January is a month that keeps our calendars booked with weddings followed by a long trail of seasonal festivals. With each day comes a new reason to celebrate and matching that spirit, celebrity designer Rocky Star has come up with his festive 22/23 collection. The edit adheres to the designer’s eponymous label’s design philosophy that exudes neo-Victorian era charm. Rocky shares the inspiration behind his new drop, “The collection is inspired by our signatures, which includes a combination of baroque and botanical motifs incorporated in our lehengas and saris melded with Indian craftsmanship.”
Further telling us about the design process, Rocky shares, “I try to extract similar elements of the inspiration and design motifs and combine them into compositions. The motifs and compositions are further converted into khakhas (moulds) for intricate details. The khakhas are traced and are hand-embroidered with embellishments of beads, sequins, etc., and translated to fit the contemporary silhouette coinciding with current day trends.”
The collection presents a wide range of saris, gowns, kurtas, dresses, and lehengas in exuberant hues of tangerine, cerulean, peach, coral as well as darker shades of scarlet, black, and grey borrowed from the trappings of the bygone era. However, to spice things up, he has also played with gold and silver sequin and shimmer silhouettes to give it an elevated party look. The designer has lent a fusion touch by pairing the ensembles with an eclectic range of Indo-western blouses such as embroidered, pleated and peplum-styled ones.
He has adorned the outfits with ornate embroideries and tessellations for that extra oomph. Telling us about his signature ‘East meets West’ approach, Rocky shares, “The amalgamation of eastern and western aesthetics can be surreal. It enables the mingling of various cultures and can lead to the creation of distinctive and avant-garde designs. People can use this kind of blending to honour their cultural history and adapt it to their individual styles. It is fascinating to observe how various cultural influences may coexist in clothing and how fashion can be a vehicle for expressing their thought process into reality.”
Rocky established his label in 1995 and has since dressed global icons like Beyonce as well as Indian stars like Sonakshi Sinha, Katrina Kaif, and even Rajnikanth. Given his celebrity-approved status, we asked him about the wedding and festive wear trends for 2023. “The prediction gravitates towards the fusion of Indian crafts with western silhouettes—one where design elements are simplified with intricate details. Given the modern-day trend of minimalism, people's choice of colours has shifted towards warmer tones. Such tones are picked with accents of similar hues to support the main colour. In contrast to earlier selections that included several colours, the choices have veered to monochromatic statements and warmer accent fusions.” he tells us.
Price on request. Available online.