Shivan & Narresh Making A Splash

Shivan and Narresh’s namesake label brings a fresh and vibrant perspective to holiday wear. Characterized by bold prints, colours, and intricate embroidery, their chic and contemporary style clothing is versatile enough to be flaunted on beaches, resorts, and casual gatherings, equally well.

The designs are elegant, playful and capture the beauty and energy of exotic destinations. Their minimalist use of prints has found its spot in the wardrobes of celebrities from Kim Kardashian West to Aishwarya Rai Bachchan. With their luxurious fabrics and feminine silhouettes, you will feel stylish and confident, wherever you go.

by Akash Puri

What started with swim wear and has now expanded into resort wear, including ski wear. What inspired you to enter such a niche category of fashion?

Shivan: We love swimming! We loved the challenge of creating minimal clothing in a creative way. We travelled a lot and an important thing for us was to embrace our own sense of style while travelling. We wanted to help others achieve this too and more importantly, we wanted to create a luxury brand for the child in ourselves. Our logo, created in 2010 has five animals representing five different holiday lifestyles: snail representing beaches, peacock for resorts, dolphin for cruises, elephant for safaris and reindeer representing skiing. By our 10th anniversary, we wanted to put together woollen ski wear to capture the fifth animal of our logo and to ensure we have holiday wear covering all types of travellers.

How adaptive are your designs to the Indian body type?

Narresh: We thought that Indian women did not have too many options and were tired of wearing the same designs irrespective of their age. We also thought that women struggle with self-confidence after childbirth and start to avoid beach holidays. Women in India have been forced to fit into standard American and European sizes. Even today there are no standardised measurements for Indian women. Women in India have shorter torsos, and fuller and wider hips and busts that cannot be fed into flatter Eurocentric styles. So, women try to get around this by wearing layers of clothing because at its very foundation, what they wear doesn't fit them right. So, we studied Italian fashion, which is also always known to be cut very close to the body, and created ranges that will be apt for an Indian body. We sat down and made our own chart by resizing European or American fits to Indian sizes and we modelled our entire brand around these body types.

Where do you find the inspiration for your designs?

Narresh: I think our inspiration has remained constant from the very beginning. Most of it comes from the art we encounter while travelling and we dedicate our collections to the artists who inspired them. We're very transparent, and at the same time educative, about the starting point of each collection. Once we pick a piece of art, we sit together to interpret it in terms of prints and colours. Our final products are usually just as surprising

We thought that Indian women did not have too many options and were tired of wearing the same designs irrespective of their age. We also thought that women struggle with self-confidence after childbirth and start to avoid beach holidays.

Narresh

to us as they are to our audience and I think that is what art and fashion are meant to be: a human expression, timeless and not trend bound.

What differentiates you from the bigger, global luxury brands?

Narresh: Our differentiating factor is definitely our prints. You can see a person in our prints from a mile away and immediately be able to tell that it is a Shivan and Narresh design. This is the beauty and the DNA of our brand. None of the other luxury brands are so entwined with patterns.

Shivan: While a lot of brands rely on their very name for endorsement, in our case, it is the print that speaks our true language.

What should people look forward to in your resort and swimwear for 2023?

Shivan: Our next inspiration is from our travel to Finland. The series is called The Suomii after the tribals from Finland. Inspired by their culture, artists, landscape and the Northern Lights, this collection is the embodiment of the Finnish spirit. With this collection, our focus has shifted to skiwear, but you will still see some bold swimwear.

Who are some of the global and Indian celebrities that you have dressed? How did you select the designs for them?

Narresh: From the likes of Kim Kardashian, Beyonce, Oprah, and Dita Von Teese to our very own Priyanka Chopra and Shilpa Shetty, the list never ends. We have created their swimsuits, outfits for TV show appearances, evening dresses and gowns.

We sat down and made our own chart by resizing European or American fits to Indian sizes and we modelled our entire brand around these body types.

The point of a vacation is to spend time outside, rather than in your hotel room. You must have a swimsuit, a pair of wedges, a hat, and a tote.

Shivan: A lot of them have endorsed us and love wearing us. I remember when Kim was shooting for Vogue and saw one of our garments, she loved it and wanted to wear it that instant. For Akash Ambani’s wedding, we designed Beyonce’s outfit for her performance. We were approached by her stylist and that’s how that garment came to be.

What are the must-haves that could be fashionable yet comfortable for vacations.

Narresh: I think that you should be smart: there should be no need for you to keep going back to your hotel room too many times. The point of a vacation is to spend time outside, rather than in your hotel room. You must have a swimsuit, a pair of wedges, a hat, and a tote. These are the essentials. Shivan: These are definitely my top five too. For men, swim shorts or jersey trousers are a must.

Narresh: Our jersey trousers don’t crease but have the texture of herringbone trousers: formal and dressy! Perfect for everything from a flight to the beach - you feel like you're wearing a pyjama but they’re actually formallooking trousers.

How do you balance your friendship and work?

Narresh: It’s certainly a work in progress: sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. This is true for all relationships and it holds true for us as well. We are completely different people but when we work together, it’s magical. We have worked together for the last twenty years and we look forward to our chemistry lasting another fifty. v