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Anara by ShowShaa: A Love Letter to the Modern Indian Woman

Tucked away in the gullies of Shahpur Jat, ShowShaa by Ashima brings together the colours, craftsmanship and cultural nostalgia of Indian heritage, reimagined for the woman of today.

There is something about the gullies of Shahpur Jat that makes discovering a new space feel like stumbling upon a little secret. Amidst its labyrinthine lanes, a pop of colour draws you in, leading you to ShowShaa by Ashima, a contemporary Indian wear label that wears its heritage proudly. Founded in 2016 by Ashima, the brand brings together the richness of Indian craftsmanship and the sensibilities of a modern woman, creating garments that feel as much like a celebration of culture as they do an expression of individuality.

On 21 October 2026, I stepped into the vibrant world of Anara, ShowShaa’s latest collection, during its preview. Before I could fully take in the clothes, I found myself enveloped by an atmosphere that felt almost cinematic. Live singers serenaded the room with ghazals from our beloved 1980s Bollywood soundtracks, their voices weaving through conversations, while a bangle maker sat crafting bangles in real time for visitors. Everywhere I turned, there was something to look at, listen to, or experience. It felt less like walking into a store and more like being welcomed into a celebration.

For a moment, I felt transported into a dream of a Gen Z desi wedding, one where nostalgia meets a distinctly contemporary sensibility. It was exuberant without feeling excessive, rooted in tradition without being confined by it. Here was an understanding of the modern Indian woman who wants to dress up, embrace colour, wear her culture on her sleeve, quite literally, and still feel entirely herself.

This energy was made all the more inviting by the warmth of Ashima, the founder, and the creative director, who took us around the space, sharing the thought and vision behind Anara. The collection, as I learnt, began with an unexpectedly ordinary sight: a half-cut pomegranate sitting alone in Ashima’s refrigerator. There was something about the fruit’s deep red hues, intricate seeds and organic form that captured her imagination. A symbol of abundance, prosperity and eternal life across cultures, the pomegranate became the starting point for a collection that translates nature’s quiet poetry into clothing.

I found something particularly beautiful about this origin story. Inspiration did not arrive from an elaborate mood board or an abstract pursuit of the next big trend. It emerged from an everyday encounter, from noticing the extraordinary in something familiar.

As I wandered further into the store, the collection unfolded almost like a colour story. Each shade had its own dedicated section, beginning with playful pinks and moving through blues and greens before culminating in the reds of the bridal section. The progression felt deliberate, guiding visitors through different moods and expressions of Indian celebration. The reds, in particular, held the room with their unmistakable bridal grandeur, while the other colours offered a reminder that Indian occasion wear need not always follow a singular visual language.

What stood out to me was the way traditional craftsmanship found new expression in the silhouettes. Bandhani and Leheriya, with their distinctive patterns and histories, appeared alongside extensive embroidery, reimagined through corsets, straight skirts and other contemporary forms. Rather than treating heritage as something to be preserved behind glass, ShowShaa seemed intent on allowing it to move, adapt and become part of a woman’s everyday vocabulary of dressing up.

There is a fine balance involved in such reinterpretation. Traditional techniques carry the histories of the communities and craftspeople who sustain them, while contemporary silhouettes respond to changing ideas of femininity, comfort and personal style. At its best, the meeting of these worlds does not dilute either; it creates room for both to exist together. Walking through Anara, I was reminded that heritage is not necessarily about returning to the past. Sometimes, it is about finding new ways to carry it forward.

My conversation with the creative director further deepened this understanding. Beyond the garments themselves, she spoke about the experience ShowShaa hopes to create for its clients. Customisations allow a woman to work towards a look that feels right for her, rather than simply selecting something because it happens to be fashionable. The intention is not merely to sell a beautifully crafted outfit, but to help someone arrive at a version of herself that feels authentic.

In a fashion landscape increasingly shaped by rapidly changing trends and algorithmically circulated aesthetics, this idea feels especially relevant. We are constantly shown what to wear, what to buy and what the ideal version of ourselves should look like. Somewhere in that process, dressing can become less about expression and more about keeping up. ShowShaa’s approach offers a gentler alternative: garments that invite the wearer to participate in their creation, making space for her preferences, personality and comfort.

I have come to believe that comfort is not simply a matter of fabric, although the softness of the purest cotton certainly has its place. Comfort is also the feeling of wearing something that does not ask you to become someone else. It is the ease of recognising yourself in what you wear, of feeling beautiful without feeling disguised.

With Anara, ShowShaa by Ashima celebrates an Indian woman who can be deeply connected to her cultural inheritance while remaining entirely contemporary. She can love the nostalgia of an old Bollywood ghazal, admire the hands that craft her bangles, wear centuries-old techniques in a modern silhouette and still make the look her own.

Perhaps the most meaningful kind of fashion gives us the freedom to express who we already are. And in the colourful, craft-filled world of Anara, that freedom feels like a celebration in itself.

beyond the red hair: an encounter with Asit Patanaik’s continuum

With winter beginning to hint at its arrival in Delhi’s air and people decked out in elaborate Navratri ensembles, I reached Bikaner House, New Delhi, on the seemingly quiet evening of 14 October 2026. Against the distant sounds of garba music and festive processions, I walked towards the quaint LTC Gallery. There, a red-haired woman on a canvas in a fleeting blue ensemble, casting a sultry gaze at the man beside her, greeted me. Before I could turn my attention to the artworks themselves, I found myself wondering whether the surface beneath the figures was, in fact, made of newspaper clippings. It was an unusual detail to be caught up in, but one that immediately drew me closer.

That was my introduction to Asit Kumar Patnaik’s Continuum: A 30-Year Retrospective, presented by Chawla Art Gallery and curated by Shibani Chawla. The flowing red-haired woman has almost become the artist’s visual signature, but this exhibition invites visitors to look beyond the image that has come to define him and discover the years of artistic exploration that led to it. Bringing together early sketches, unseen paintings and works from different periods, the retrospective offers a glimpse into the making of an artist, revealing how his visual language has evolved while retaining a persistent fascination with human identity and relationships.

Moving through the early works, I encountered an artist whose interest in the human condition was evident long before his paintings acquired their recognisable vibrancy. Images of women in striking ensembles sit alongside almost haunting portraits of heads, their features seemingly disfigured. While Patnaik is renowned for the vivid colours that draw viewers into his paintings, I was equally taken aback by the intricacy of his sketches. There is something intimate about encountering these earlier explorations; they allow you to look beyond the finished image and glimpse the artist’s process of observation and discovery.

As I moved through the exhibition’s different sections, the evolution of Patnaik’s practice became increasingly apparent. The red-haired woman remained a recurring presence, even as the treatment of figures, surfaces and compositions changed. One could easily spend hours standing before his paintings, attempting to decipher the complex emotions conveyed through their visual elements, studying the interplay of colours and, perhaps most unexpectedly for me, losing oneself in the textures and iconography that populate their backgrounds.

These details surprised me in the most pleasant way. The surfaces often seemed to hold an entire world of their own, with layers and visual references that rewarded closer inspection. In one instance, the iconic dance sequence from Pulp Fiction appears on the canvas as an additive element, an unexpected reference that made me pause and reconsider the many visual worlds coexisting within a single painting. Patnaik’s use of texture and material is not merely decorative; it adds another dimension to the emotional narratives unfolding before the viewer.

Yet, across these changing palettes and compositions, the red-haired woman remains central to the experience of the exhibition. Through his Man-Woman series, Patnaik explores the complexities of human relationships, capturing the emotions that accompany intimacy: desire, longing, companionship and misunderstanding. His figures often appear caught between closeness and distance, their gestures suggesting feelings that words may leave unsaid. As a viewer, you find yourself drawn into these moments, trying to understand what passes between the figures and what remains hidden beneath the surface.

Sushma K. Bahl writes, “The barely clad petite icon (red headed woman), confident and comfortable in her own skin could be the celestial beauty, the central figure in a world co-habited by men.”

On my first reading of this wall text, I struggled to fully reconcile the interpretation with what I saw before me. The woman certainly appeared confident, but in many of the paintings, her sensuality seemed inseparable from the emotional worlds inhabited by the men around her. I found myself reading her through the moments she shared with them, as though her identity were partly shaped by their desires and the intimacy they seemed to offer. I could recognise her as the central figure, yet I was still looking at her through the lens of the man-woman relationship.

It was only when I reached the final section, displaying a series of ‘Thoughtscapes’, that something shifted. Suddenly, the focus was no longer on the moment shared between a man and a woman, but on the woman herself. Hands emerge from the canvas, almost reaching out to touch her, while she remains absorbed in her own world. The emotions persist, but the emphasis moves beyond sensuality. There is longing, hope and desire, rendered with an intensity that feels distinctly her own.

Standing before these works, I found myself thinking about identity beyond desirability: who are we when we are no longer looking at ourselves through the eyes of someone who wants us? Being wanted is, after all, a deeply human desire. Yet these paintings left me with the uncomfortable but necessary reminder that the desire to be wanted need not become the very thing that consumes us. There is a self that exists beyond the gaze of another, and perhaps the most compelling aspect of this final series is the suggestion that she is beginning to find it.

This shift in my understanding of the red-haired woman also made me think about her origins. Patnaik writes of observing women in Varanasi, their heads covered in sindoor, as they dipped into the Ganges to bathe, the vermilion washing away in the water. It is a striking image: something so transient becoming the starting point for a figure that would recur throughout decades of artistic practice. The red hair, initially so arresting as a visual element, begins to feel like an entry point into something more enduring. It is a reminder of how an everyday observation can grow into an artistic language through which an artist continues to explore the human condition.

I arrived intrigued by a red-haired woman and the curious textures surrounding her. I left thinking about the complicated relationship between intimacy and identity, and about the parts of ourselves that remain beyond another person’s gaze.

If you visit, resist the temptation to move through the gallery too quickly. Look beyond the colours, follow the textures, linger over the details in the backgrounds and allow yourself to return to a painting after you think you have understood it. Continuum: A 30-Year Retrospective is currently on view at Chawla Art Gallery, Saket, until 30 November 2026.

would you rather: freedom of choice or freedom from choice?

I attended a book club in Delhi which provided a breath of air amid this experiential economy’s often bigoted Delhi literary community. Once seated, the host specified that we are not there to foster yet another artificial “safe space”, the kind that has intimidated people out of engaging with literature just as much as the faceted standards imposed by academia. This is a bigger issue I look forward to talk of soon, but right now my thoughts are captured by the lively discussion on the book ‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being’ by Milan Kundera on weight and weightlessness of freedom.

This was the first of the five sessions dedicated to dissecting this book, so we did not engage in a lot of literary thought, but our first impressions of the idea the book focuses on. The question which kept making the rounds was: what is freedom? Is it freedom of choice or freedom from choice? I believe there cannot be a one-definition-fits-all, universal answer. Well, if there is, we certainly can’t arrive at it in the first meeting.

I think a major problem is that the world runs on binary. You either choose a partner for life or live feeling hollow, with lovers across states and continents. You either choose a cold land to settle or a warm one, perhaps altering your upcoming generations’ endurance of the other. You are either a poet or a physicist. Every decision you make seems so permanent because we are so used to being defined by hollow words; words whose definitions are too narrow to contain a human being.

For now, I believe freedom lies in the fluidity of moving between the freedom to choose and the freedom from choice, in believing each choice I make does not have to be my identity.

I might change my stance; for now, I am free to believe and trust my instincts.

Bought the softest silk shrug from a quaint shop in McLeodganj, run by a wonderful Tibetan lady selling authentic Tibetan artefacts.

my museum of failures at almost 21

day one of stream of consciousness writing

From Process/प्रक्रिया, A Group Exhibition at Shrine Empire, New Delhi

all our dreams can come true if we have the courage to pursue them

– walt disney

i heard somewhere, it was as if I was brimming with ambition but had nowhere to pour it. that singular line broke me because I had often felt like that: when my poetry transcript didn’t get through for my dream venue, when my most admired lab did not have any vacancies, and, of course, the most hurtful of all, when my undergraduate study abroad application did not go through. for each of these quests, i had taken all the right steps: tailoring and perfecting my proposal, manifestation, visualisation, just about every piece of advice the internet could provide. i understood it as the holy grail and committed to it as if i had found the secret weapon, a key to the door encaging all my desires.

i soon realised that is rarely the case. you can do everything right and still not be rewarded in the way you believe you must be. i do not mean to discourage you with this fact, but stop waiting for one moment to unlock your dream life; i have wasted months doing the same. we are of the belief that life is happening to us. it is not. we are building our lives day by day: reading the classic book on a rainy evening, sitting through the boring lecture, slugging out the internship you had to take on to pay the bills; each moment is building you up for your most authentic version.

the science research that ultimately led me to international conferences was not inspired by my work at some admired lab in the country. the inspiration struck me when i was a part of a social science study undertaken at my university. the poem which has been appreciated by respected poets of the country was an idea I had been playing around with for months until i penned it down and was so scared i copped out the first time i had to perform it. my most-read article on here was a quick freelance assignment i had taken on during my leisure time in COVID.

you will never know when your luck clock strikes, so all you can do is choose something you will enjoy, where the journey seems so enjoyable, the destination is just the cherry on top.

an attempt to bring soul back in the world

Hi, I am Avni. I am a twenty year old writer. For as long as I remember I have been writing, be it fiction on Wattpad, non fiction on this website or poetry in communities, I have put word on paper and felt it to be the most honest act one can commit to come closer to themselves. I believed my ability to pen down the chaos in my mind to a perfect metaphor reader can feel to, relate to, was my ultimate gift.

Then AI happened, it learnt patterns, metaphors, linguistics from writers, much alike us, who put their years of writing on open access platforms to reach wide and share years of their training and knowledge to democratise knowledge. Now, I am told to put my final draft on ChatGPT to make it “smoother”, “better”, “concise.” Well, fuck better. Humans aren’t an algorithm to be optimised. Write messy. Write true. I want to read your rambling on the terrible sandwich you bought for Rs. 600, use language as vile, as unpolished as possible. That will have more soul than anything AI can conjure up from its most polished prompt.

Hence, I am starting a 30 days series where i write everyday here without any AI assistance, a little contribution to keep the soul intact of a world which is fed with gallons of AI slop each day. I would love to see more of you join in: write about the most seemingly ordinary thing or the revelation you believe will change the world, your words deserve a reader and readers deserve soul back in the words they read. So, join me, reclaim your words.

See you tomorrow.

P.S.: Attaching a piece from one of the most celebrated works of the author whose novels taught me to appreciate the stream-of-consciousness style of writing: Agua Viva by Clarice Lispector. For the next 30 days, I will be writing in this format – notably human.