For FDCI X Lakmé Fashion Week’s first-ever phygital show, Anamika Khanna dressed her models in a collection she calls, “Timeless”. But, look closely, and you’ll be convinced that these designs are, in fact, a silent nod to how Indian couture will look in the future. It is almost as if you are looking at these outfits through the sepia lens of nostalgia and the visions on the other end are suggestive of what humans - not too far away from now - will wear.
There is a feeling of protection brought on by the armour-like qualities of the jackets, both the bomber variety and the full-length gilded version of it. Would you stand in the debris of radioactive fallout wearing these pieces? Of course, not. But does it look like it will protect you from that anyway? Hell, yes. The fringes that decorate various outfits on hemlines, necklines, and sleeve ends, along with various drapes that are on display in the skirts, add to this collection a certain type of movement that has become a mainstay in Anamika Khanna’s couture. Although strong silhouettes are what make this collection interesting, they have not been traded off for femininity. High doses of sophisticated womanliness in the form of colours and floral motifs that pollinate the clothes are available to those who want to wear them.
But what makes the clothes truly special is how the clothes make you feel, and what these clothes are evocating is a feeling of reassurance.
Anamika Khanna’s Timeless is actually based on a simple premise: nothing is permanent. While most of us are struggling to cling to the last threads of what we knew was normal, her collection is setting the precedent that all good things come to an end, and that it is okay. In the end, in a very Thanos-snapping-his-fingers moment which culminated in the cinematic disintegration of models followed by waterworks resembling rain, one can see paint leaking from the clothes, wiping the slate clean and revealing the original canvas – pristine Anamika Khanna clothes, open, again, to a new wearer’s interpretation. Now, isn't that what the virus is doing to us, too?
