Some collections are too important to belong to one season. Rahul Mishra is, for my money, among the most coveted and publicly acclaimed designers India has produced, and on Wednesday, 29 July, he closes Hyundai India Couture Week 2026 at Taj Palace, the finale slot, the one the whole room stays seated for. He will almost certainly show bridal, and he would be right to. This is the business of fashion. Bridal is what the week rewards, what fills order books, and what a couturier in his position is expected to deliver. I understand the machinery of it completely.
Rahul Mishra showcased his collection 'Humlog' in Paris, 2023
(Image Via: Rahul Mishra archives)
I have organised fashion shows to know exactly how this works. I have worked alongside choreographers on the cue sheets, the run of show that fixes who walks when and on what beat. I have sat through fittings that stretch long into the night, the kind that take a long, long while. So I will say the obvious thing plainly: the show is set. The garments exist, the looks are finished, the styling is signed off. A finale cannot be rewritten four days out, and I would never pretend otherwise. What follows is wishful thinking, and I am choosing to indulge it in public, because some wishes earn the right to be said aloud.
Here is my wish. I want him to bring back We The People. The name alone earns its moment. Right now the country is invoking the Constitution in the streets, quoting its opening words, We, the People of India, arguing about rights and who the republic is actually for. Mishra put that same phrase on a Paris runway three years ago, and he meant it about the people who make our clothes.
Rahul Mishra showcased his collection 'Humlog' in Paris, 2023
(Image Via: Rahul Mishra archives)
We The People was the collection Mishra carried to Paris in January 2023, the show that made him the first Indian designer on the official Paris Haute Couture Week calendar. It was dedicated, wholly and without apology, to the karigar. Each piece held an average of three thousand hours of hand labour. It was also, worth remembering, full of bridal, heavy with lehengas, which means a return to it would sit comfortably inside the couture week format rather than against it. The artisans were the subject of the work, not its footnote. I sat in the front row that day. I remember the tribute he paid to the people behind the embroidery, and I remember the craft itself seeming to carry their presence, their hands and their labour honoured inside the work. It stays, to this day, my favourite thing he has ever made. It had depth.
Now look at the week he is closing.
India is in the middle of its loudest argument about work in years. The movement the press now calls the Cockroach Janta Party grew from a single remark, when the Chief Justice of India likened unemployed young people to cockroaches during a court hearing. Tens of thousands took the insult, wore it, and carried it into the streets. Graduate unemployment sat above fifteen per cent this spring. The grievance beneath the placards is simple and very old. People want the dignity of work, and they want to be seen doing it.
That is the register We The People speaks in. Fashion adores the language of craft. It prints “handcrafted” on the label and “artisanal” in the press note, then keeps the actual hands offstage, unnamed and rarely paid what the work is worth. The glamour is the surface. The substance is the labour, and the labour has a face. Mishra grasped this in 2023 and built an entire Paris debut around it.
Rahul Mishra showcased his collection 'Humlog' in Paris, 2023
(Image Via: Rahul Mishra archives)
To bring that collection back onto an Indian ramp now, in this month, in this climate, would be one of the sharpest statements a couturier could make. It would say that the people who make the clothes matter as much as the clothes. It would place employment, the real kind, the kind that lives in a workshop in Noida or a karkhana in Lucknow, at the heart of the country’s grandest fashion night.
The logistics say no, and I have already conceded them. The wish stands anyway, because it names something true about this moment.
FDCI’s Hyundai India Couture Week will give us a peek into whichever collection he is about to showcase on Wednesday, and but naturally on all days. This is not most days. Outside the Taj, the country is arguing about whether its young people will ever get to work at all. Inside, the most powerful thing on that runway would be a reminder that fashion runs on workers too, that the karigar is the reason the glamour exists.
So this is my provocation, filed with full knowledge that it changes nothing about Wednesday’s line-up. This show, or the next one. Bring back We The People, Rahul. You got that collection bang on. The timing will never be this right again.
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Some collections are too important to belong to one season. Rahul Mishra is, for my money, among the most coveted and publicly acclaimed designers India has produced, and on Wednesday, 29 July, he closes Hyundai India Couture Week 2026 at Taj Palace, the finale slot, the one the whole room stays seated for. He will almost certainly show bridal, and he would be right to. This is the business of fashion. Bridal is what the week rewards, what fills order books, and what a couturier in his position is expected to deliver. I understand the machinery of it completely.
Rahul Mishra showcased his collection 'Humlog' in Paris, 2023
(Image Via: Rahul Mishra archives)
I have organised fashion shows to know exactly how this works. I have worked alongside choreographers on the cue sheets, the run of show that fixes who walks when and on what beat. I have sat through fittings that stretch long into the night, the kind that take a long, long while. So I will say the obvious thing plainly: the show is set. The garments exist, the looks are finished, the styling is signed off. A finale cannot be rewritten four days out, and I would never pretend otherwise. What follows is wishful thinking, and I am choosing to indulge it in public, because some wishes earn the right to be said aloud.
Here is my wish. I want him to bring back We The People. The name alone earns its moment. Right now the country is invoking the Constitution in the streets, quoting its opening words, We, the People of India, arguing about rights and who the republic is actually for. Mishra put that same phrase on a Paris runway three years ago, and he meant it about the people who make our clothes.
Rahul Mishra showcased his collection 'Humlog' in Paris, 2023
(Image Via: Rahul Mishra archives)
We The People was the collection Mishra carried to Paris in January 2023, the show that made him the first Indian designer on the official Paris Haute Couture Week calendar. It was dedicated, wholly and without apology, to the karigar. Each piece held an average of three thousand hours of hand labour. It was also, worth remembering, full of bridal, heavy with lehengas, which means a return to it would sit comfortably inside the couture week format rather than against it. The artisans were the subject of the work, not its footnote. I sat in the front row that day. I remember the tribute he paid to the people behind the embroidery, and I remember the craft itself seeming to carry their presence, their hands and their labour honoured inside the work. It stays, to this day, my favourite thing he has ever made. It had depth.
Now look at the week he is closing.
India is in the middle of its loudest argument about work in years. The movement the press now calls the Cockroach Janta Party grew from a single remark, when the Chief Justice of India likened unemployed young people to cockroaches during a court hearing. Tens of thousands took the insult, wore it, and carried it into the streets. Graduate unemployment sat above fifteen per cent this spring. The grievance beneath the placards is simple and very old. People want the dignity of work, and they want to be seen doing it.
That is the register We The People speaks in. Fashion adores the language of craft. It prints “handcrafted” on the label and “artisanal” in the press note, then keeps the actual hands offstage, unnamed and rarely paid what the work is worth. The glamour is the surface. The substance is the labour, and the labour has a face. Mishra grasped this in 2023 and built an entire Paris debut around it.
Rahul Mishra showcased his collection 'Humlog' in Paris, 2023
(Image Via: Rahul Mishra archives)
To bring that collection back onto an Indian ramp now, in this month, in this climate, would be one of the sharpest statements a couturier could make. It would say that the people who make the clothes matter as much as the clothes. It would place employment, the real kind, the kind that lives in a workshop in Noida or a karkhana in Lucknow, at the heart of the country’s grandest fashion night.
The logistics say no, and I have already conceded them. The wish stands anyway, because it names something true about this moment.
FDCI’s Hyundai India Couture Week will give us a peek into whichever collection he is about to showcase on Wednesday, and but naturally on all days. This is not most days. Outside the Taj, the country is arguing about whether its young people will ever get to work at all. Inside, the most powerful thing on that runway would be a reminder that fashion runs on workers too, that the karigar is the reason the glamour exists.
So this is my provocation, filed with full knowledge that it changes nothing about Wednesday’s line-up. This show, or the next one. Bring back We The People, Rahul. You got that collection bang on. The timing will never be this right again.
TO BE CONTINUED, FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY.
This is where the surface ends and the reporting begins.
The complete piece, the full archive, and access to The French Press Circle. Reporting answerable only to its readers.
Already a subscriber ?
Login
Read these on the house, with our compliments.
A selection from the current issue, open to all readers. Read them in full. The rest is one decision away.
