Wearing the village

Raw Mango has been as much a traditional Indian label as it has been a disruptive one 

- NAMRATA ZAKARIA

Sanjay Garg’s Raw Mango opened the India Fashion Week in Delhi last week. Many say it also closed the fashion week, as all the chatter for the next few days was around his showcase alone. If you were among the other designers who got lost in the aftermath of the Raw Mango show, we are sorry.

Garg, 43, is elated with the noise. The collection— Children of the Night—was nothing if not intended to get people talking. It was quite unlike Garg’s mien, the designer let go of his Indian mood of saris and tunics soaking in a vintage aesthetic. It was still a textile-first line, but presented in new styles that one could only call a Euro-centric aesthetic. Reviews are divided, in equal parts blown over and bewildered.

Garg is jubilant when we speak the next day. “When I started designing, this world didn’t exist. Social media didn’t exist. People called saris “behenji”. And thought I was foolish,” he says of his 15-year-old fashion label, hallowed for its tasteful and antiquity-loving Chanderis and Benaresis. Garg’s superior tailoring, largely inspired by the Asian silhouette of tunic and trousers—either as salwar kameez, or churidar kurta or then just a long structured top with pencil pants— made brocade and woven metallics a thing of urban sophistication. He always presented the old as if it was a new thing, often taking a snipe at those who did not know all of this was seeped in India all along.