The Hindu Business Line : Light fabrics, bright colours

From tangy orange and mellow lavender to sheer georgettes and crisp cottons — this summer it is the charm of colours and comfort of fabric that keeps the warm breezes at bay.

Watermelon. Peach. Mango. Strawberry. Guava. Lime. And vanilla. Lots and lots of plain vanilla. These are not the ingredients for a mocktail, but the colours of the season, as seen on shirts, blouses, kurtas, kurtis and pants.

Summer's here, with the heat and the dust and the humidity, but so are bright colours, light fabrics, floral prints, sequins, embroidery and cool shades. From Linking Road in Bandra to Brigade Road in Bangalore, the plush interiors of Westside to the streetside stalls on Colaba Causeway in Mumbai, shoppers are buying lace blouses, chikan kurtis, patchwork shirts, embroidered jeans and drawstring pants for work wear, weekend wear, party wear and stay-at-home wear. Even the big labels have "cool" trousers, lightweight jeans and other apparel designed for the long Indian summer.

At a time when Aishwarya Rai's wardrobe in Cannes is getting almost as much attention as the premiere of Matrix Reloaded, and Lord & Taylor's Fifth Avenue store dedicated 20 windows to showcasing four contemporary Indian designers, there is a great deal of emphasis on not just looking good, but looking right.

So while Manhattan got a taste of silk tunics, sequined T-shirts, embroidered shawls and sari-sarongs from designers Tarun Tahiliani, Rina Dhaka, Vivek Narang and Manish Arora, fashion pundits in India forecast that summer 2003 will see "elegant, straight colours and value for money" options.

Apparel being a high-involvement category, and the customer exposed to trends from Paris to Milan, there is no dearth of choices. In Mumbai, where mainstream fashions are influenced by Bollywood, where the annual Lakme Fashion Week is a must-do, and designer wear can be had off the rack for a price, the most popular shopping haunts remain Colaba Causeway, Fashion Street and Linking Road.

Chikan kurtis, crushed cotton shirts, gypsy blouses and embroidered hipster jeans are all the rage, as are studded belts and rectangular shades. Lace tops with sequins and patchwork and chikan blouses are teamed with cotton lycra capris and full-length pants, and crushed crepes in bright colours with linen pants are popular, says designer Anita Dongre, whose AND label retails in Shopper's Stop and Westside. For evenings and parties, georgette blouses are teamed with polyester pants in darker shades. Shoppers tend to balk at spending heavily on summer wear, and Anita's causal range is priced at affordable rates of Rs 800 and Rs 1,200.

In larger chains such as Wills Lifestyle, which has introduced a summer range, the accent is on linens and cotton fabrics in pastel colours. For women, there are gypsy tops with embroidery at the neck and ruffles at the edges. For men, there are short-sleeved shirts, kurtas, tunics, drawstring trousers, embroidered shirts, some tie-and-dye and batik, besides stripes and checks in classic whites, bright colours and pastel shades.

Raymond's Be: Collection is also about colour — fuchsia pink, turquoise blue, ice candy, and bright, vivid colours in linens, cottons and denims. Tunics for men and kurtis for women are popular, complemented by garments in neutral shades, says Aniruddha Deshmukh, Executive Director, Raymond Ltd.

In the Capital, where the mercury makes no distinction between the netas and the glitterati, the accent is on "an elegant and sophisticated line with a minimalist look", says Leena Singh of Ashima-Leena label. The designer duo, who have designed for Neena Gupta for the game show Kamzor Kadi Kaun, and for actress Rani Mukherjee, also think shoppers are looking for value for money and are very aware of what they want to be seen in. Their range is priced from Rs 999 to Rs 9,999.

For consumers like Swati Pande, a housewife, brand loyalty is difficult, particularly when it comes to men's apparel, so she would rather visit a multi-brand outlet for her shopping. And for shoppers like Shashank Banerjee, a student, "more than price, it is the comfort level which is important".

In Silicon City, designers are in favour of Indian designs and traditional Indian apparel, and question the reluctance to move beyond whites and off-whites. Designer Indhu Samuel feels that very few Indian designers can effectively use "true" Indian colours such as saffron and green for summer collections.

While linen rules in the Garden City, where summer is mercifully short, fashion consultant Prasad Bidappa thinks a kurta and a dhoti "make most sense". Indian designs are in demand even at Ffolio, the store for designer wear: sequined kurtis in pink, blue, orange and yellow, and bright coloured kurtas for men, Jaipuri prints and "bohemian" flared trousers made from old brocade saris are the most popular items here, according to Vandana Mudkuni, Retail Manager, Ffolio. For evening wear, there is apparel in a light silk fabric in that perennial party colour, black.

Even in Chennai, where summer is sultry and long, there is no compromising on fashion: lace is in, as are patchwork tops, cotton singlets and kurtis, teamed with stonework denims. At Westside, cotton tops in blue, fuchsia, lavender and pastels are priced between Rs 395 and Rs 899. And there is no dearth of choice in cotton: hand-woven kurtis, bandini printed kurtas, jute cotton, gudri kurtis and `jayashree' cotton kurtis are but some of the options.

At Pantaloon, cotton drawstring trousers come with fine embroidery around the ankles and slits on the side. There are also cotton blended shirts and georgettes, crushed cotton and seersucker — even for pants — for the casual, crumpled look that's acceptable when it's 37 degrees in the shade. Also popular are viscose shirts with a denim finish in all shades of blue, and denim shorts — sandblasted or faded.

Despite the move to minimalist apparel, the salwar kameez remains an all-time favourite: powder blues, baby pinks, pista greens, with a hint of badla and mirror work. And, there are bias (diagonal) striped blouses, ideal for party wear, in soft orange, mango and deep lavender. For the more daring, there are sheer georgettes and tissues with long bell sleeves.

Men are spoiled for choices, too, with lightweight cotton chinos and diet chinos, drawstring pants, cut offs and baggy shorts. While indigo shirts are popular, the ruling colours are pastel, lavender, stone, ecru and mango.

Summer affects hairstyles, too: while the straight, ironed look with highlights is in for women, men are sporting the rumpled, just-rolled-out-of-bed look, a la Sunny Deol in Hero. It's about low-maintenance and high-attention.

Make up is minimal, and innovative: Lakme has a range of water-based makeup, `WaterColors', which claims to use the hydrating powers of water to refresh and rejuvenate the skin in the summer. The range is extremely lightweight, and specially designed to last longer without smudging or streaking in the heat and humidity. It includes pastel shades of pinks, lilacs, peaches and light browns. There are liptints - or lip colours that cool the lips, vitamin-enriched lipsticks in water gloss shades of pinks, lilacs and glittery browns, nail colours that gleam like reflections on water, liquid blush, and eye pencils in `water inspired shades' of blue and green. Avon has an `Arctic Flowers' range of lipsticks and nail enamels, with shades such as white frost to offset the summer heat. And Cosmos has a range of fragrances called Iceberg Effusion and Iceberg Fluid, which blend fruity notes with floral notes for a light bouquet.

When the sun is out, can sunglasses be far behind? The shades of the season are colourful tints of blue, brown, green and grey; wrap-arounds and metallic frames are particularly hot, from the pavement stalls to designer boutiques.

Well, the mercury will keep rising, and folks who don't know their chinos from their chikan will sweat it out, but there's no going wrong with the cool choices that are laid out from Chennai to Chinchpokli. It's a cool, cool summer!

With inputs from Anjali Prayag, Nathalia Jones and Richa Mishra.

Pictures by Shaju John and Paul Noronha

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