Bio -
Rhea Singh is a contemporary Indian fashion designer with a unique background and perspective on fashion. She was born in Poland but grew up in Singapore, which has likely influenced her multicultural and diverse approach to design. Currently residing in New York, Rhea's work has garnered attention for its exploration of identity and cultural sustainability.
One of Rhea's distinctive features as a designer is her focus on incorporating Indian-inspired fabric prints into her garments. Her background in print design allows her to digitally recreate traditional Indian prints, preserving the rich heritage of Indian textiles. She combines these prints with delicate beadwork and embroidery, ensuring that each garment tells a unique and meaningful story.
Under the brand name REA, a variation of her own name, Rhea aims to represent the eternal flow of time and generations through her designs. Her brand's mission is to bring the heritage of Indian textile prints into the contemporary fashion world, emphasizing the importance of preserving and celebrating cultural traditions.
Rhea's debut collection, "Eternal Threads," showcases her commitment to this mission. Each look in the collection serves as an example of how heritage is not only preserved but also celebrated in the modern fashion landscape. Rhea Singh's work is a testament to the rich tapestry of influences that shape her as a designer and the stories she weaves into her creations.
Interview -
Please share a bit about your journey to embrace fashion design as a career.
I decided to become a designer 4 years ago. Before this I was a print designer where I made hand carved blocks for printing. I randomly decided to take up a class in garment construction and fell in love with the process. It was a whole different feeling watching your work come alive through human movement. The garments I created became a way for me to connect back to my heritage, and now I incorporate my knowledge of print design into my collections. My impulsive decision to study fashion has led me to work with designers from all over the world. The last few years I have gained recognition for my prints through magazines and other designers. Now I am here at New York Fashion Week while I start to grow my brand.
I decided to become a designer 4 years ago. Before this I was a print designer where I made hand carved blocks for printing. I randomly decided to take up a class in garment construction and fell in love with the process. It was a whole different feeling watching your work come alive through human movement. The garments I created became a way for me to connect back to my heritage, and now I incorporate my knowledge of print design into my collections. My impulsive decision to study fashion has led me to work with designers from all over the world. The last few years I have gained recognition for my prints through magazines and other designers. Now I am here at New York Fashion Week while I start to grow my brand.
How did you learn your skills?
I studied at the School of The Arts Institute of Chicago where I majored in fashion design. But I have also learnt a lot from all the designers I worked under over the last 4 years. I have worked under designers from Singapore, London, Chicago, New York and India and they have all taught me so much. From pattern making to creating a collection, I gained a lot of knowledge from my work experience. When it comes to my prints that I create for my fabrics, that is something I taught myself. During COVID when everything was under lockdown, I started to teach myself to draw digitally. It took years before I taught myself how I can start converting these drawings into full prints for fabrics. It's something I am glad I taught myself, because it is part of how became the designer I am today. Those prints are who I am as a person and designer.
I studied at the School of The Arts Institute of Chicago where I majored in fashion design. But I have also learnt a lot from all the designers I worked under over the last 4 years. I have worked under designers from Singapore, London, Chicago, New York and India and they have all taught me so much. From pattern making to creating a collection, I gained a lot of knowledge from my work experience. When it comes to my prints that I create for my fabrics, that is something I taught myself. During COVID when everything was under lockdown, I started to teach myself to draw digitally. It took years before I taught myself how I can start converting these drawings into full prints for fabrics. It's something I am glad I taught myself, because it is part of how became the designer I am today. Those prints are who I am as a person and designer.
I was born in Poland, later brought up in Singapore, moved to Chicago and now I am living in New York. I lived in India for 2 years before moving to Singapore, but as an Indian who grew up outside of her home country, being a designer really helped me connect back to my heritage and understand who I was. As a designer you can see how I combine my heritage through motifs, print and embellishments and bring that into the more contemporary design world that I was brought up in. It's my way of carrying my culture into the world I am in. There is a whole history of textile and art in India that is slowly getting lost, As a designer I want to preserve that art and way of storytelling. That is who I am as a designer.
What comes easiest for you as a designer? What is hardest?
I don't think there is an easy or hard part, the entire process from the start till the end is unpredictable. It's rare that things will go as planned. Each part of the process, whether it is designing the print of the fabric, pattern making, embellishments, or pattern testing, all take time. At the moment I currently do everything myself. The only part I outsource is sending my digital prints to my supplier in India to get them printed on my fabrics. It's always stressful having to do the entire process on your own, and it can feel really overwhelming, but it's something I had to teach myself to work around if I wanted to be in this industry.
My inspiration comes from my heritage. I spend a lot of time looking at and understanding traditional Indian architecture in temples and forts. Not just how they used geometric patterns but how they built structure through these motifs, a story, a narrative that lives on till today. If I do visit the temples when I go to India, I tend to look up at the carvings in the ceiling, and if you look at them for long enough, it starts to encapsulate you. It's an incredible experience. That is the experience that inspires me to design the way I do. My inspiration has stayed the same - pulling references from old Indian and Mughal architecture and how they played with structure and motifs. Color is just as important as any other element in the collection. In my culture, every color has a deep cultural significance and I grew up understanding color that way. What color I use for the prints really changes the way a viewer experiences and sees the print. Most of my main color schemes draw from earthly tones used in Indian art. I use that as my base before I start playing around with more “contemporary” color palettes.
Readers would love to hear about the collection you will be showing on the runway at New York Fashion Week FW24 in February? Inspiration, fabrics, pallette, etc.?
I drew inspiration from my Indian heritage. We have a long history when it comes to textiles and architecture. The story telling technique through motifs in Indian architecture and fabrics is something you can see bleeding into my own work. I design my prints and get my fabrics printed in India. While I design with cultural sustainability in mind, I am also mindful about the type of fabrics I use. The fabrics that we use are mainly 100% cotton or a mix of natural fibers. My color palette is largely inspired from the artworks that came to India during the Mughal Empire. This entire collection is a conversation between the cultures and environments that I have been brought up in through design and print. It's a homage to the heritage that created me and the world that made me who I am. It's a visual representation on how I have experienced my culture.
Do you have a favorite look in this collection?
Over the last few months of creating this collection, every week I had a new favorite look. What I will say is that I definitely love the men's collection, especially the red snake jeans.
Where can readers purchase your designs?
At the moment the online store is being developed where all custom pieces will be sold. But in the meantime purchases or inquiries for products can be done through our Instagram page which is @reabyrhea.
What's next for you as a designer and your brand?
The next thing for me as a designer is to really focus on building up the brand, creating new prints for future collections, working on some new designs, and handling custom orders. At the moment I am working on getting the online store up and running, while creating more custom looks.
Over the last few months of creating this collection, every week I had a new favorite look. What I will say is that I definitely love the men's collection, especially the red snake jeans.
Where can readers purchase your designs?
At the moment the online store is being developed where all custom pieces will be sold. But in the meantime purchases or inquiries for products can be done through our Instagram page which is @reabyrhea.
What's next for you as a designer and your brand?
The next thing for me as a designer is to really focus on building up the brand, creating new prints for future collections, working on some new designs, and handling custom orders. At the moment I am working on getting the online store up and running, while creating more custom looks.
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