Classic and contemporary with a sense of raw allure, dynamism and attention to detail. That has defined Kunal Rawal’s man. The same charm that now defines his womenswear that he will be doing a lot more of. His collection Dhup Chao showcased at Hyundai India Couture Week in association with Reliance Brands, an FDCI initiative, comprised thumping minutes of gender-bending designs, his men edgy-romantic in their jewellery and drapes and his women, portraits of character, in their structured silhouettes. Ranbir Kapoor was smoking hot in his veshti pants and sherwani.
Kunal sat down for a decode with t20S and shared how young India has bolstered his conviction in his design DNA.
‘I have always been into oxymorons’
We did not title the collection for quite a while. Our storytelling is very layered and there are so many messages we want to put out there. In my earlier days, I was like why am I doing so much? People might catch it, might not catch it, but as the years progressed, I saw our audience catching the messaging and the layers. So, I have got even more confidence to go about it the way we do.... And storytelling gets minimised where you have to be really up close to catch it.
Playing with Dhup Chao, it has so many layers. Back in the day, karigar work used to be called Dhup Chao, a colloquial term. Today, it’s a very popular colloquial term for thread mixing. It’s used in multiple iterations whether it is thread karigars or mirror work karigars. So, that thought connected a lot to me. I have always believed that our world is an inclusive world, many worlds coming together, in more ways than one, when it comes to inclusivity in the product, the way we create the product. We create the product for 10-15 different personalities because we believe in diversity, and that being one of the biggest strengths of India, the unique perspectives that form young India today. I saw many connects and layers to Dhup Chao that were working perfectly with the collection. It also has a bit of a comforting factor.
I have always been into oxymorons. We used to take inspiration from industrial and grunge to create luxury. The look we used to love was always a clean look, but always slightly imperfect. Dhup Chao to me signifies a lot to do with our journey, a lot to do with both sides of a coin, that balance that comes through with the collection.
‘Music is such an important aspect of our storytelling’
We have been creating music for the label for the past few years. I have been working with Akshay Raheja and IP and three of us have been creating different sounds for the brand for the past few years. This time also we wanted to take on, like the label, traditional music like folk and then contemporise it to a sound that works for all of us for different iterations. Music is such an important aspect of our storytelling. Ishq mitha was one of the tracks of the show that we created. I am glad we could put it out there also, from Apple to Spotify to YouTube Music.
Film and music are two worlds I love after fashion. I am someone who has done so much work in costume and films that I literally see the show almost like directing. I believe in couture there is a lot of seriousness, which scares a lot of people away and to be honest, it’s very far from reality to me and far from my reality. The understanding of couture has changed for the younger generation and for people like me where we all get that it is for us and it is something that makes you feel good.
Kunal Rawal and Ranbir Kapoor took a bow post-show
‘I am a painful consumer’
For me, couture and weddings are a lot about celebration, and a happy mood. It is not how you see couture being presented, which is so serious. It is a lot more fun, younger energy and the clothes are worn and consumed differently. You almost never have a straight back when you are out at a celebration of somebody you actually care about.
So, the clothes need to be prepared for a lot more fun. I am also a painful consumer and I expect so much from what I wear. I expect comfort and it to look good eight hours after I wear it.... I don’t like things tight on my neck and I like to roll my sleeves up. I yet need it to look formal and correct for that occasion...
‘It is always a sun-sepia hue to life’
When it comes to groomwear and ceremonial wear, I am such a sucker for neutrals. I will always push out an ivory or a light beige or an oyster. How often does a groom end up wearing a white look with a white safa, and, I think there is nothing more impactful than that, a nice, thread-dipped piece in all ivory.
Coming to eveningwear, our signature brand colours are the navies, dark wine tones, jewel tones and black. We experiment a bit more with industrial tones and grunge colours like charcoal and olive. Yes, you are right, this season has been a lot about creating new colours, about softer tones, but signature tones to the brand.
The product of occasionwear has not been gender-neutral from the beginning. It has been about bold, bright primaries. This time we have introduced so many mixed colours, in softer tones but giving it our stamp. With pastels also... we love whitewashing, so, whether it is a whitish mushroom or a pastel olive which we have done for the first time... we have done tones like baby peach. We have done three tones of mushroom actually. We have also played with sage and a whitish mint. We have whitewashed the pastels and mixed a bit of warmth. I am a Bombay boy and I am used to seeing everything a bit warmer and it is always a sun-sepia hue to life. That warmth we have added in all our softer tones.
(From left) Kunal’s man was dapper in softer neutrals; Kunal played around with the silhouettes and gave traditional occasion wear a twist, Kunal played around with drapes for men; The men, like the women, channelled gharara pants; The show had a wide representation of age groups, championing inclusivity
‘To me, it’s always been about an all-inclusive world’
To me, it’s always been about an all-inclusive world. With Covid and (in) the last few years, it’s so much more exciting being a menswear designer. Menswear is not a segment of the market you are catering to. It is a kind of clothing that is for everybody. It is a kind of look that is for everybody, irrespective of shape, size, gender and location. It’s an aesthetic-based product that’s meant to be consumed by everybody and that’s why you see elements like gender neutrality in our clothes. Customisation is a big part. All our androgyny goes into menswear and all our menswear can be consumed by women or by any gender. The idea is that we are the rulers of our destiny and why should I choose from only the menswear section? I want to choose what works for me from the entire store.
Being a menswear designer, there were a lot of preconceived notions and thoughts about menswear. This is my 18th year in the industry. We have all grown up being told how a man is supposed to dress... there was no individuality. Thanks to young India which I believe is very progressive compared to even the strongest first-world nations, and the way they think, there has been so much attention on the right conversations in the last five years.
This decade has been so exciting. That’s what makes the menswear space exciting and ever-evolving. Things are moving so quickly and I am so grateful for that. It’s taken a while for my aesthetic to be accepted in mainstream occasionwear because it was a unique aesthetic.
Even when you see the shift from traditional occasion wear to how younger designers like us are doing couture today. Globally you see so many iterations of couture. In India, you’ll see a lot more unique perspectives to couture because that’s what couture is and is meant to be.
(From left) We loved the safa rims, that completed a few of the looks; The men also had a ‘What jhumka?!’ moment; Kunal also showcased a jacket blouse-and-lehnga set; Kunal’s women were wow in their structured silhouettes and Kunal sent out his first sari on the ramp
We have been doing womenswear minimally and were waiting for the market to evolve. We are clear as to what we want to put out as our womenswear. I was waiting for androgyny to become a thing in the market. It has been big on the pret level in boyfriend jeans, in a casual way. I was wanting to push our silhouettes where we can go into a girl’s lehnga budget. We want to create androgyny for occasionwear. We are doing our spin on traditional occasionwear. We had 18 looks this time and you will be seeing a lot more of that. We put out our first sari and it was very exciting. It is a silhouette I love from my younger days. We also did our version of lehnga and jacket blouse on the runway. We have been taking from the ghararas that has been one of my favourite silhouettes from my younger days. We did ghararas for men and girls. We are obviously going to get the androgynous look through our bandhgalas and bundis.
You will see a lot of gender-fluid and gender-neutral clothes. Hopefully, we will be a part of this new wave of strong individuality coming into occasionwear.
‘We are trying to change the landscape for men’
In my 17-18 year journey, I have been told at least once a season to shut shop because men don’t spend money on themselves and fashion. I feel men today are expecting as much from designers and their products as much as anybody in the fashion world today. They are ready for designers who specialise in menswear because menswear in India has always been taken as an add-on. It’s always been about womenswear in India. Then the same fabric gets used in making sherwanis and bundis. We are trying to change the landscape for men. They deserve much more as does this menswear space as an aesthetic, in the country. The market is ready for it and looking for it. That’s the reason you have every designer, whether womenswear or not, doing menswear also. It’s now the cool thing to do or it is being looked at as a serious industry today.
When the brand completed 15 years, I wanted to create fabrics and things that I ran away from in the 15 years, and give them our version. One of them was paisleys, which we started using from last year into the label. Second one was brocade, which has been completely made for womenswear. Back in the day, there used to be menswear brocades. In the last few decades, it has always been womenswear fabrics going into menswear. The math of how it is done has to be recreated for menswear.
‘It is important to change the face of how a model looks’
See, this is our normal and my responsibility is to normalise this. This is who we are and this is what we do. I find it funny when it’s not there. We create for different body types. That has to be shown. It is important to change the face of how a model looks. A model is a model depending on the casting and that’s the beauty of fashion. This is how our models look and that is how we cast... there is no visual of how a model is supposed to look. The brand loves strong and original personalities. I work hard on our casting....
‘The occasionwear space is getting more and more gender-neutral’
We have designed jewellery for the collection and we worked on our groom pieces with Birdhichand (Ghanshyamdas) for this collection. We are putting out a groom’s range soon of fine, real jewellery. The conversation we were having was how everything in the occasionwear space is getting more and more gender-neutral. Even with the groom’s jewellery and occasionwear jewellery, it’s women’s wear jewellery that is broken and converted into pieces for men and then converted into a bracelet for a girl. The idea was to create fine jewellery for grooms. We put in elements like the polki safa rim and the buttons. Art deco Bombay-inspired polki buttons are also part of our collection.
‘The hardest thing on the runway is to do nothing’
We have stayed away from asymmetry and drape. I am somebody who loves structure and you see that coming through in our clothes... a lot of sharp tailoring and structured garments. But we have been playing with drapes for a year, year-and-a-half. For us, an innovative silhouette to come through usually takes more than a season. The veshti pants or lungi pants are something I have been toying with for a very long time. It’s our version of how we want to see people wearing lungis. I loved how simple yet impactful it turned out to be. Navy-black is my most favourite colour combo for eveningwear. We played with a micro geometric motif for him and we used the veshti pants in black suede-velvet. I wanted to create a look that was innovative, yet super effortless, for someone like a Ranbir who is so, so effortless. I kid you not, the hardest thing on the runway is to do nothing. He is just amazing. I got Aalim (Hakim, celebrity hairstylist) on board and got this new look exclusively for the show.
What I connect so much with him is this effortless vibe. I have the same thought when it comes to dressing up. It should never feel like you are packaged.
‘For me, having your signature come through is most important’
Rooshad Shroff and I have collaborated on doing festive lights in hand-carved marble and brass. These are materials we both love. I also love my product to be tactile. The lights are tabletop, hanging lights... they are multi-functional lights that have such a beautiful glow. It is like mood-lighting and it’s got all our beautiful textures on it. I am enjoying myself creating stuff for the younger groom and young India.
It was a conscious decision for the label and me to focus on occasionwear menswear for the last four years... now that our look has registered and gotten accepted, we will be diversifying with products that represent our storytelling and thought process. We are getting into doing candles for Diwali this time. For me, having your signature come through is the most important thing.
