Lingerie’s  Romance with COLOURS

January 7, 2017 written by
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The advent of colourful lingerie in the Indian intimate apparel market

Lingerie in a variety of colours, fabrics and styles is certainly a very common phenomenon today. Statistic show that  the retail revenue of the global lingerie market from 2008 to 2016  is estimated to reach 82.1 billion U.S. dollars in 2016. A bigger share of this revenue today can be accounted to the colourful sets and individual lingerie pieces. But what looks as an ongoing trend today was an out of context question until a few decades back. Lingerie as a concept has been identified individually only during the 90s.  As the 20th century progressed, underwear became smaller and more form fitted. In the 1960s, lingerie manufacturers such as Frederick’s of Hollywood began to glamorize lingerie.

The lingerie industry expanded in the 21st century with designs that doubled as outerwear. The French refer to this as ‘dessous-dessus’ which basically means innerwear as outerwear. But functionality in lingerie, or for lingerie was always considered and earmarked as the foremost requirement. However, with an evolution taking place within the lingerie industry, over time many changes were brought in. And colours as an add on to the lingerie and the idea of wearing colourful lingerie was thus eventually introduced to its full glory. However colour as a global phenomenon is also way too new and did make an advent with the beginning of the humble hipster. During the later half of 1960s cotton gussets were added to nylon briefs for comfort and better hygiene.  In this era various permutations on the bikini bottom took panties lower and lower down the hipline and higher and higher up the thigh. These were hipsters or hipster briefs and they featured leg variations from straight cut to high cut became usual. Late 1960s alternatives were the ‘modern’ hip huggers. With the Hipster styles of panties becoming fashionable, the floral printed fabrics, bold colours and flesh toned knickers were the new must have.

 

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By the 1980s, eco conscious superfine cotton jersey knickers were back in fashion, but so were slinky silk or polyester satin or crepe de chine French knickers dripping in lace. These new stylish demands gave way to colour and the same walked its way into the lingerie industry Internationally. But nationally and from an Indian perspective colourful lingerie is rather a modern phenomenon and started showing its emergence during the late 80s. Colour was only making its appearance in glimpses and in its lighter shade variations during this time. However printed fabric and colours  on hosiery is certainly a millennium phenomenon and only grew in prominence with the advent of the millennium.

 

“Earlier lingerie was just treated as a modest piece of undergarment and as the necessity of life, the basic idea was to wear only white, later on black. As there was no vision beyond black and white. After some time since we the producers felt the need of a skin colour variation in lingerie, which were prompted out by the pastel shade blouses & dresses.

 

The idea for skin was well accepted by the females, as everyone knew, the fact that skin is the most safe yet sexy colour. Later on the vision of colours came to our minds and we started offering colours, initially colours beyond white, black and skin were just rejected by the market, but gradually the rainbow of colours became the life of the undergarment industry, just like the outer garments. Unlike the early days  the undergarment today is treated  as per the outerwear industry,” explained Nandkumar Badlani, MD, MM Corporation.

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Heavens Fairy is one of those brands who can be credited to have revolutionised the motif of colour and have brought in the trend of colour into the lingerie industry. The early catalogues and ads of the brand clearly shows a variation from the boring notion of white, black and skin with a touch of pink, grey and other pastel shades. Now this brand has been morphed into Softy Lingerie. Later in the early Nineties another home grown brand Laika was the first to introduce colour and prints in synthetic fabric which was enthusiastically promoted by Little Lacy  who introduced the concept of colour matching with fabric and lace through dyeing.

 

While Sherry brought the concept of colours in hosiery fabric for the first time. But that was a time when lingerie was made using cotton fabric and simply stitched to glory with a hint of light colour. Bodyline had also introduced an array of colours in the late nineties and Scan had introduced his printed range of hosiery bras in early 2000. While in Delhi a few brands like Eves Beauty, Romance, Supreme, Groversons were dabbling in colours for their local clientele in the late nineties.

 

As  we turn 18, we realised that this is the right age, when the teen first begins to relate to emotions through a rainbow of colours. This is the age when romantic notions are born, which are as colourful and charming as can be. As we take a step forward to our adulthood, we decided to celebrate the colourful journey of lingerie through decades of its progress.

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Sansar was their first style in colour, introduced in an array of 12 colours in the beginning. “If we look 25 years behind time, we will certainly not find any trace of colour. 60% of the industry was dominated by the colour white, the rest 40% was equally balanced by Black and Skin colour.  During those days even accessories used for lingerie were in neutral colour,” informed Dipesh Kubadia, Director Sonari.

He also went on to inform that colours were brought in to the market by the brand almost 20-22 years back. When initially the colours introduced were Red, Pink, Purple, Maroon etc.

But initially brands introducing colours had to face many negative feedback from the market. But cutting the years of invalid response, finally colours were well accepted by the consumers and today it is hard to believe that the same has become a trend. Mr. Kubadia informed that Sansar was their first style in colour, introduced in an array of 12 colours in the beginning, the same is made available in sizes 30 to 44 . A simple bra for the women who demand simplicity in her lingerie this style still commands heavy demand even today.

Sonari today offers many styles in a wide range of colours ranging from a variety bucket of  25-30 colours to 46 colours offering too for selected styles. With the advent of colour, dark colours became an instant hit. With time owing to high demand colours like lemon, green, pink, coffee etc. were further added to make way for more exciting shades like fluorescent colours, cherry  etc.

Little Lacy was the pioneer in introducing colourful sets s in a market stashed with the mundane white, black and skin. “The product was launched in 1992 called ‘Catwalk’ and had never before colours like magenta, chocolate, lavender, bottle green etc. It was certainly a head turner  and an instant hit among the customers,” informed Urja Padwal, MD, Little Lacy. Currently the brand offers a palette of over 85 shades and is expertly adding exciting new colours every season to their wide bouquet of offering.

CORAL is gradually becoming the go-to colour for brides as a fresher change over standard bridal colours like red and maroon. The autumn will see a rise in jewel tones like emerald and amethyst, she further informed. “Also we see a lot of women picking subtle shades like old rose , taupe , cerise and pewter,” Urja commented. Colours though a late entrant into the lingerie industry has been a constant motivation for better sales with the changing times.

What was just revolving around the basic colours to begin with has given way to a rainbow of colours today and with the lingerie industry growing mature by the years the demand to get colourful has become more of a necessity as compared to just being trendy. Women today want a splash of colour on their intimates, unlike a few years back when colours were not so much appreciated and were considered more of a havoc.

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There are universal truths about colour, and then of course, there are individual preferences. For example, A customer is always looking for something fresh. She would not want to purchase a particular design if it is only available in 3 colours variants. She will find it boring and always look for something new. But if she has her eye on her favourite design, and it is available in many colours.  she would want to purchase that design in many colours, since she already knows the fit and feel of the product.

She can continue to wear her favourite old design but still feel like she’s purchasing something new, hence it is very important for bras to be available in different colours.  Though there are many factors that influence how and what consumers buy. However, a great deal is decided by visual cues, the strongest and most persuasive being colours. bright colours are in major demand by the young customers and this trend will be active for a long time,” informed Gautam Makhija, Director, Sherry Apparels Pvt. Ltd.

In the year 1993-94,  Sherry was the first company in India to manufacture bras in mercerised knitted fabric. Before Sherry’s launch bras were usually crafted out of woven/ nylon fabrics which were very dominant in the Indian market.

Due to the climate conditions in India, then Sherry decided that mercerised knitted fabric would be the ideal fabric for bras. When they introduced a few styles crafted from this fabric in a matter of three years the fabric caught on with the Indian consumers and now after 20 years almost every company in India and abroad, are producing bra out of knitted fabric. And people slowly started to realise that this is the best suited fabric for the Indian climatic conditions. Back then Sherry introduced many new bra styles that were primarily introduced  in 7 colours when at that time most bra available were in basic colours like White Black, Skin.

When first introduced in 1995 these styles were priced at Rs. 90 and currently this style is priced at Rs. 200. Sherry today has introduced a bigger colour basket that accommodates 112 colour variations across a great variety of styles.

 

 

 

 

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