The curtain rises on the FDCI X Lakme Fashion Week 2021 with Anamika Khanna's gorgeous collection.  

It's phygital. Yup, you read that right. That's what 'physical' becomes when it combines with 'digital'. It may well be one of the 'words' of 2021.

But that's not the only thing that's different about this fashion week.

Lakme and the Fashion Design Council Of India are back together -- they parted ways in 2006, with Lakme and FDCI hosting their separate bi-annual fashion weeks in Mumbai and Delhi respectively --  after 15 years!

Kolkata-based designer Anamika Khanna raised a toast to the reunion and launched the FDCI X Lakme Fashion Week 2021 on Tuesday night with her impressive collection, Timeless The World.

In an email, Anamika explains, 'My collection is a collaboration of art and textile and will be an homage to the fact that what is created will one day perish. What is left behind is legacy, and what matters most is what you do with it.'

To ensure social distancing norms, an immersive studio was set up at the FDCI office in New Delhi with large screens and customised lighting.

Here's a glimpse from Anamika's stunning collection.

Timeless designs, timeless colours, inspired by the past. 

And how does Anamika do it? She weaves a lovely story about a 24-year-old, who discovers a trunk with textiles and imagines new clothes that blend modern ideas with traditional designs.

So traditional and yet, so modern!

The men were not left behind... the collection featured open cut sherwanis with intricate embroidery.

A closer look at the careful detailing.

As the fashion industry rises again after the pandemic, Anamika's collection makes it clear that she sees the traditional embroidery, weaving and material finding its place with the modern.

Watch!

Anamika introduces three artistes -- Deepak Kumar Saw, Amalan Dutta, Smriti Lekha Gogoi -- and ends with a beautiful message: 'And yet reborn we will be, Together will we move, Rebuild our lives we will.'

• FASHION FIESTA: FDCI X Lakme Fashion Week 2021