In a career spanning decades, fashion designer Neeta Lulla has created garments for films, the ramp and also for brides from all across the world. Having worked on films such as Devdas, Manikarnika, Jodha Akbar, Thalaivi and more, she known for channeling the opulence of royals and historical figures into timeless pieces on the silver screen.
She is among the busiest constume designers of Bollywood and this time, she is in Pune for her show with Vivz Fashion Scool.
HT caught up with her ahead of the show to ask her all about her connection with Pune, a legacy that spans years, work that endures the test of time and more.
You are back in Pune! What made this moment and this city the right time and place for such a personal presentation?
So this is not my first presentation in Pune. I have done a couple of shows in the past, but somehow it always felt that Pune was just next to Mumbai, you know. That is why I didn’t think about this earlier. And obviously, with the kind of schedules I’ve had with the films I’ve worked on and the musicals that I work on, time went by — time lapsed — and then COVID hit.
So now, after a long time, when VIVZ Fashion School asked me to do the show, I said definitely, because I’ve styled many brides in Pune. I have a lot of clients who come down to Mumbai from Pune, especially driving down to get their clothes done from me.
And that’s the reason I said, why not? I mean, when they’re coming all the way here, why should I not go there, meet up with them, and have them at the show?
Your work has brought beauty to the big screen with films like Devdas, Manikarnika and more — but did cinema ever inspire your work and designs?
I would say my designs in cinema were inspired by my work — and vice versa.
When I started my journey, I started both simultaneously. As a young designer then, it was always about bringing mainstream into cinema, and that is what created the edge for my clothes in cinema.
I kind of became the most sought-after designer because there was an element of newness in the way I cut the clothes or created the kind of characters. And that came from my education in mainstream fashion and creating the techniques of costume with mainstream fashion.
So I wouldn’t say cinema inspired my clothes or my clothes inspired cinema — it was a great synergy for me.
In fashion, restraint and intention are also forms of strength. In an era driven by trends, how do you define relevance today, especially for the contemporary Indian woman?
In an era driven by trends, you need to stay consistent to your philosophy. You need to stay consistent to what you believe in — what your clothes should do for the women of today.
That is what I work with. And I would say that I’m blessed to have the experience of 40 years of work that evolves over time. Because of which, I can hold on to that restraint and be consistent with what I would like to work with for the clients or the women of today.
And be able to create a newness with the philosophy that I embark on for the longest time. Because as a designer, when you know your philosophy, when you know your work, when you know your techniques, it’s very easy to transcend that into trends of today — where you bring in an amalgamation of your experience and techniques with the trends of today.
The catalyst for this is the kind of people you work with. You definitely need to know who are the kind of women you want to dress, or what you want the woman you dress to feel like.
So I definitely want the women I dress to feel like they’re wearing a shirt and jeans — even though they’re wearing a sari. That is the philosophy that encapsulates the entire collection.
Vaani Kapoor is your showstopper this time. Tell us about your partnership with her and other Bollywood stars over the years. Do they share their inputs or completely surrender to your genius?
She’s not my partner. Anyway, as far as Vaani Kapoor goes, she is a great muse to have because she has great carriage and great stage presence.
And as far as my synergy with stars is concerned — no, I don’t have them imposing their ideas and thought processes on me. It’s very simple: when you know your job, when you know what you’re giving an artist, and when you’re able to tell them why you are using a particular technique on their clothes and what kind of characterization you’re giving them — they are like children in your hands.
They don’t discuss beyond that because they know they are in safe hands and what you’re telling them makes sense.
And it’s not only today — from the time I started work, you come with films that once they’re shot, they’re canned and there forever for posterity. So obviously, the artist working on that film is nervous because you can’t change it later.
Therefore, they want to work with people they trust. They may have a point of view, but either you take it because you like it as a technician, or you explain why you do not want to take that point of view and why you want to give them something different.
It’s a give and take, purely technical. I can take a suggestion or I may not take a suggestion purely on the fact that it needs to work with the cinema and the holistic look.
Looking back at your journey, what has experience taught you about identity, legacy, and the kind of passion that truly endures?
My philosophy of design has never been nuanced or aesthetic or dramatic. It’s been magnanimous. My philosophy has been creating that larger-than-life aspect — whether it’s mainstream or whether it’s films.
It sounded dramatic because of the time when I started my work — the 1980s to 1990s — where everything was larger than life. Everything was colour. People were wearing bold things. You saw Cyndi Lauper, Madonna with pink hair and a lot of over-the-top styling, so it came across to the new age as dramatic.
Then we came into the era of elegance where everything went very simple and classic. Then came 2000, which brought back the 1980s.
So there is a cyclical format of drama versus eclectic versus elegance. But the fact is that as a designer, you encapsulate these cyclical movements of fashion into your philosophy. That is why you have a particular philosophy and then you create it with trends — you amalgamate it with trends — and that’s exactly what happened.
So today you see a more nuanced, more eclectic, more sophisticated or more silent look only because that is the demand of today’s trends.
Tell us more about your collaboration with Vivz School of Fashion & Design.
So this fashion school is making waves and has been there for some time now. They’re pretty dynamic, and I like the dynamism that transcends into the teaching system for the students — and also them being all out there, bringing many of us onto the India platform.
They are taking many firsts — from India to international — so they’re a very dynamic bunch of people doing this entire format of fashion which is not only teaching, but going over and above teaching.
And I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate Aarti and her team for being so enterprising. One needs to transcend beyond education in today’s times into various aspects of various fields, and she is a pioneer in that.
