Think of designers as philosophers and you will start seeing the role of the humble fabric anew. There’s something more than imagination that is woven into couture which is the ultimate art of handmade luxury. You find stories and narratives beneath the embroideries that foreground fashion. When Bridelan, a luxury wedding styling service based in Mumbai, decided to collaborate with House on the Clouds, arguably among India’s finest wedding photographers and filmmakers, they found creative expression in Indian couture, whose fine art-like texture, themes and storytelling, and exceptional stylistic innovations are pushing the boundaries of what it means to be fashion-forward.
“I’m an observer of fashion and a voracious reader of what designers think and how they bring certain collections to life. This year, haute couture has touched a fascinating core of designers attempting to give the creators, artisans, and embroideries their place of pride—whether it is Maison Schiaparelli, Valentino’s Haute Couture Fall Winter 2023 collection or our very own Rahul Mishra. It is an admirable gesture on the part of these great designers to acknowledge the under-appreciated talents of our highly skilled artisans,” says Nisha Kundnani, founder of the bridal styling service that has been tirelessly working to elevate Indian fashion at a global stage for more than a decade.
Indeed, the Rahul Mishra Couture Fall 2023 collection titled ‘We, The People’ that was unveiled at Paris Haute Couture Week 2023 earlier this year was a love letter to the efforts of his karigars and creators. As Mishra put it at that time, “The finest creator, God must be an embroiderer.” For Bridelan’s special collaborative editorial spread with House on the Clouds in Paris this summer, Kundnani used one of Rahul Mishra’s most sumptuous pieces—what the designer calls ‘Noir Karigar’ from his collection ‘We, The People’. Apart from Mishra, Reverie Francaise, as the collaboration between Bridelan and House on the Clouds is called, also features Anamika Khanna’s handmade designs, Lebanese fashion designer Georges Hobeika and Alexis Mabille, who also showed at the Paris Haute Couture Week 2023. “I think what comes naturally to me is authenticity,” adds Kundnani. “As an editorial and luxury stylist, I have grown up learning from masters of styling like Grace Coddington and that’s how I have found my own voice. For me, craft is extremely important. The extravagance and maturity of a garment lies in the detailing of how beautifully it is imagined, woven, and embroidered.”
For Reverie Francaise, both Kundnani and Siddharth Sharma of House on the Clouds were unanimous in their choice of location. The artistic opulence of Paris as a city was one of their origin points for this shoot. “We needed that grand maximal look where Indian and French couture could feel at home and blend seamlessly. We shot at historical destinations like Musee du Louvre, Musee Rodin, and Palais Galliera which offered us rich and intense textures and contrasted beautifully with almost painterly-like details of the Indian garments. For example, when we were shooting the brocade Anamika Khanna couture jacket at Palais Galliera, I felt the most powerful sentiment of being India proud. That jacket in such an exotic setting felt so fitting—the model Ilona van den Arend who wore it looked like a piece of museum-worthy sculpture,” notes Kundnani. The textile of the jacket is called ‘KimKhwab’. As Anamika Khanna herself remarked, “I have a love for everything that is Indian in its modernity.”
It was Sharma who conjured the title Reverie Francaise. “I wanted to keep the name easy but still give it some edge. So it came from the very idea of Parisians and their way of life. Their sense of enjoying life, every moment of it, being involved, dreaming, and much more. Their idea of leisure is just so satisfying to watch and learn from,” says the official wedding photographer of such top Bollywood nuptials as Alia Bhatt Ranbir Kapoor, Kiara Advani-Siddharth Malhotra, and more recently Parineeti Chopra-Raghav Chadha.
FULL CREDITS:
Photography: House On The Clouds, India
Styling & Creative Direction: Bridelan, India
Photographers: Siddharth Sharma, Vivek Kashyap, Ashwin Kumar
Produced by & Words: Shaikh Ayaz
Fashion Stylist: Soraya D’Souza
Talents: Ilona van den Arend, Debora Wagatsuma
Modelling agency: Mademoiselle Paris
Makeup & Hair artist: Akiko Kawano, Paris
Designers & Accessories: Anamika Khanna, Rahul Mishra, Georges Hobeika, Alexis Mabille, Christian Louboutin, Twinkle Hanspal, Diosa Paris, House of Shikha
