Profession: Founder and creative director of Rkive City
Location: New Delhi, India
Why you should know him: In a short span of a little over two years, Khanna has built one of the buzziest fashion brands on the Indian fashion scene today. His practice, Rkive City, which has a store in Dhan Mill, deconstructs and reconstructs discarded garments and textile waste using simple patternmaking. The label won the sixth edition of the R|Elan Circular Design Challenge in 2024 and showcased at Lakmé Fashion Week last month.
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Looks from Rkive City’s latest collection, ‘Reclaim the City’, that repurpose old shirts, canvas, leather, wool, and suiting fabric
The camouflage looks were created by patching together camo from different regions around the world
His first job in retail was as a fit model in a children’s store: “My mum and my grandmum had a small children’s clothing store. I was usually the kid they would just put clothes on if somebody would come and say, ‘I have a child maybe that size.’”
Why he dropped out of college: “I was studying Fashion Business Management at FIT, but then COVID happened, and I dropped out because online education wasn’t for me. I had saved a bunch of money from hustling (trading Supreme, sneakers, just like every other kid in college trying to make some money) and was planning on opening an archival clothing store in New York called Rkive. But all of that changed because of COVID. It sparked a lot of conversations around the idea of what it means to make clothing that people will want to buy again. And that was the beginning of Rkive City.”
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Rkive City’s storefront in Dhan Mill, New Delhi
A look inside the store
How the name Rkive came about: “Because I was doing an archival store and my initials are RK, one of my friends said, you should just name it RK-IVE. We had the name before [RM of BTS] changed his Instagram name to that [@rkive] and now that pops up first. It’s pure coincidence.”
Participating in Lakmé Fashion Week was… “Very hectic. There are so many things I would have liked to do but you can’t because it’s institutional. But it comes with pros and cons. Programmes like the Circular Design Challenge are very important. I think it is actually one of the best programmes in the country. We had multiple mentors to further educate us, and just to have support from people, backing you on an idea you’ve been talking about for two years… You believe in yourself a bit more. If I can do it, I bet hundreds and thousands of others can.”
On neighbourly neighbours: “I have my office right next to the likes of [photographer] Bharat Sikka, Gursi and Bunkiy [Amrita Khanna] of Lovebirds, Amrit [Kumar] of NorBlack NorWhite. These guys have been working for, like, 15-20 years. I’m very cheesy like that, so I go to them saying, ‘Boss, I can’t understand this. How do I fix this?’ And they’re always very open and supportive. I give credit to everybody who surrounds us, including my parents.”
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A behind-the-scenes look at the printing process
Khanna at Lakmé Fashion Week
On Rkive City’s four-day non-shop pop-up in Mumbai: “We had a four-day long thing in collaboration with Flying Flea, the electric division of Royal Enfield, at Snowball Studios this March, where we invited people to come but not buy things. It was more ‘Come, try this. Converse about this’. Buying will happen eventually, because at the end of the day nobody’s buying Rkive because it’s sustainable—they buy it because it’s fucking cool. Nobody gives a shit about sustainability. Sustainability gets people like journalists interested, but I also think a lot of journalists do not understand true sustainability, if I’m being very honest. There’s so much shit being pushed under this sustainable tag.”
The things he collects: “I have a lot of vintage cameras because I’m a photographer before anything else. I’ve just restored my first ever vintage car—a 1971 Land Cruiser. I collect vintage watches and shoes. I don’t buy new things. Even the glasses I’m wearing are old Davidoff that I got from Two Extra Lives, which is a very cool store.”
The last new item he bought: “Baniyaan and socks. That’s where I draw the line. I don’t know about the rest of the people, but that’s where my personal line is drawn.”
Each Rkive City store will be accompanied by a Re-pair shop that mends old garments
Why he’s opening his next store in Mumbai: “The concentration of cool people in one town can really affect how people think and believe. You can push narrative through the city. You can push style through the city. Delhi very much accepts what you give them. Here, people will question it. They’ll hopefully challenge us. It’ll be fun.”
What’s next: “We’re opening our first ever Re-pair shop in Delhi, which will be open to the public. We want to build it as a concept that goes to every city. So, when we open in Mumbai, we’ll do a Re-pair shop plus Rkive City.”
