Archana Walavalkar

Archana Walavalkar is a movie costume designer based in Mumbai. She was the former junior fashion editor of Vogue magazine, India. Today, she is the founder and creative director of the company, Style Cracker.

She has played a pivotal role in styling some high profile and famous stars like Shahid Kapoor Shahid Kapoor also identifies as the name Shahid K >> Read More... , Varun Dhawan Varun Dhawan, a new comer entered Bollywood with h >> Read More... , and Alia Bhatt Alia Bhatt is a trendsetting actress from Mumbai, >> Read More... . She has been styling lead actors of films for the past five years. She had no plan of getting into the line of mainstream Bollywood and the elite genre where she stands today. Most of her career was formed by styling editorials, initially at L'Officiel, and later as fashion editor of Vogue magazine, India.

She grew in the industry with the popularity gained through styling and filmographies, which were a natural progression and consequence of the inherent quality she possessed. So far, she is known for designing costumes of celebs for known movies like ‘Drishyam’, Humpty Sharma, and ‘Shaandaar’. The most recent add up to the list has been Bollywood's crazy debut film, Kapoor and Sons, featuring Alia Bhatt, Siddhartha Malhotra and Fawad Khan.

She explains that the styling process isn't as simple as people consider it to be. It demands one to go and survey the market, different costumes designed by fashionista's and moulding one's appearance to suit the nature and outlook of their character. For instance, sometimes, there has to be a quick round of local markets so as to pick fabrics, colors and embroidery. The most important of all, are the fitting schedules, which yield a chance to the actors to offer their inputs and opinions on the costume they would be wearing. She also believes that weather has a detrimental role to play in the pattern with which the styling work unfolds.

Archana shares her personal views explaining that Bollywood has definitely come a long way. Styling has evolved as the most essential part of the movie making process nowadays. She asserts that as a stylist, she strives to create an individualistic style for whoever she is working on. With it being right, one can actually track on the nerve of their character.

She considers that once styling is on for red carpet events, the process becomes very spontaneous and that's the prime time when one's personal relationship with brands and designers come into play. An organised and well managed team affair proves to be an icing on the cake!

Her opinions reflect beautiful messages she wants to convey to an indefinite and prolonged lists of fashion stylists, who are still striving hard to gain popularity and fame.

The Kapoor and Sons stylist is on the ins and outs of designing for the whole of B-town!