NEETA LULLA’S SARTORIAL SUCCESS
Costume designer for iconic films like Khal Nayak and Taal, Neeta Lulla believes in the power of the work you put in
NNeeta Lulla’s sartorial journey began in a small room at her in-laws’ home in Mumbai. “They said I shouldn’t be simply sitting at home,” says Lulla, 55, who was a teenage mother when she began studying dressmaking and apparel construction at the city’s SNDT University. Her credentials have only grown since then. On July 1, Lulla was among the 12 Indian film professionals invited to be a part of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the outfit known to vote for the Oscars. She joins the likes of costume designer Bhanu Athaiya (Gandhi) and Arjun Bhasin (Life of Pi) to become a member.
“When I heard about it, I didn’t understand it at first. It took some time to sink in,” says Lulla. “It is a big accomplishment because it only comes with the power of the work you put in.” There are many memorable looks that Lulla has created in a career spanning three decades, beginning with dressing up Sridevi for Lamhe, Madhuri Dixit in Khal Nayak, Aishwarya Rai-Bachchan in Taal, to Kangana Ranaut more recently in Manikarnika: The Queen of Jhansi (2019). Lately, she is the craftswoman of choice among filmmakers looking for a designer who can nail fashion centuries old. Her credits include Devdas, Jodhaa Akbar, Mohenjo Daro and the upcoming multilingual Jayalalitha biopic, Thalaivi, in which she has designed the looks of Ranaut and Arvind Swami, who plays M.G. Ramachandran. “I take just one project a year,” says Lulla, “as it takes six to eight months to do research, followed by filming. Over the years, the films I have done have progressed in terms of technique. Just when I think this is the best work of my life, next year I have to push the bar further.”
As the fashion industry reels from the lockdown, Lulla has still managed to clock in 18 hours a day, from sketching, learning social media marketing and painting, to mentoring fashion students via webinars. More recently, she was seen in season two of TLC show Decoded, in which she talks about fashion in the 1980s, the decade in which her career be
gan. “There was a lot of inventing, reinventing and experimenting,” she says. “You would create style statements and, of course, you would get away by thinking how smart and innovative you are. Today you come up with something new and it’s already there on Instagram or Pinterest, and you are like ‘Okay, so I wasn’t the first’.”
Bridal orders are slowly trickling in at her workshop for weddings scheduled starting November. “These are testing times, but I’m quite
Neeta Lulla is the costume designer of choice among filmmakers working on period dramas
an optimist,” says Lulla. “I am being patient, counselling my clients on what will work and not.” For the moment, though, she’s still high on the badge of honour from the Academy. That it comes less than a year after she sat on the steps of the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, home to the Oscars, makes it even sweeter. “I said to myself I am going to walk these steps for something big someday,” she says. “I just said it out to the universe.” Her call was heard.