Lakme Fashion Week Winter Festive 2019 concluded its five-day extravaganza with a bang on Sunday. With all the who’s who of Bollywood attending the prestigious show throughout the week (as audience and as models), everyone knew that the last day of the show would be star-studded nonetheless. But, no one could prepare fashion-lovers for the grand finale and the majestic magic of none other than Kareena Kapoor Khan. She’s every designer’s dream showstopper and we can’t complain.
There were many other celebrities who graced the coveted Lakme Fashion Week Winter Festive 2019 ramp this year, and we admit that each and every presence didn’t go unnoticed.
Here’s looking back at the week to see our favorite celebrity showstoppers who made heads turn with their ramp walk.
Diana Penty
The “Cocktail” damsel in distress walked the ramp for designer Ridhi Mehra. Penty turned showstopper for Mehra’s lovely festive wear and added her own flair to the piece with her staple hair and makeup choices.
The lovebirds turned heads as they strutted down the ramp for none other than ace designer Payal Singhal. Dandekar is known as the face of Singhal’s fashion campaigns, and what better way to bring the oomph factor up than to pair Dandekar with her beau, Akhtar. The pair wore printed ensembles for the final walk — the sneakers and the edgy hair definitely stuck out!
She may not be active in the movie scene but D’Souza definitely knows how to make heads turn on the ramp. Actor Riteish Deshmukh’s wife, D’Souza, walked as the showstopper for @sarojjalan wearing an ethereal pink lehenga.
@pinkpeacockcouture showcased their latest collection and had Rautela as their showstopper, in the forefront. Rautela looked breathtaking in the silver gown with a flowing cape gracing the ramp behind her.
The fitness guru and impeccable dancer took to the ramp for @punitbalanaofficial and she did so in style. Sporting her signature hair, Shetty rocked a crop top and ankle cut skirt to mark the end of the show for Balana.
Expect Arora to turn up the heat in the room with her presence. Her sleek hair, bold lips, and skin-baring attire stole the show. @diyarajvvir couldn’t have chosen a better showstopper for this piece!
They may not have made an appearance together, but you can’t have Arora in the house without her beau, Kapoor. So, keeping up with fashionable tradition, the Kapoor lad walked the ramp, too! He brought the audience a trimmed, green button-up kurta and black pants. Looking dapper as ever!
Manisha Malhotra found his muse in Kaif for Lakme Fashion Week Winter Festive 2019. He introduced his brand new collection, “Maahrumysha,” to the anticipating crowd, and we can confirm that he did not disappoint. Just look at the details of the lehenga and the top!
No one does fashion like Kapoor Khan, there’s no second way about it. She looks stunning in anything and molds each one of the designers’ looks into her own avatar — she’s a ramp natural. Kapoor Khan even called herself a “pro” at a Lakme media gathering for Lakme Fashion Week Winter Festive 2019. She’s confident on the ramp and lets her confidence ooze!
Her showstopping look for the grand finale, for designers Gauri and Nainika, dropped everyone’s jaws. The black gown with the netting details took fashion to a whole new dimension and we couldn’t have applauded the designers more for choosing the ultimate diva, Bebo, to pull this look off.
Although that’s a wrap for Lakme Fashion Week Winter Festive 2019, the fun has just started! All of these designs are now up for grabs for the upcoming wedding season — go ahead, channel your inner showstopper (and favorite Bollywood celebrity) with these stunning pieces!
March 20, 2023March 21, 2023 4min readBy Nida Hasan
If you are a South Asian, born in the ’80s or the early ’90s, chances are your ideas of love and romance are heavily influenced by Hindi films — that first gaze, the secret love notes, that accidental meeting somewhere in Europe, over-the-top gestures and dancing around trees. While reality may have been far from what was promised on reel, you still can’t stop pining over a hopeless romantic, with chocolate boy looks, chasing you across the earth and many universes; in the life here and the ones after. Somewhere deep down, you still dream of that possibility despite your husband sitting and sipping his morning coffee right next to you. And much of the credit for weaving this dreamland, that we can’t resist happily sliding into, goes to the legendary Yash Chopra. Award-winning filmmaker Smriti Mundhra’s docu-series, “The Romantics,” that released on Netflix on February 14, chronicles Chopra’s prolific career; offering an illuminating look into the highs and lows of his journey, his unblemished vision for Hindi cinema and sheer love for filmmaking.
I wanted to look at Indian cinema through the lens of it being a major contributor to the global cinema canon and Yash Chopra seemed like the perfect lens to explore that because of the longevity of his career and the fact that he had worked across so many different genres. His films, for so many of us, defined what Hindi cinema is.
— Smriti Mundhra
As “The Romantics” unveils, in a mere episode — a challenging feat in itself — Chopra did experiment with multiple genres as a budding filmmaker, initially under the shadows of his elder brother B.R. Chopra. From the religiously sensitive “Dharamputra” and the trendsetting “Waqt” to the action-packed and iconic “Deewaar.” It wasn’t until later on in his career that he set a precedent for a Hindi film having a wholly romantic narrative; though “Waqt” did offer the perfect glimpse into what would go on to become Chopra’s cinematic imprint. And then came “Chandni” which ushered in a new era for Hindi cinema; defying the formulaic approach to box office success and making love stories the golden goose.
In the words of more than 30 famous faces, a host of archival videos and interviews, and personal anecdotes, audiences get an extensive insight into the life and career of Yash Chopra and the evolution of his vision through the business acumen and genius of his polar opposite son and a famous recluse, Aditya Chopra. “The Romantics” is not a fancy portrait of a legendary filmmaker but an exploration of what goes into making a successful film family and a path-breaking production house. As viewers, we not only get a peek into the making of a fantasy creator but also learn of the many failures, hurdles and uncertainties that the business of filmmaking comes packaged in, the impact of socio-political shifts on the kind of content being produced and demanded, and just how much control we have as an audience over the fate of the film and the filmmaker.
For both the uninitiated and fanatics, there are some interesting revelations like Shah Rukh Khan’s lifelong desire to become an action hero as opposed to a romantic one and the creative conflict between Aditya Chopra and his father Yash Chopra on the sets of “Dilwale Dulhania Le Jaayenge” — a project that, surprisingly, did not seem too promising to the latter. Mundhra penetrates deep into the family’s history and industry relationships evoking some really candid conversations; almost as if these celebs were eagerly waiting for their moment to speak. With one appraising interview after the other, it’s a panegyric that does border on being a tad tedious but there is enough depth and fodder in there to keep one hooked. Kudos to Mundhra for managing to achieve cohesion despite there being more than enough material to chew on. In the process of bringing this project to life, Mundhra also ends up achieving a number of milestones: one that the series features the last of actor Rishi Kapoor’s interviews and two, it brings Aditya Chopra, who, it appears, can talk a blue streak contrary to popular belief, to the front of the camera after almost two decades. The moment when he puts the nepotism debate to rest by referring to his brother’s catastrophic attempt at acting is quite the show-stealer.
At some point during the four-episode series, you might question if it’s fair to credit the Yash Raj family for being the only real changemakers of the Hindi film industry and for picking up the baton to get Hindi cinema the global recognition that it has. But then there is no denying the Chopra clan’s body of work, their ability to understand what pleases the crowd and their commitment towards growth and progress amidst changing times and technology — Yash Raj Studios is in fact the only privately held and one of the biggest, state-of-the-art film studios in India. Chopra’s career and legacy are in no way under-lit that Mundhra can claim to throw new light on with “The Romantics.” But what she really has on offer here are sheer nostalgia, some fascinating discoveries and an ode to a cinephile and his art with a bit of fan service.
In an interview with Brown Girl Magazine, Mundhra discusses why it was so important for Chopra to be the subject of her docu-series, her own learnings during the series’ research and creative process and her accomplishment of getting Aditya Chopra to talk, and that too, at length.
