Saloni (Q3590)
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Saloni is a fashion house from FMD.
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Saloni |
Saloni is a fashion house from FMD. |
Statements
Saloni Lodha has never done a runway show. Instead, she presents her collections via appointment or low-key luncheon, but the unassuming vibe contradicts the force behind her label. Her London-based brand has grown exponentially in recent years, and she has fans all over the world—including her native India. This season, her team brought the collection to New York while Lodha finished prepping for a weekend-long event she’s planned around India’s annual Holi festival. “Holi Saloni” will take place just after Paris Fashion Week ends, and will bring actresses, influencers, and friends of the brand together in Udaipur. The festivities will include a twist on the famous Holi color festival: Women will wear pure white Saloni dresses, then partake in the exuberant paint- and powder-throwing tradition. Each will walk away with an original “print” full of memories.Prints are the thing at Saloni, and her new Fall collection had more of the painterly florals her customers love to collect. The opening look, however, was noticeably subdued: a gray plaid robe coat over wide-leg trousers. Lodha is gradually expanding into solids and more casual pieces, but she’s not trying to do everything all at once. Her updates make sense for her brand: That plaid robe will look great over her glossy satin or velvet dresses, and a lilac wool coat coordinated beautifully with the season’s new azalea print. On that note, the print appeared on some of Lodha’s best new dresses: a long-sleeved mid-length style you could wear year-round, and a ’40s-ish number with ruched sleeves.A pretty print only works if a dress is masterfully cut, though. So while one might assume Lodha starts with prints and works from there, the opposite is true: She zeroes in on the silhouettes first. “I’m someone who falls in love with a dress shape, so I’ll get 10 and wear it every day,” she said, only half-joking. “Our girls want to wear these dresses during the day or at night, but with a lot of ease. So it’s so important to [perfect] those simple shapes, so she can reach for that dress every fall and know it’s her favorite. I like creating those moments.” Those azalea-printed dresses certainly qualified, ditto a bias-cut cherry satin dress with a gently fluted skirt and ruffled sleeves. Even a glittering emerald-sequined slipdress—arguably Lodha’s most glam dress yet—had an ease about it thanks to a narrow, not-too-clingy cut.
Next weekend, Lodha will present a new eveningwear capsule in Udaipur, so you can expect more black-tie-worthy dresses like that in the future.
2 March 2018
To present her Spring collection in Paris over a few days of scheduled appointments, Saloni Lodha brought her own furniture and art from London so that a rental apartment would perfectly complement her extroverted print dresses. “We don’t do shows, so it’s a question of how to create an environment,” she said from a vintage Art Deco-esque loveseat. “For me, the showroom is my world; I get to have creative freedom.” Such a holistic, exacting approach likely explains how her array of floral motifs, despite their dense arrangements, turn out delightful rather than dizzying. Working from a garden-party theme, her studio produced creations in all manner of stylized bloom. And as her clients have come to expect, she offers enough varieties to respect various silhouettes. “Women come to us and all find their shape,” Lodha said, as her fit model emerged in a short, day-to-night georgette number with an adjustable neckline. She singled out a 1940s-inspired style freshened up with a drawstring waist and small cutouts at the hip, as well as a diaphanous maxi robe that, left open, would enliven a T-shirt and jeans with minimal effort. For this newcomer to the brand, keeping up with the dress names wasn’t easy. Was Lorna the yellow devoré that felt very French? And who was the pretty pink one, dotted with fil coupe? (Lodha later confirmed she was Rose.) No doubt Saloni enthusiasts will surely recognize the Zoe, a solid style with a button front and pouch pockets reintroduced for Spring in crisp olive green. Lodha referred to it as “the Saloni T-shirt,” and she might consider adding in a few more of these basics. And yet, while showing off a rare pair of printed pajama-style pants, she noted that people can go elsewhere for those standbys. Considering the way in which she spoke of her designs and how she wears them, you might get the sense they were confidantes accompanying her through her life as a traveling businesswoman and mom. If you’re curious, she’s currently closest with Ashley and Alexia.
3 October 2017
Saloni Lodha is in expansion mode, with a consistently strong business in Europe and Asia and a fast-growing one in the U.S. Printed dresses are her bread and butter—the more vibrant and far-flung-feeling, the better!—but in recent seasons, she’s added salable pieces like poplin blouses, evening jumpsuits, and statement faux furs, too. Still, it’s the vivid dresses that set Lodha apart from her trend-driven competitors, and Fall had some of her prettiest frocks yet.Loosely inspired by vintageqipaosshe discovered in Hong Kong, she whipped up chinoiserie-esque florals in shades of crimson, jade, and canary yellow, with beading and embroideries that touched on her own Indian heritage. The specialness of a Saloni dress is that it isn’t simply printed—usually, the print is embroidered too, or it’s on a devoré velvet or has a smattering of beads for a little extra dimension. Sometimes you can’t see those details until you’re up close, so it feels personal, not OTT. Of course, some of the dresses here were loud on purpose; the sequined, embroidered, and pearl-covered frocks in emerald and mint or black and pink gave fresh new meaning to the term “cocktail dress.”That said, Lodha’s favorite look was on the quieter side: a jade green, short-sleeved silk dress with a tonal print and subtle embroidery. The designer said she simply loved those shades of green—and, at nine months pregnant, it’s a dress she could wear before, during, and after pregnancy. The nipped waist, slightly poufed shoulders, and row of covered buttons gave it a slight ’40s feel, too; a black velvet ruched-sleeve dress and a high-necked cherry red one were also reminiscent of that era. Other designers have done similar silhouettes of late (see: Bottega Veneta, Altuzarra, Erdem), so we’d venture to guess the ’40s-ish midi dress is poised to become the busy woman’s new uniform. Saloni’s are nicely priced (around $500 to $800) and will work seamlessly from day to night—and they look a lot more sophisticated than your go-to jeans.
21 February 2017
“I’m pregnant again, so I just want to feed everyone!” jokedSaloni Lodhaat her lunch-cum-presentation today. You could describe the luncheon in the same words as the clothes: genteel yet easygoing. Lodha is by nature a dressmaker, and her stock-in-trade is a sort of cheerful, gently polished workaholic’s frock, kindred in spirit to the all-purpose 1940s tea dress. There were lots of appealing options here for ladies in need of such an item.Lodha’s ballsy, travel-inspired prints and embroideries were the thing that jumped out at you first. The bright ikat had particular pop. But it was her more subdued efforts that stayed with you, like the simple red dress in a universally flattering nipped-waist shape. There was a nice matter-of-factness to Lodha’s separates, too—an A-line white skirt detailed with multicolored buttons; crisp poplin blouses; a pajama-like blouson in seersucker. You could imagine women getting a lot of pleasure out of these pieces, as well as a lot of use. Lodha’s instinct as a designer is to be generous: She just wants to feed everyone.
20 September 2016
Saloni Lodha started her label on the basis of designing pretty, easy-to-wear printed dresses. Unlike some designers who rush to add more categories to their offering—accessories, outerwear, knits—Lodha favors a gradual approach, slowly growing her London-based brand and feeling out the market. In recent seasons, she introduced denim culottes and waffle-textured separates, and, for Fall, she added faux-fur coats to the mix. A sapphire blue chubby with mirror embroidery is sure to be a favorite when the collection hits stores.Like all of her collections, Lodha started with a hand-painted print. This one—with its tiny, jewel-toned brushstrokes evoking antique images of lush flowers and exotic birds—was inspired by old drawings at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. To add dimension to the print, Lodha embellished it with turquoise beads, lace panels, and feminine ruffles. Or she printed directly onto guipure lace for a more graphic look. There were a lot of solid pieces, too, like a rhinestone-studded velvet pajama set and a few burnout silk dresses; the common thread was that each item had some sort of texture. Also a standout: a handmade orange-and-cobalt lace skirt that could be worn year-round. Fans of the label will delight in the fact that instead of going to Lodha simply for dresses, they can start filling their entire wardrobes with her easy, eye-catching vision.
16 February 2016
Saloni Lodha’s corner office might be best described as cozy: a carved-out scrap of jumbled floor space overlooking an unlovely Clerkenwell junction, walled by two rails. The rest of the little studio seemed happily but snugly inhabited by her team of around 20, all of whom were working hammer and tongs. A sewing machine rat-a-tat was the soundtrack.The reason for all this pell-mell industry—and the sense of a business bulging beyond its accommodation—was on those rails. This 60-look Pre-Fall collection, pared down for Vogue Runway to 20 key punctuation marks, was crowded with midsummer pieces that looked easy to love. The print and lace was inspired by the intense checks of Burmese basketry, but only loosely, with colors zestily bastardized into a near-fluorescent static of green, orange, yellow, and violet. On a long, light waffled polyamide skirt with a seersucker hand feel, or a mesh lace skirt, or a three-section dress bottomed with pleats and ruffled at the neck, that check sang nicely.Simple-to-wear, hard-to-miss print dresses and skirts are Saloni’s core product, but there was plenty of commercially seductive diversity here too. Denim culottes in oxblood were teamed with a fine high-waisted perfecto in a matching color embroidered with bugs and blooms. Blue and black single-shade neoprene and poly-whatever dresses—some priced as low as $195—combined drama (in their silhouette) and lack of it (easy care!). Lodha has her super-cute tees in puckered, perforated fabrics with comely ruffling at the arms and grosgrain at the neckline made in Canada to reduce duty costs to the U.S. It’s not at all difficult to imagine many women taking great pleasure in incorporating the label into their lives when the first wave of this collection drops in June.
12 January 2016
Saloni Lodhalaunched her brand on the strength of its signature printed dresses. That focus has always served her well, but this time around the designer finally feels she’s in a place to branch out. “This is the biggest collection we’ve ever done,” said Lodha, who added denim, leather, and T-shirt categories to her lineup this season. “I didn’t want to expand too soon. Now we are at a stage with our retailers where they really can see us as a full brand.”Brand extensions can go either way, of course. But here, the new categories were a major boon: Lodha successfully translated the line’s signature playful femininity into those aforementioned leather and denim jackets, jeans, and T-shirts by way of clever embellishments. A favorite included a ’70s-inspired cropped denim jacket with a random spattering of grommets in primary colors that is sure to be street style photography bait next season, while a leather jacket embroidered with flowers was an unexpected alternative for evening. Often the new categories furthered themes that have been central to Lodha’s aesthetic from the beginning: A pair of organic natural-dye jeans, in which you can see stripes of variation in the springy pink hue, were made in Pondicherry, India, the same area that Lodha named her LLC for when she first launched her business.But the core of the brand will always be printed dresses; they’re a buyer’s no-brainer and a consistent best-seller. For Spring, the designer tweaked some of the offerings to go even more romantic, with skin-baring cutouts and prints painted on lace. All in all, this collection was a strong step forward for Saloni.
16 September 2015
"I've really been trying to discipline myself, in terms of color," Saloni Lodha said at an appointment today. "Which is so hard for me! I'm Indian! I want all the colors!" Lodha owes herself a pat on the back: Her discipline is paying off. This season, there was a palpable sense of rigor in the Saloni collection, and not just in the constrained palette. Although there was a full complement of femme-y printed dresses—the Saloni signature—many of the strongest looks here were tailored pieces, like the long, lean pantsuits with ruffled sleeves or a buttoned cotton sundress. That both of the aforementioned looks were shown in plain black or cream underscored the fact that Lodha's sense of line and proportion has matured. Her take on pattern has evolved, as well: Painted check, polka dot, and a printed, feather-shaped lace gave this collection a graphic quality. Pretty as they were, the frothier feather and lace prints looked tepid by comparison. Lodha can afford to give her clothes an edge—her idiomatic femininity still comes through. This season, as she focused on expanding her range of separates and offering more grown-up dress silhouettes, she seemed to have taken that idea to heart. There was a lot of edge here. The collection looked sharp.
10 June 2015
The label Saloni is known for its printed silk dresses. At an appointment today, designer Saloni Lodha boasted that these no-brainer pieces are snapped up by shoppers almost as soon as they hit the sales floor. But as Lodha went on to explain, the challenge for her now is to expand her brand in ways that complement the silk prints at its core. With that in mind, she executed her rather psychedelic new prints in dévoré velvet, a material with a weight suited for Fall, and extrapolated them into embossed taffeta and crinkled jacquard, shape-holding fabrics with a season-appropriate sense of formality.That approach made for a lot of pattern and texture, but Lodha kept things in check by erring toward simple shapes and punctuating the collection with understated tailored pieces. There were also a small number of knits, a category she said she'd like to emphasize more: Knit, she noted, has the same throw-it-on, wear-it-anywhere vibe as a printed silk shirtdress. The canny part of that comment is the observation that, as much as prints have emerged as a Saloni signature, the mood she's created of vibrant ease deserves acknowledgment, too. That's why the showpiece look here—a fuchsia coat fully embroidered with chiffon and yarn to create "veggie" fur—seemed more at home in this collection than, say, a heavy black top of viscose and bouclé. Lodha is right to want to introduce a sense of gravity to her brand. She's done a good job thus far of not weighing it down completely.
24 February 2015
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg,a 1964 musical film starring Catherine Deneuve, informed the feeling of Saloni Lodha's latest effort. "The '60s, yes, but also the incredible color palette," said the designer at her New York showroom. (She was in town from Hong Kong, where she lives, via London, where she works.) Indeed, the flamingo pinks and turquoise blues were like Technicolor come to life, in florals and checks rendered on high-waisted culottes, button-front shirts, and bitty rompers. Lodha played those looks against black-and-white woven plaid trousers and mock turtlenecks: a lineup meant to reflect a complete wardrobe. There were plenty of solid-colored dresses, too—arguably one too many. But one couldn't argue with a black off-the-shoulder fit-and-flare, which impressively stood its ground against all those splashy prints.
9 December 2014
For Spring, Saloni Lodha's thoughts turned to the Silk Road—especially Samarkand, the Central Asian city revered for its embroidery, engraving, and abundance of colors, like copper, lapis, and jade. Her inspiration may have been exotic, but she's aware that her customers' lives often aren't. "What's wrong with dressing the normal girl?" the designer asked rhetorically but earnestly. Lodha looks at her clients' wardrobe issues like a puzzle to be solved: She provides wonderfully outspoken patterns and clashes of color, but splices in wearable shapes and sedate everyday pieces, such as a crisp white woven dress and a canary yellow tailored jacket.Standouts included a fluted skirt in a Bokhara pattern, teamed with an easy crop top—throw on the checked bomber jacket and it would be a great day-to-night outfit. A dobby-weave maxi dress in pale orange with a touch of tailoring in a cotton weave collar paid homage to the Silk Road's ancient tradition of weaving, while being practical for modern city dressing. Patterns and textures were mixed up compellingly; a Bokhara-print blouse worn against checked gray culottes was striking. Saloni's business has been growing, and that should continue with this tight collection. The designer is on the Silk Road to success.
12 September 2014
While showing her Saloni Resort 2015 collection, designer Saloni Lodha said: "It's rare when a woman can wear something from morning to evening that works with her full day of events. Usually they have to rush home and change after work—I wanted to put an end to that. With our strangely hectic lifestyles, to be able to provide functional, luxurious day-to-night dressing is my definition of modern luxury."In Saloni's compact collection (which, according to Lodha, has "no product pollution"), a printed shirtdress with a dipped hem and sheer sleeves would transition from work to dinner with ease—the level of formality could be adjusted with its belt. A sweet polka-dot crop top/skirt set saidsummer weddingas much asoffice gear. (Intriguingly, the print bled through into a tie-dye effect on Lodha's signature embossed brocade cotton taffeta—a little detail that made it stand out among this season's abundance of polka-dot prints.) Key to any Saloni collection is print, and this year the theme was all about snakes: pythons, boas, rattlesnakes, and mambas appeared on various pieces, the most formal of which was a party dress in a silk organza twill with a rich eggplant print. Those were some very covetable snakes, but if ophidiophobia is an issue, then a burnt orange trouser with origami-waist detail or a short khaki playsuit would do nicely instead.Transitioning not only from work to play but also from season to season was critical for Lodha: "We realized the collection couldn't be too 'resort-y,' because, really, how many of us are packing for Christmas holidays in October?" said the designer. "In my office we're all working like mad, dreaming of vacation but stuck at a desk—and the majority of our clientele are in the same position." For those women, there was an utterly ladylike cropped jacket in cotton lace embroidery that did double duty as a blouse, with creamy white city shorts to match. A python-print linen trenchcoat was noteworthy not just for its instant hit of chic, but because it managed to make linen look crease-free. But in case escape is on the agenda, all the looks are made from mid-weight fabrics so they can work in different seasons and temperatures. Saloni thinks as much about what a woman needs as much as what she wants, which might explain why her collections have been doing so well with key e-tailers like Net-a-Porter and Shopbop.
11 June 2014
Saloni Lodha is one of London's daywear queens, and a rising force in "sell-through" (meaning, many of her pieces sell out at full price—a retailer's dream). Her languid, easy looks with a sunny color palette transition into comfortable eveningwear. There's nothing existential, angst-filled, or modernist with her—no great fashion innovation. Lodha specializes in uncomplicated, upbeat looks.For Fall, inspired by Fritz Lang'sMetropolisand astronomy, Lodha began by showing wearable separates like her standby shirtdress, fluid trousers, flowy jumpsuits, and unstructured blousons. Details were restrained but cool, such as bugle beads on a sleeve that was sewed on vertically, creating a ventricular effect. A fantastic nubby black and red spotted wool coat and a cocoon version in silver Lurex zebra print had sell-through written all over them. So far, so Saloni.But then Lodha showed that she wanted to push herself in new directions. A looped-wool and silk chubby was extremely glam, and a few very subtle sequins gave an idea of where she was going. Then came the face print, but her take was aMetropolis-esque, alien pixelated print; it was very fashion-forward for this designer. Normally the politest of ladies, Lodha also had one print on a tank top of hands positioned to be clutching the breasts. A double silk georgette blazer with gold disks wasn't quite a full-frontal bling assault, but it was close. Perhaps most striking was the no-holds-barred, high-octane statement dress: a transparent silver and black hand-beaded affair that took hundreds of hours to make. Lodha is usually so focused on affordability that she seemed almost embarrassed to say the cost of the piece—around the $2,000 mark, which for her is astronomical.Lodha isn't letting go of the perfectly nice day-to-day stuff that pays the bills. Given how good those pieces are, and how much better they're getting, nor should she. But she is moving gently out of her comfort zone, and the results are very encouraging.
25 February 2014
Saloni Lodha launched her business in 2008 with a few wrap dresses in pretty prints, mostly worn by buddies like Charlotte Dellal and Poppy Delevingne—the cool-girl club where Lodha herself is a card-carrying member. But in the past few years, her collection has gone through a growth spurt. There is a more cohesive, grown-up message in her Spring collection—perhaps a result of her own life growth. Marriage and a new baby seem to have centered her, all for the better.Her starting point this season wasBetty, Gerhard Richter's photorealistic painting of his daughter. Lodha focused on the poppy-print coat worn by the little girl and Richter's signature blurry brushstrokes. It was most obvious in a three-quarter-sleeve dress in colors Saloni described as "brocade chili and palace blue." An aurora borealis print appeared on her popular Apsara dress, affectionately nicknamed "the bum dress," she explained, "because I have been told it makes every woman's butt look amazing. Both Helena Christensen and SamCam have worn them, not that they need any help in the bum department."Lodha's silhouettes have advanced beyond the wrap styles she's known for. There was a cleverly draped short black number as well as a sharp black jumpsuit that felt new for her. Restraint was the order of the day here, especially in her use of beading. She could have gone nuts with embellishments—being Indian, after all, that is a birthright. The standout piece was the Victoria dress, a blue and white embroidered frock with a beautiful bodice detail, just the thing for a summer wedding. But where the collection really matured was fabric. Lodha has worked extensively with a Japanese mill in an effort to keep her prices reasonable—a point she is passionate about. Her sumptuous rayon and viscose pieces feel no different in quality to her hammered silks and quilted and embossed jacquards.
5 October 2013
Saloni Lodha's still-young brand has been having a growth spurt of late: Not only has Saloni expanded its distribution, especially stateside, but the Saloni collections themselves seem to be getting bigger and bigger, as well. Happily, this rather large Resort collection didn't lack in focus, despite its size. Lodha's starting point this time out was Henri Rousseau—he of tranquil, surreal, Postimpressionist jungle paintings such as the very famousThe Dream. Lodha then translated Rousseau's jungles into the cheerful colors of her native India, with a particular pop coming from her acid yellow and neon coral. Hand-painted tropical prints were applied to beachy maxi dresses and caftans, as well as camisole tops and shorter frocks that all felt more urbane. In general, though, this felt like a very traditional kind of Resort collection, in that it was full of clothes designed for getaways.
13 June 2013
Designer Saloni Lodha lives in Mumbai. But she launched her brand in London, back when she was something of a local It girl, and in the years since, she has developed its aesthetic into an adroit mix of her Eastern and Western influences. Lodha's silhouettes are rather straightforward, with an emphasis on flirty jacquard and printed jersey skirts and dresses. But as this collection affirmed, the real interest in her clothes is the surface embellishment. Here, for instance, she transformed an otherwise anodyne organza cocktail dress by covering it in color-blocked Indian cord work. Elsewhere, she created camo-like patterns on a short dress and baseball jacket, using dense thread embroidery. Those were the most interesting pieces in the collection, but there were lots of attractive looks here as well. In particular, Lodha's stained-glass print gave a kaleidoscopic kick to her relatable little dresses. She also did well with her outerwear, which was both a new category for her this season and, as she explained when presenting the collection, an especially challenging one. "When you live in Mumbai," she noted, "it can be hard to remember that there are places where it's not always hot."
21 March 2013