Man of the cloth

As Manish Malhotra turns film producer, adding another dimension to his brand and persona, he reflects on a 35-year-long, fluid, fruitful career conjured out of a preordained love for cinema and fashion.

- By VARUN RANA

ONE WAY OF looking at fashion designer Manish Malhotra (59) is to see his various titles—costumier, stylist, couturier, jeweller and, more recently, producer of the Vijay Varma-Fatima Sana Shaikh starrer Gustaakh Ishq—as a collection of accolades gathered strategically over decades. The other would be to see them as extensions of his creative curiosity, each emerging on instinct. “I’ve always been wide-eyed about films and clothes,” he says. “It’s that simple.”

With what he calls “terrible scores” in his 10th standard exams, Malhotra joined 11th grade as an arts student, where receiving roses on Valentine’s Day sparked his interest—not in dating—but in modelling. “Can you imagine? That was my first reaction,” he laughs. A short, “random” modelling course later, he found himself getting portfolio shots clicked by photographer Hemant Trivedi on the latter's terrace, of all places. To supplement his modelling income, he took up a job at the then famous, now defunct Bandra boutique Equinox, while also frequenting ad agencies and shoot sets. “My family was convinced that I would—should—become an actor. It was the expected route: model to ‘hero’. But I didn’t want to.”

By then, the legendary costume designer Bhanu Athaiya had moved on from commercial work to larger projects; she'd won an Oscar for her work on Richard Attenborough’s Gandhi (1982). “The industry didn't have big designers then. Because I could sketch, I started getting work,” he recalls. “I thought, there’s no investment, and actors need to be dressed for their roles. If I could make a change and bring in a look, I could surely make a name for myself.”

He was 19 at the time. “And my instinct was right.”