All her whites for her father

(life) For designer Payal Jain, her latest collection "Crescent Moon" is an expression of love for her father whom she lost last year. The all white collection was presented by the designer on the third day of the ongoing Lotus Make-up India Fashion Week SS20 on Friday in the national capital.

Jain says the line-up is a heartfelt tribute to her father who died of age-related ailment while she was working on the collection. "For me, he remains in white forever. His whole personality and life was everything white. He had no greys, no blacks in his personality."

"I was working on this collection when he fell ill and I lost him last year… And when you lose something very precious, you do change as a person. For me, this was a sort of an introspective work to go inwards to deal with my emotions. I needed an expression and this was the best way to show my love for him," Jain told life.

He even named the collection "Crescent Moon" derived from a poem of Rabindranath Tagore, who her father keenly followed in his lifetime.

"He loved Tagore and his works. The Crescent Moon was his favourite poem as was the colour white," Jain said. "White is something that comes from my heart. I'm very monochromatic in my aesthetics. It's always black and white for me. You will never see me wearing any other colour."

The line-up included gowns, ensemble pieces, skirts and sarees all in whites with heavy chikankari and hand embroidery and with red and green floral motifs.

Natural fabrics like cotton, linen and silk were used to create the garments, inspired by neoclassical costumes from the early 19th century.

"It was a culmination of fabrics and textiles that I have worked on for the last 27 years. And to me all that marries together in white. Every garment that you saw had a different technique inspired by the 19th century European costumes," explained Jain.

She, however, admits that white is a very tough medium to work it and it quickly gets dirty. "When you do chicken works there are finger marks that gets on the clothes, there are blood marks. For one single piece, it might take upto two years to make it. It's a very challenging medium."

Jain also sent out a message of inclusivity, saying she doesn't believe in making clothes for selective women and has designed the collection keeping in mind the idea of fashion for all.

"I don't believe fashion should have a bias, whether it is gender or skin tone or body type or shape or size. So there were models who were short, plus size, transgender or with dark skin tone," she said.

The showstopper at her show turned out to be the whole board of Fashion Design Council of India (FDCI) namely Sunil Sethi, Anjana Bhargav, Nitin Bal Chauhan, Rahul Mishra, Reynu Taandon, Varun Bahl, Rajesh Pratap Singh.

Jain said that these people have been her support system for the past two years and as the fashion week this season is themed on 'My Fashion, My Tribe', she wanted her tribe to be there with her.

Meanwhile, designer Suneet Verma brought the curtains down on a high note with the presentation of his first luxury travel destination collection. Ensembles, skirts, lehengas, separates and frilled sarees, with heavy mirror work and embellishment comprised the line-up of 20 outfits in neons, pastels, black, blues, and metallic colours.

(Puja Gupta can be contacted at puja.g@.in)

( With inputs from IANS )