The UK prime minister resigned. And his wife stood near him in a dress that seemed to augment his downfall. Or was the Internet reading too much into the outfit?
She stood by her man, watching him give a farewell speech to the British public. In the televised parting, defeated UK prime minister, Rishi Sunak emerged from 10 Downing Street with his wife Akshata Murty, looking like the crushed—but still-happy—couple after the unsurprising landslide victory of the Labour party and its leader Keir Starmer in the recent general election. He was dressed in his usual ministerial navy suit and white shirt, but with an odd skinny silver tie. It was, however, what the wife wore that allowed trolls to have a good day. As he said unemotionally, "I am sorry... I have heard your anger...", Ms Murty, holding a black umbrella, looked a little glum, but it was her dress that seemed to be delivering a message of defiance or underscoring her husband's defeat, depending on who saw what.
Although the dress sported the national colours of Britain—red, while, and blue, it was not a local label. It is fascinating that Ms Murty chose the modest outfit by a brand from her native India: Ka-Sha (not to be confused with the French label Le Kasha, also supplier of knits to French couture houses such as Chanel). The 12-year-old line is based in Pune, in the western state of Maharashtra. It was founded by London Collage of Fashion alumna Karishma Shahani Khan and is touted as a "zero-waste label". Ms Khan told Vogue India in 2022: "Our clothes are real people's clothes—comfortable, eccentric and very wearable." Just what the PM's wife needed. While in India, the brand is considered high-end, it is rather of the same league, price-wise, as the British labels she favours while her husband was in office, such as Jigsaw and Joseph. But the visually dominant dress did appear to suggest, that in appearing strident, she was saying something.
Akshata Murty, daughter of the billionaire founder of Infoysis N.R. Narayan Murthy, chose to wear a £395 (or about S$682) cotton dress, named Lina, available in the UK through the Indian e-tailer Omi Na Na (it is not known if Ms Murty bought hers online or directly from the brand). The dress with appliquéd stripes, while striking, would probably not draw much attention if not for the occasion to which it was worn. On the bodice, the navy and white stripes were arranged into a chevron bib, which led many observers to say that the repeated Vs were downward facing arrows, emphatically indicating downfall. Clearly, not a symbol of victory. One commentator on X wrote, "Even Rishi Sunak's wife's dress says you're going down!" As we often see in fashion, perceptions can be as discordant as politics is divisive.
Screen shot: thesun/YouTube
No comments:
Post a Comment