Doing It Her Way

Stepping into the world of movies as a rank outsider, she beat several odds to find her niche with standout roles in projects like raanjhanaa (2013) — and went on to headline movies like Nil battey Sannata (2016) and Anaarkali of Aarah (2017). Unabashed and confident, Swara Bhaskar draws from her strong sense of self — and the world around her – and today effortlessly straddles the domains of commercial and indie cinema. Shraddha Jahagirdar-Saxena spends time with the thinking actor who is poised to showcase a new avatar next year in the romantic comedy Veere Di Wedding.

Family Ties

With her royal genes and illustrious background, this actor has much to write home about — and does so with a dash of humour. Verve presents an exclusive excerpt Bangla Bolte Paro? from Soha Ali Khan’s upcoming biography The Perils Of Being Moderately Famous.

Show and Tell!

The Kardashianisation of style is about fame, flamboyance and flaws propped up against existentialist realities. It is, perhaps,  culturally unsuited to India where the deepest and most intimate revelations are still at a nascent stage.

Grapple and Glory

Journeying from Rohtak to Rio, Sakshi Malik made the country proud by becoming the first Indian female to bag an Olympic medal in wrestling. Shraddha Jahagirdar-Saxena spends some time with the gritty athlete right after she has emerged from a gruelling training session in the capital.

First Amongst Equals

Gaffer Hetal Dedhia, jockey Rupa Singh and commando trainer and close quarter battle specialist Seema Rao defied gender biases to blaze a new trail in challenging domains. The three pioneers speak to Shraddha Jahagirdar-Saxena about the highs of exploring predominantly male territories.

Graceful Warrior

In an exclusive write-up for Verve Zinnia Kumar opens up about her personal battles with social phobia and distorted expectations of women in fashion. She uses her celebrity to spread the real meaning of beauty.

Standing As One

The Berlin Wall, a prominent symbol of the Cold War, had divided a country, and city, for decades. After the wall fell in 1989, the German capital was left to reconcile two contrasting aesthetic and ideological identities. Rohan Hande captures architectural idiosyncrasies and coexistence in the formerly east-west districts.

Changing The Games

Designer duo Aditi Agrawal and Anjali Menon’s studio, Gudgudee, develops recreational areas and products to help make our metros more child-friendly, one playground at a time, learns Huzan Tata.

Livin' La Vida Local

A stranger to Instagram until two years ago, 37-year-old Shrima Rai has renounced a lucrative career in banking and made a successful foray into the glittering realm of the now-ubiquitous digital influencer.

Worlds On A Page

Gita Wolf’s Chennai-based publishing house Tara Books’ handmade offerings are produced in collaboration with both Indian and global artisans. These thought-provoking titles, aimed at younger readers, navigate cultures, societies and geographies with sensitivity, says Lavanya Mohan

Behind The Brush

Rithika Merchant paints fantasies — her work is full of hybrid creatures, liquid landscapes and horoscopic skies. But, the Barcelona-based visual artist has her feet firmly on the ground and her eye sharply on the ball. Skye Arundhati Thomas explores both the right and left brain of the Mumbai-born artist whose life straddles two continents

Floral Science

A highlight of visiting Provence and the French Riviera is definitely a sojourn in Grasse, with its splendid 19th-century villas, grand town houses, 11th-century cathedral and old town centre. But more than that, it is the gorgeous flower fields in the countryside that draw tourists and locals alike to the region. For this town in south-eastern France, where several international luxury brands also maintain their fields of flowers, has been considered the perfume capital of the world since the 17th century. Fragrance and flavour company Robertet has had its headquarters here since 1850. One of their master perfumers and native Grassois Daniel Visintin, who’s been in the business for 45 years, has utilised his elevated sensory instincts to create a wide range of products using natural ingredients from all over the globe. During a quick tête-à-tête, Verve gets a whiff of what it takes….

(Un)Familiar Territory

As redevelopment and construction projects cast a dusty haze over an already unrecognisable Mumbai, Simin Patel, founder of walking tours company Bombaywalla, and photographer Hashim Badani are determined not to lose sight of the sometimes-overlooked spaces that gave Mumbai its original, distinct character. Sadaf Shaikh joins them on a customised expedition and is reminded why she shouldn’t take the uniqueness of her hometown for granted.

Girl On An Island

Her voice, rippling with an otherworldly timbre, swirls around dreamy guitar chords, and it leaves listeners imagining her floating away to some cosmic nightscape at the end of a song. But Ditty (aka Aditi Veena) has her feet firmly planted on Earth, and the Goa-based musician and urban ecologist taps into the synergy between these two fields while living in tune with this planet’s rhythm. Verve has a heart to heart with the singer of ‘earthsongs’….

Walk On The Wild Side

The rugged topography of central India’s Chambal valley is expertly navigated by cinematographer Anuj Rakesh Dhawan’s lens in the Hindi movie Sonchiriya. Shreya Dasgupta plays guide for Verve as her well-trained eye tracks the sinuous camerawork, zeroing in on the specific terrains, vegetation and wildlife that get screen time.

Moral Fibre

Founded by Zuzana Gombosova and Susmith C. Suseelan from Slovakia and India respectively, Malai Biomaterials Design is a Kerala-based research, development and design studio.

Manhattan's Manic Style

Against the backdrop of the Big Apple’s most frenzied borough and its ever-changing skyline, fashion pulses, beats, morphs, and morphs again. Change is in the very nature of fashion, observes Wednesday Martin.

Thanjavur in Focus

Parmesh Shahani escapes for a weekend getaway to a Tamil Nadu temple town, and explores a moving  photography festival in Mumbai

Turning Points

The 20th century is dotted with defining moments — when a trailblazing ‘look’ has disrupted the industry and pop culture at large. Amishi Parekh highlights a few that have endured even today

Aditi Dugar

The maverick restaurateur reflects to Shirin Mehta about curating menus, foraging for ingredients, seasonality, sustainability and zero waste. All at that restaurant, Masque.

It Takes Two

Dancing might be poetry in motion, but there’s a science to it. Pole dancer Aarifa Bhinderwala’s agile spins and inversions defy gravity, and Odissi dancer Ranjana Dave elevates simple physics to keep her lower body firmly grounded while her torso is fluid and snake-like. Sadaf Shaikh spends an afternoon watching how the two women’s mutual intuition for movement results in a beautiful crossing over of forms and synchronicity

Nikhil D. And Smita Lasrado

The flip side of beauty is not necessarily ugly. The duo — cofounders of model agency Feat. Artists — tells Rushmika Banerjee about giving a voice to the brewing subculture of individuals who believe that looking good is more than skin-deep, even in the fashion industry

Through Their Looking Glass

Anshika Khullar, the 24-year-old England-based illustrator, talks to Verve about the process of creating an inclusive imagery of the LGBTQIA+ community and pushing for adequate representation for South Asian queer groups on a global scale

Amruta Patil

Her works hold the reader captive with their sinewy, multilayered storylines. The country’s first female graphic novelist constructs and deconstructs narratives with a view to tell stories that are progressive, socially relevant and epic in scale, finds Ranjabati Das

Neena Gupta

It’s the coming of age of an unconventional artiste, whose life has been laced with passion, scandal and heartbreak. As she stuns audiences with her latest release Badhaai Ho, she takes Megha Shah through the defining moments of her life

#Metoo India: The Road Ahead

A special feature exploring some of the ongoing conversations around the movement in India.

Staying In Character

What’s it like for authors to grow with protagonists that they write about over multiple books? Acclaimed writer Kalpana Swaminathan talks to Huzan Tata about the joys of living with her favourite leading lady, Lalli the detective, from her series of crime mysteries

The Big Fan Theory

The early versions of comic conventions mainly attracted people who were looking to swoop up limited-edition comic and sci-fi merchandise. Today, they have become less about the products and more about an immersive, interactive experience, expanding to include the entire gamut of pop culture entertainment. Cosplayer Sana Saha Khan reveals the finer details of this upcoming art form while Comic Con India founder Jatin Varma breaks down the evolution of the fandom subculture in India.

Welcome To The Valley Of The Gods

First-time trekker Geeta Rao braves the cold, bath-less days and sleeping alone in a tent to get to Uttarakand’s Har Ki Dun. Would she do it again?.

A Passion for Pokmon

The new-age romance has taken a quirky turn, with millenials chasing virtual creatures instead of each other