Rhea Sonawane is a womenswear designer working in London who grew up in Mumbai, India. She believes there is a personal association between fashion and the individual, not just as a medium to cover the body but also to portray one’s identity. It is a platform she wants to use to rethink fashion and propose sustainable ways to create garments while experimenting with different interpretations of my Indian heritage. She wants to work towards creating a responsible brand that finds solutions rather than trends and express her concerns as a citizen through her clothing to help rebuild our society.

“Musafir” is a word in the Indian language, hindi, meaning ‘traveler’. Her graduate collection is inspired by a spiritual journey of an individual that begins with harrowing memories of the past and working towards achieving serenity in the future. She believes that life is a journey and we are the travelers looking for unexpected miracles along the way. But instead of waiting for these miracles we should strive to create a beautiful reality.

Rhea has explored various sustainability techniques in her collection by using bio- degradable, recylced fabrics, upcycling clothes and a zero waste process of creation that resuses deadstock fabric scraps to create textures and manipulations within the garments. Clo3D software is used for experiments and toiling to reduce calico waste.

The collection portrays a transition, not just in terms of colour and prints but also with silhouettes. The aesthetic of the collection shifts and progresses from being restrictive to free and comfortable drapes communicating the emotions of the journey.