it’s an overcast Parisian morning, and leaves the colour of maple syrup are raining down on the street style photographers gathered outside Pavillon Ledoyen. They’re confident of their prospects today—after all, the name on the invite says Manish Arora, which is basically a fashion synonym for ‘the crazier, the better’.
Rounding up a decade of showcasing at Paris Fashion Week, Arora has a treat in store for his Spring/Summer ’18 presentation. The designer has teamed up with fine jewellery label Zoya, whose eclectic handmade pieces will be paired with his garments for the very first time. If this seems like an oddball combination, it’s only because you haven’t fully appreciated the bold choices Zoya’s master craftsmen make with their jewellery. Pink enamel lotus blossoms dangle from one model’s earlobes; a peacock feather-inspired statement necklace highlights the collarbones on another. While the show’s jewellery is a curated mix from Zoya’s recent collections, the showstopper, if you will, is the Pont Des Arts necklace, inspired by Paris’s melancholic bridge of love.
“We spent a year working on the Musée Du Luxe collection, and all the handcrafted pieces are inspired by various Parisian icons, from the Eiffel Tower bracelet to the Arc de Triomphe necklace,” explains Amanpreet Ahluwalia, business head, Zoya. “Our pieces are not what you would ordinarily expect when you think of Indian handcrafted jewellery, and that’s why we thought Manish Arora was the perfect match.”
Not that Arora needed too much convincing. You only need to hear him wax eloquent about Paris and its mythical charms to know why the collaboration was such a natural fit.
He adds, “Our Spring/Summer ’18 collection reflects fun and luxury interpreted through printed, embroidered and embellished motifs of hearts, stars, feathers and flowers, and many of these design elements are beautifully crafted through precious gems and metals in their collections. Both at Manish Arora and Zoya, we spend months creating our pieces, meticulously by hand. It’s an aspect of both our products that comes through quite evidently, and it’s what I am most pleased about in the course of this collaboration.”
