Inspired by the goddess of love and purity, Tara, the collection named after her by Nikasha Tawadey turned out to be one of the highlights of the show. Moving away from her earlier style, Nikasha presented a controlled elegant line of ethnic women’s wear with a minimum of embellishments and worked around a colour chart which was rather unconventional for Fall/Winter.

Since the theme was so spiritual the designer used only shades of haldi, kum-kum red and antique gold. The base of her designs were the delicate cotton, muls, Bhagalpur silk brocade, chiffon and khadi as Nikasha preferred to move away from the conventional silks and brocade used for winter.

There were dainty appliqués, traditional motifs, and chikan work with flowers which were delicately highlighted with antique Zari. The silhouettes were fluid. A crushed silk and hand printed chiffon sari embroidered pleats and floral blouse made an opening entry. The crème silk georgette tunic with side frills detail was teamed with churidars and a mini dupatta with cloth tassels, the light beige cotton mul tunic with leaf motif and printed lining was teamed with matching churidars. The pleated jaamdaani lehenga with embroidered chiffon blouson top was gorgeous and the haldi chiffon kaftan with frills worn with mul churidars looked relaxed in silhouette. The final coral and red chiffon embroidered sari with ochre border and blouse was a graceful end to the show.

This season Nikasha Tawadey has scored a winning collection which will surely fly off the racks.

A fashion Show by Narendra Kumar Ahmed always has a social message attached to it. This time it was aimed at the moral police who are hounding women all over India. So the collection was called “Fun, Young and Responsible” and was inspired by the hit TV series “The Gossip Girls”.

The show started with a chatter among three friends - Jackie, Mandy and Serena on their way to a club in Mumbai and that was the background score for the rest of the show which was a trifle irritating. The colours were inspired by the American artist Edward Hopper and the shapes of the 80s with an interesting newsprint pattern which appeared on most of the dresses.

Incidentally since women’s wear was shown in the men’s wear show, the reverse had to take place this time for T-shirts with contrast sleeves, shirts and jeans with the newsprint and salmon pink shirts were thrown in for good measure.

The fabrics for women’s wear were interesting with georgette, taffeta, lace, jersey, silk, satin, felt and bits of leather detailing used for the dresses, tops skirts, trousers and shirts.

The women’s wear under the Nari Nari label was funky to match the theme and the designer sent out a printed denim dress with zippers and square embroidery, a military blue felt jacket with gold lace and pleated sleeves, purple frayed denim trousers, yellow georgette crest printed satin silk dress with shawl collar and sizzling red felt jacket with embroidered lapel and ended

Themes that Kallol Datta selects are often quite serious and at times a bit grim, but his collections have a quirky appeal that one has to grow to like.

This time the title was “Verbal Autopsy” so there were dresses called Malignant, body binding apron, Derelict, Rising of the Middle East, wigwam, New Order Amish which may not make much sense, but the garments were rather interesting with shapes and severity but at the same time very practical and wearable once the ‘icing’ is removed from them.

The colours were grey, rust, blue with tie n Dye technique to liven them up and a mannequin print which appeared on the cotton and wool ensembles and also as jewellery. The wool sack with large side pockets with contrast lining, the 3D apron with side pleats, pinstriped cowled short sleeve jacket, the circular seamed dress, the constricting hem long dress and the drum dress in black with frills cascading down the front were some of the innovative entries. The crab dress with tie n dye had a dull green front tie up, while another one had great 3D neck cowls, which Kallol is rather famous for.

Most of the entries had two parts – dress and apron or cover which were rather appropriate for the season.

It was a simple toned down collection that Kallol Datta presented with a good saleable image.

It has taken Soumitra Mondal a few years of participating in the Lakme Fashion Week to push khadi onto an haute level and each season he seems to be succeeding with his high fashion work on the humble fabric.

For the coming season his collection called Swadesh was in a colour palette which is influenced by nature so there were black and dark brown with which the designer mixed and matched for the western and Indian garments.

The saris in khadi where lavishly embroidered with black and red thread; while the garments ranged from kurtas to dresses, shirts, tops and skirts. The blue black woven striped top, the plum long sleeve kurta, the black ethnic print embroider dress and the elegant black jacket with brown brick embroidery, all gave the fabric a stylish touch.

Soumitra also added on an origami layered turquoise drop-waist mini and then followed it up with a wine princess line long sleeve dress. The flapper skirt in brown printed khadi, the ink dhoti dress with embellishments and the asymmetric hem with looped skirt kurta with ornate body was an interesting experiment in silhouettes.

The finale was a turquoise long Raja coat over an asymmetric black skirt which almost made the audience forget that they were watching an all khadi collection. It is heartening to note that designers like Soumitra Mondal are pushing the use of khadi for fashion and promoting them at fashion weeks so that more people will be encouraged to buy the garments.

The recession has affected the fashion business rather badly and therefore most designers are trying to fight it with interesting creative ideas.

Designer Rahul Mishra who enjoys working with the textiles of India has tied up with the weavers of Banaras to create special fabrics for his collection, ‘Reversing the Recession”. Having won awards for reversible garments, Rahul’s collection left the audience gasping as the models reversed the garments on the stage and the reversed side was as beautifully tailored, fitted and finished. Using silk, chenille and woollen checks and keeping his silhouettes to dresses and coats; Rahul worked with a colour story of white, black, copper, burgundy, brown, off white, red, grey, purple, gold and silver silk weaves.

Of the 29 entries, 20 were reversible like the red Banaras stripes spaghetti dress which turned into an off white raw silk dress, then there were others that had a different style like the grey black stripes polka dress, the black beige Benarsi and organza entry and the long brown black chenille jacket. The black multi colours floral cap sleeve dress turn into a dress with a border. Most of the garments had that touch of ethnic styling with drapes that resembled saris and dupattas on the garments.

The blending of two colours was done to form gentle curves along the body. The stand up necklines were impeccably tailored and the insets in the skirts were precise.

One of the very few collections that stayed within the format of Fall/Winter 2009 was by Mandira Wirk. Called “Industria Invincible” it was fashion for the future with very clean and functional lines.

It was a collection that was meant to dress down but with some minimal styling details. The designer sent out a line of amazing woollen coats and dresses, capes, gilet, jackets, high waisted trousers and jodhpurs made from wool blends, furs, velvet, jersey, silk tux satin and added a little glitter and graphic detailing rubberized printing, texturing and drapes.

Colour palette was dark and wintery with black, grey, deep wine and bits of olive to add more colours. The silhouettes were strong but feminine with angular shoulders and the sleeves were panelled, tailored and curved.

The tailoring and finish of the coats and jackets was amazing, specially the laser cutwork which was used in geometrics for cape coat with a rouched dress, a trench jacket with cutwork, the shift with butterfly sleeves and lazer cuts and the corseted blouse teamed with draped jersey jodhpurs with side cowls. The satin cape with silk jersey inner and wool trousers, the elegantly styled quilted satin jacket, the raised neck, the fur jacket the striped fur coat, teamed with a matching skirt and the wrap style belted fur jacket were some of the ideal items for winter.

Here was a collection that will do well on either side of the Atlantic as well as in the country.

Anamika Khanna has been publicized as an internationally renowned designer with outlets all over the world but the collection for the grand finale at the Lakme Fashion Week inspired by the Lakme cosmetic line for summer 2009 was interesting with a few innovations; but otherwise it was far from a bridal collection except of the lehenga sets since the rest of the garments looked more like summer wear.

The colour base was crème with a few pastels along with red and black in cotton, net, chiffon, brocade and silk with a bit of lace and cutwork and sequins added for glitter along with embroidery and some digital prints of Rajput figurines.

There was a lot of crushing and crinkling for the pants and the sheer kurtas, which were rather sexy with their sheer silhouette. The saris were very Bengali in appearance in off-white with broad gold or red borders or with giant size gold polka dots and worn with some interesting choli styles in net with a black bustier under them and visible shoulder pads.

There were crushed dhoti pants, voluminous salwars, lots of draped kurtas, lehengas worn with gold belts, dupattas knotted around the neck and garments knotted at the hem. The all net almost crinoline like lenghas with rigid ruffled hemlines were worn with black churidars and so were the saris.

Most of the silhouettes were wide and flowing for the multi panelled kurtas, kaftans and lehengas. There was a lot of resham and zardozi work on the