Video By: Rayees Ahmad | Article By: Nusrat Ali
Shahid Rashid Bhat, 23-year-old boy, a young model and fashion designer from Pulwama is on the mission to reinvent Kashmiri traditional attires and make them fashionable again.
He is the first designer from the valley who is designing clothes for celebrities. He is best known for his work in mixing culture and punk wear. He runs an online brand SRB Style Statement which was launched in March 2017 in Kashmir.
In 2012 Shahid joined New Delhi’s Pearl Academy, considered as one of the best fashion designing colleges in India and graduated from it in 2015. He also did two Advance PG Diploma in Fashion Merchandising. Shahid managed his expenses as a student by doing Mehandi designs and working as a freelance model. After graduation, Shahid was selected by Pantaloons as a fashion illustrator.
Shahid wants to use his experience as a fashion designer to help modify existing designs used in Kashmir. He wants to revive traditional Kashmiris designs and make them relevant as per current fashion.
“Kashmiris can wear their own traditional clothes but with some modern designs,” Shahid.
Shahid feels there is a taboo attached with traditional Kashmiri attires like Pheran. Recently, Shahid’s Pheran designs are in demand in Pakistan, UK, Afghanistan
Starting with 4 employees in 2015, at present Shahid has more than 50 employees working at his units.
Shahid, who has got his own label-SRB Style Statement- has attended a number of meeting and workshops at Fashion Design Council of India (FDCI) in New Delhi, where his ideas of designing ‘Khadi’ Pants, Cotton blended Jeans, ‘Matka’ Silk, adding embroidery to dull gone clothes got applause.
