MUMBAI - Talented people from Northeast are making their presence felt in various professions. Among them is fashion designer Imchatsung Imchen from Nagaland, who dazzled the audience with his collection at the Lakme Fashion Week held in Mumbai recently.

Imchen hails from a small village Mongchen in Nagaland, and is the first-ever Naga fashion designer to be selected for the biggest fashion event in India- the Lakme Fashion Week.e has done his post graduation from the National Institute of Design (NID) in Ahmedabad, and his source of inspiration comes from the works of artists like Piet Mondrian, Monet, Beethoven and Sabyasachi Mukherjee.

He used the rich folklore of Northeast in his collection, and experimented with traditional Naga textiles with a modern touch.

“The collection has been inspired by a song written by a musician friend who is based in New York. The collection revolves around the feeling, the mood and the hues. The mood and colour has been inspired by the collection. The different elements of designs are inspired by the Naga traditions which are interpreted in the collection,” Imchen said.

Models walked down the ramp wearing drapes of mekhela, a loincloth used by Naga tribes, while tribal motifs on clothing, exotic armlets and leggings and dry flower headgears were some of the traditional inputs in his collection.

“I got fabrics woven from Nagaland’s organic cottons. I tried blending it with different fabrics in the collection. That is what it is,” Imchen said.

Imcha’s endeavor to preserve the essence of the traditional costumes and handloom of Naga tribes will go a long way in encouraging budding fashion designers from the northeast. (ANI)