During my college days in 2010 at NIFT Delhi, we had to wear our traditional state garment for a fashion history class. That was the first time I remember wearing a veshti as an adult. I wore a Tamil veshti-sattai to a fashion college ! At NIFT!! At Delhi!!!

The white veshti sattai stood out among the kurta pyjamas and sarees that others wore. It drew a lot of admiration.

But that was only one side of the story.

The other side was that I had to run to the restroom multiple times because the veshti kept slipping. It simply would not stay on my skinny waist. I also had a tough time carrying my phone and wallet because the veshti had no pockets.

For generations, the veshti and lungi were garments defined by memory rather than design. They were draped through instinct, secured through folds and knots learned by watching elders, and adjusted constantly throughout the day. Despite their cultural centrality, the garments remained structurally unchanged and were largely absent from designer fashion runways. Comfort of the lungi and veshti depended on the skill of the wearer. Stability of the garments depended on the vigilance of the wearer. Innovation, as fashion history often records it, never arrived.

As a fashion designer, that moment stayed with me. The veshti was prone to slipping. The veshti required constant adjustment. The veshti had no pockets to carry everyday essentials.

As a design student, I began experimenting with ways to redesign the veshti to solve these real life functional problems.

The innovation began with a simple design question. Why should a garment worn daily by millions demand constant adjustment? Why should dignity and comfort rely on bodily technique rather than construction? Why must tradition remain physically unforgiving to be considered authentic?

These questions led to a new silhouette. A lungi and veshti that were tailored, structured, adjustable, and stable.

My early prototypes included tie up versions and D-ring variations with side pockets. However, they still did not feel completely secure or comfortable.

That changed during my graduate design collection at NIFT Delhi. On the runway, I presented what would become the first tailored waistband lungi, introducing a structured waistband construction to a garment traditionally worn through folding and tucking. The lungi was reimagined by Purushu Arie as a stylistic and inclusive gender neutral garment, extending the traditional silhouette beyond its conventional boundaries.

Over the following years, I continued refining the design through multiple prototypes and wearer feedback. This process eventually led to two variations: a tailored waistband lungi and veshti with side zippers, and another version with an elastic waistband and adjustable drawstring. Elastic and drawstrings were not added as an afterthought. They were built into the logic of the garment itself.

In 2017, I launched the fully developed versions as part of my first gender neutral fashion collection. The designs featured tailored lungis and veshtis made using Tamil Nadu handloom fabrics, with pockets, zipper closures, elastic waistbands, and adjustable drawstrings.

The tailored elastic waistband veshti and lungi were an immediate success. The innovation received widespread media coverage and was featured in The Hindu, The New Indian Express, The Telegraph, Mint, DT Next, and several other publications.

This innovation was launched under the Purushu Arie label several years before ‘ottiko kattiko’ veshti products became widely popular around 2020. Purushu Arie became the first designer brand to introduce and formally document tailored lungis and veshtis constructed with an elastic waistband and drawstring as a primary design feature.

This distinction matters not as a trend, but as a matter of design authorship. Prior to this work, there was no verifiable fashion archive, catalogue, museum record, or press documentation presenting elasticated drawstring lungis or veshtis as an intentionally designed garment with named authorship.

By introducing elastic waistbands and drawstrings within a tailored veshti and lungi design, the garment’s behaviour on the body fundamentally changed. It became secure without being restrictive. Adaptive without being shapeless. Wearable across ages, professions, and body types. The wearer no longer had to constantly perform the garment. The garment supported the wearer.

What emerged was not simply a reinterpretation of an existing garment. It was a new design architecture applied to a traditional draped form.

At a time when much of Indian fashion looked upward toward elite social aesthetics or outward toward Western silhouettes for inspiration, this work looked inward. It reworked a garment that had long been stigmatised or considered inappropriate in elite spaces in India.

The veshti was not presented as nostalgia or costume. It was treated with the same seriousness that fashion typically reserves for trousers or tailored separates. In doing so, the work quietly challenged a hierarchy within Indian fashion where innovation is assumed to emerge from Western forms while indigenous garments remain frozen in time.

The cultural impact of this shift is subtle but meaningful. The elastic waistband veshti removes anxiety from the act of wearing the garment. It invites movement and everyday functionality. It allows the body to exist without constant adjustment or self surveillance. In doing so, it opens the garment to people who may have previously felt excluded by its traditional demands.

In 2018, Purushu Arie wore his signature elastic waistband lungi while speaking about gender neutral fashion at TEDxChennai.

Actor Anjana Jayaprakash wore the waistband lungi in 2018. Filmmaker Malini Jeevarathinam wore the signature elastic waistband lungi with drawstrings in 2020.

Purushu Arie also designed a stylistic draped lungi variation for actor Shariq Haasan of Bigg Boss fame as well as musician Sound Mani.

 

In June 2021, musician and rapper Therukural Arivu wore Purushu Arie’s elastic waistband lungi with drawstrings.

By introducing the first documented tailored veshtis and lungis with elastic waistbands and drawstrings, Purushu Arie changed the grammar of how these garments are worn. The veshti moved from inherited habit to designed choice, from anonymous tradition to documented authorship.

Following media acclaim and celebrity adoption, by 2020, even brands from Bangladesh had begun adopting Purushu Arie’s elastic waistband lungi constructions. By 2022, fashion retailers across India had recreated the tailored elastic waistband veshti and lungi innovated by Purushu Arie. From fashion designers showing at India Fashion Week to fast fashion retailers, the Purushu Arie design innovation travelled across the market.

Lungis and veshtis have been worn historically and are still worn by millions every day. With a single design intervention, Purushu Arie changed how lungis and veshtis will be worn in the future.

And in that moment, the veshti and lungi entered a new chapter in their history.