ELLE Cover Star: Gauravi Kumari - The Princess Diaries

It was raining in Jaipur. The kind of rain that doesn’t disrupt but creates a lush, scenic backdrop, cooling the pink stone just enough to soften the sunburn of July. We were deep inside a palace that didn’t need an introduction. 

When Princess Gauravi Kumari of Jaipur arrives, she doesn’t announce herself. There is no rustle of entitlement. No choreography of handlers. Her entrance, just like her gaze, conveys quiet assurance. And yet, you can’t miss her. She moves like she’s been here before, not just in the building, but in the pause before the shutter clicks. Her demeanour has a kind of stillness that carries authorship. It becomes clear, almost immediately, that she’s not trying to be captured. She is, simply, being present.

“Fashion is my way of expressing myself, no matter the environment,” she tells me later, in the room where we speak after the last frame has been shot. “It’s never accidental; when I wear a saree internationally, or a traditional poshakat an event, I am not just dressing up. I am making a statement about who I am and the culture I represent.” She speaks carefully, not out of caution, but out of consideration. This isn’t someone filling space with anecdotes. Every sentence betrays a measured maturity.

She is, after all, the inheritor of a legacy where presence has always been more powerful than performance. Gauravi is the daughter of Princess Diya Kumari, and sister of Maharaja Padmanabh Singh and the granddaughter of the late Maharani Padmini Devi — each a figure who shaped public imagination in their own quiet way. Her brother, the young Maharaja of Jaipur, may hold the ceremonial title, but Gauravi holds the emotional memory of the palace. It’s not just lineage — it’s lived history. The weight of it doesn’t define her, but you sense she carries it with intention, like someone who knows what it means to be looked at, and chooses how to be seen.

Root To Rise

In many ways, Gauravi’s life is mapped in courtyards and courtesies. She grew up in the City Palace of Jaipur. Her ancestry includes rulers, reformers, and aesthetes. Her current life is dotted with the animation of global fashion campaigns, the demands of running cultural foundations, and the constant tension of being known before being introduced. “The walls of a palace can be restored,” she says, “but preserving its pulse, its living relevance, demands a different kind of imagination.”

That pulse is what she’s trying to protect through the Princess Diya Kumari Foundation (PDKF), where she serves as general secretary, and through The Palace Atelier, which is housed within the City Palace grounds and acts as both a retail and cultural space — curating contemporary design rooted in traditional craft. From embroidered occasion-wear by Indian designers to capsule collections by local artisans, the space is as much about patronage as it is about preservation. The retail experience is punctuated by archival references and rotating exhibits that honour seasonal rituals, craft forms, or artists. The initiatives don’t feel ornamental. If anything, her work reveals a quiet refusal to let inheritance turn into inertia.

“It’s never about letting traditions go, but about reimagining and repurposing them for today,” she says. “Traditions for us aren’t something that is relegated to the past. It’s something we keep alive through all the work that we do. Living heritage is a huge part of the City Palace.” When she speaks of festivals likeHoli, Gangaur or Teej, she isn’t talking about them through the lens of nostalgia but of continuity. She’s referring to rituals carried forward not as reenactments, but as living, breathing acts of culture. As a third-generation royal raised in the early 2000s, Gauravi belongs to a cohort for whom inheritance is not just about holding titles, but also about holding space — for reinterpretation, innovation, and creative authorship.

Fashion Royalty

She was dressed in Jimmy Choo for the shoot, but there was no indulgent glamour to the styling. The clothes were precise. The makeup was restrained. And she held herself with the kind of discipline that suggests a comfort with her role.

“I started wearing sarees quite young, when I was in my teens,” Gauravi says. “Over the years, I’ve cultivated my own way of styling them. Family has always inspired me, but even in homage, I’ve found ways to let my voice come through: a new drape, a personal twist, or mixing unexpected elements. It’s a constant conversation between past and present.” The conversation deepened when she moved to New York to pursue her studies. “My time there helped me bring focus to the cultural storytelling element.”

It’s a thread that continues to direct her endeavours. “Through our work [at The PDKF Store], I’ve seen how fashion can platform stories and crafts that often go unheard. It becomes a catalyst for revisiting our past, championing artisans, and showcasing India’s creativity to the world.”

She co-founded The PDKF Store alongside Claire Deroo, a Paris-based curator and heritage consultant. This partnership brings a distinct cultural perspective but shares a common mission: to celebrate Indian craftsmanship without rendering it static. The store champions designers who honour indigenous techniques but reimagine them for contemporary life. Whether it's a handwoven saree styled as a trench coat or miniature painting motifs on a sculptural potli, the pieces speak to a living, breathing idea of heritage. The edit feels personal, reverent, and quietly radical — a reminder that heritage isn’t something to be displayed in a museum, but something you can wear, inhabit, and move through the world in.

Holding Her Own

Even in the midst of the shoot, where film cameras required long exposures and the heat was unforgiving, with tight schedules, she seemed comfortable. But when chaos and disorder ensued, she took notice. Her stillness wasn’t to be mistaken for passivity. It was a quiet command for order.

“I am certainly aware of what I represent,” she tells me when I ask whether she’s conscious of being a symbol. “But above all, I try to be authentic to who I am and what I stand for. If that brings disruption, it comes from a place of sincerity and honesty, not from trying to stand apart just to do so.”

In an age that rewards performative presence, there’s something disarming about her self-containment. “Despite the public spaces I navigate, I am, at heart, quite private, even shy,” she admits. “The parts of myself that I choose to share, whether through projects or public appearances, are always aligned with causes that move me deeply.” It makes sense, then, that she was visibly more comfortable in Jaipur than she might have been in Mumbai or Delhi. She was at home.

What Endures

Gauravi’s role is ceremonial. It is public. But the core of her work, she reminds me, is community.

“The women of PDKF humble me every single day,” she says. “Their resilience and creativity constantly remind me that true strength lies in community, connection, and a willingness to uplift each other. Many of the women we work with have faced numerous social, economic, and cultural barriers to achieving independence and success; however, these challenges have never deterred them. Through everything, they continue to preserve, and do so with a smile on their face.”

When I ask what she’d want to leave behind, not in concept, but in form, she doesn’t hesitate. “My collection of poshaks,” she says. “They’re more than just garments; they embody generations of artistry and the kind of craftsmanship that is so rare now, and importantly, a huge part of Rajasthani culture. Each piece is a story, a link between family, heritage, and artistry that threads through time.”

She’s speaking about clothing. But it’s also the clearest description of herself — a woman shaped by ritual, tempered by responsibility, quietly curating what comes after.

Editorial Director: Ainee Nizami Ahmedi; Photographer: Bikramjeet Bose, rep by Feat.Artists; Fashion Director: Zoha Castelino; Stylist: Jahnvi Bansal; Asst. Art Director: Alekha Chugani; HMUA: Kritika Gill rep by TAP; Bookings Editor: Rishith Shetty; Words by: Kannagi Desai; Location: Jaigarh Fort; Production:Western Warriors by Akshay Rawat; Artist Reputation Management: C&C Talent 

Read the full story in the new issue of ELLE India.