Rules Of Engagement

Designer Amit Aggarwal’s collaboration with textile maker Tanira Sethi for his India Couture Week debut made for an exemplary interplay of form and fabric—both on the runway and behind the scenes.

- Shweta Shiware

Amit Aggarwal’s designs are sculptural and have a whimsical dynamism—brims and swoops of gravity-defying effortlessness. The unmistakable lightness and agility are a result of the designer’s affinity with experimental textiles, fashioned from recycled fabrics and industrial materials, which complement his subversive aesthetic.

Tanira Sethi’s education (she is a textile graduate from National Institute Of Fashion Technology in New Delhi, and has a master’s degree in textiles from Chelsea College Of Arts, UK) and subsequent work in textiles, have brought her towards a similar artisanal alchemy: to question the norm and then set out to find her own answers. Last January, for example, as an answer to her own question—“If a seven-metre shawl can be woven, why not a sari?”—Sethi, 24, introduced quintessential cashmere saris made from fine Leavers Lace fabric under the label, Taani.

These limitless perspectives of form and fabric blossomed into a special collaboration when Aggarwal partnered with Sethi on Crystalis, his debut collection at India Couture Week, held this July. “We had been talking about a collaboration for a few months, and a couture collection seemed like a perfect moment to come together,” says Aggarwal, best known for translating biomimicry into fashionable wearables.