JULY 2019 — 79IMAGE: NAINA.CO (RUNWAY)
introduction of wallets, sunglasses, shoes and belts,
part of a broader push that will also include branded
fragrances and cosmetics.BHADRALOK ROOTS
Sabyasachi’s first menswear collection was part of his
2011 Lakmé Fashion Week show. It was notable for the
family vignettes: models and children all dressed in
his signature aesthetic. Sabya recalls how he wanted
a particular kind of man for the show, but the models
provided by the event lacked the requisite ruggedness.
He says they looked “like boys,” and “women don’t want
to marry boys, they want to marry men.” His vision
of the manly Indian groom meant that beard wigs
were made for the show. This look, he says, has since
inspired many a Sabyasachi bride-to-be to persuade
her man to grow a beard for the big day.
“I wanted to create one iconic image, of a man from
India. For me, that’s a man with a Sarpech turban, a
flowing beard, a shawl...” For him, the iconography
was all about Rabindranath Tagore.
Sabya himself sported long hair and a Tagore-esque
beard for a while, circa 2013, when his NDTV hit
show Band Baaja Bride was taking off. Back then,
when it seemed the North Indian wedding, with its
Yash Chopra-fuelled vision of the bride in dazzling
gold and red, couldn’t get any more dominant, along
came Sabyasachi, offering an alternative point of
view on invented tradition, taking his cues from
Kolkata and the fabled Bhadralok gentry. “When
you live in Kolkata, you’re surrounded by textiles,
food, music, architecture,” he says. “People here are
not born intellectuals, they’re made intellectuals by
peer pressure! Sometimes it’s almost caricaturish
how arrogant Bengalis are. The pseudo-Kolkata
is intellectual; the real Kolkata is wise. I would
rather be perceived as someone with wisdom than
as an intellectual.”
There’s little doubt that Sabya is wise, and then
some; he’s also been called a marketing maestro.
Translating the refined culture of the Bhadralok for
a market defined by social transformation and the
one-upmanship of new versus old money is nothing
short of a checkmate move. He’s taken all of Kolkata’s
associations with intellectual ferment, and high art
heritage, and distilled them into a set of mesmerising,
highly aspirational visual codes, mediated through
iconic campaign imagery.THE PEACOCK GROOM
“Do you know why Facebook became so successful?”
Sabya asks. “It’s because Mark Zuckerberg realised that
all human beings are either voyeurs or exhibitionists.”
Whether families, tribes or Insta squads, the
cohesiveness provided by matching bridal party looks
has become a crucial part of the Big Fat Wedding. So
too has the coordinated bride-and-groom look seen at
the weddings of Anushka Sharma and Virat Kohli,
Deepika Padukone and Ranveer Singh and, most
recently, heiress Isha Ambani and Anand Piramal.
Around 95 per cent of his clients, Sabya says, want a
coordinated look. “For many people, the image is more
important than the [wedding] ceremony, or anythingF
or a city inundated with extravagant
events, there was a remarkable crackle
in the air on the eve of Sabyasachi
Mukherjee’s much-awaited show. After
all, it was India’s leading designer’s
first presentation in four years, and one
that would commemorate his 20 years
in the business. The Moët flowed, the celebrities air-
kissed and thronged to be photographed. Sabyasachi’s
power to draw big names into his universe was
evident in the eclecticism of the front row: Mumbai’s
leading citizens – from billionaire heiresses and
Bollywood stars to top editors – sat crammed shoulder
to shoulder. The show also marked his burgeoning
collab with Christian Louboutin, who sat up front,
flanked by Alia Bhatt and Natasha Poonawalla. The
set was bathed in a haze of red light and smoke –
otherworldly, surreal, creating the sensation of having
left the reality outside.
Once the show began, the clothes were
mesmerising: a sharp departure from the wedding
wear that’s marked the stratospheric rise of
Sabyasachi’s brand over the last decade. “This was the
most honest collection I’ve done because I didn’t do
what was necessary to make money; I did what was
necessary from an aesthetic point of view. I lost the
plot a bit because the brand was at the consumer’s
mercy; it became so huge overnight,” Sabyasachi
says. “Now, I want to shrink the clothing part of
my business and focus on other verticals. I want to
shape the business so that I can sell less clothing, but
produce exactly what I want.”
The collection, titled Kashgaar Bazaar, was
marked by fluid silhouettes that parlayed between
Indian shapes and the codes of global streetwear.
The mood was “nomadic, bohemian and gypsy”,
inspired by travel, which the designer says is “the
greatest luxury a man can afford today.” Men’s
ensembles in monochromatic Toile de Jouy or richly
embroidered fabrics were accessorised hypebeast
style, with crossbody utility pouches emblazoned
with the Sabyasachi logo of a Bengal tiger. It took off
from some of his earliest work, and indicated a new
direction for the brand, which includes plans to build
a prêt line and a potential international expansion.
Menswear forms 17 per cent of the Sabyasachi
business, and the future holds a ready-to-wear line
of shirts in printed cotton and silks, as well as the