RAINBOW NATION

From finding momentum through mask-making during the pandemic to showcasing at New York Fashion Week, the pigment-soaked label abacaxi offers an optimistic antidote to dark times. Divya Bala meets Sheena Sood, the designer behind the happiest label in home-grown fashion

- Divya Bala

“I THINK IT RUNS IN MY BLOOD, this obsession with colour, seeking it throughout my life,” says designer Sheena Sood from her home in Brooklyn, New York. From her silver nails and candy-pink accented tortoiseshell glasses, to the aqua jacket and its kaleidoscopic colour vying for attention from the collection rail behind her (not to mention her own quiet optimism), it’s clear that Sood’s lifelong quest for colour is coming to fruition in all forms. Even the name of her label, abacaxi, the Portuguese word for ‘pineapple’, was inspired by a joyful holiday memory on the beaches of Morro de São Paulo.

Sood began her career as an artist, studying visual art at Brown University and Central Saint Martins, often incorporating embroidery, beading and sequin work into her paintings. Soon after graduating, she developed print and embellishment designs for American label Tracy Reese before briefly moving to India to live with her parents. Returning to Brooklyn, it was the bounty of textiles she had collected in her homeland that inspired abacaxi’s first capsule collection. The brand then took a backseat as Sood consulted as a print designer and colourist at Rachel Roy, Cole Haan and Anthropologie. It was only in early 2020, following an abacaxi appearance at Paris Fashion Week, that the label prepared for a full launch for spring 2020—a plan that was quickly halted by the pandemic. Sood, identifying a need, pivoted to creating intricate beaded and embroidered face masks that garnered attention from the likes of New York magazine and