Founder of the homegrown label Hëne, Deepshikha Jaggi is a woman of many talents. She defines herself as the designer, social media manager, graphic designer, and runner for the label. She grew up keenly observing those around her and what dictated their sartorial choices. This helped her develop a very strong opinion regarding fashion. Hëne is the designer’s attempt at manifesting her thoughts and ideas into something tactile. Fashion was always something on her mind and the most obvious answer to her while setting up her own practice. She went on to equip herself with the technical know-how with courses from NIFT and Central Saint Martins. It was at these prestigious institutions where she met with some of the most creative minds from the industry who encouraged and reaffirmed her desire to set up her own label.
The designer goes on to tell me how Hëne literally stands for the moon in Albanian. A slow fashion label with modern and edgy offerings, the team firmly believes in creating clothing in spite of trends and not for them. “Our clothes are made so the wearer can feel good and sexy in their own skin. Most of our fabrics are factory rejects. We also don’t launch every season, we rather operate on our own timeline because we don’t think that the design should lose its value once the season is over.” When it comes to the label’s versatile yet luxurious offerings, there is a subversive role the garments play. Blurring the lines drawn by society in terms of gender and modesty, the designer wants her audience to always choose to express freely who they want to be.
When it comes to her creative process, the designer’s very first step is defining the colour palette for a collection. “It’s usually the same set of colours, tweaked around a little depending on the fabrics that are available. All our collections revolve around India and the craftsmanship our country has to offer.” With the moodboard in place, the team then acts on instinct. In a bid to minimise waste generated during production, they work with about fifty to sixty odd prints and filter them out based on theme and compatibility. After making selections, there’s a very rigorous process that follows which includes printing and sampling before eventually getting to the final garment.
For Deepshikha, individuality is key when it comes to fashion and ideas that govern our times. “From a designer’s perspective as well as a customer’s, it is fairly easy to get swayed by trends since there’s no dearth of information or visuals out there. As a designer, it is vital for me and the community to put our beliefs, aesthetics and innovation first. There’s also room for everybody if customers explore their unique and individual style.” Her thoughts are straight forward — dressing up should be a means of self-expression and not an opportunity wasted in an attempt to fit in. On the work front, Hëne has a new collection dropping soon that has the designer excited. “It is a digital combination of Indian crafts with a twist! Apart from the new collection we also plan to foray into homeware and stationery very soon.”
Words Unnati Saini
Date 13-06-2023