im sure 30 years ahead, designers will be doing amazing things and I want to be a witness to that era, he says candidly.
Even though it is challenging to be in an age where the number of designers is multiplying by the hour, Pankaj and Nidhi do agree that from Karol Bagh to DLF Emporio, the market is saturated, so the only option left is to be confident of your product. Honestly, everyone has their own space and I have never been the one to be threatened. With the current economic climate it will be tougher for bigger designers to battle the odds, but we are still a small company. I believe we have the potential to grow and the graph for us will be upward as we are in the expansion mode, he admits.
With back-to-back hit collections that have won the duo media applause as well as critical acclaim, Pankaj confesses that he does feel the pressure to be perfect, but that translates into doing something better than you have done before. It takes several years to write a great book and then you can take a break, in fashion there are no intervals, every six months you have to excel. On the flipside thats what makes it so exciting; fashion is obsessed with newness and sometimes this makes the ride a bumpy one, he confirms.
Interestingly, with a clear focus on fit, texture and finish, Pankajs autumn-winter 2014 line is inspired by the story of the death-defying spirit of matadors, people who put their lives on stake to entertain you. We were doing uniforms for the Spanish embassy when we got a glimpse into this gruesome sport. As designers what we noticed almost immediately was their dress, embroidery and vivacious colours. We were fascinated by the culture, history and the bull fights, so this made a great mood board for us, he says.
But this is not all. A pack of cards has also been ingeniously amalgamated, with diamonds, clubs, spades and hearts playing a robust game. Even though they are parallel ideas, the duo has managed to coalesce it seamlessly. Earlier we would do several techniques in one garment, now I control myself, he laughs.
So winter will have 3D appliqué, something that they both love and a bit of their signature, along with another favourite—-crewel embroidery, which is a bit like crochet using wool, so the level of skill used is quite high. We have made little emblems and patterns of characters in a card box for dimension, he concludes.
