At Jodi, every leaf, petal, and bejewelled seahorse sparks joy

As nine-year-old Max plots to take over a fort with his lovable monster friends in the Spike Jonze-directed film Where The Wild Things Are, an adaptation of the 1963 children’s book of the same name by Maurice Sendak, he shares his big dream: “And we’ll all sleep together in a real pile.” In their latest collection for Jodi that’s inspired by the film, label co-founders Gauri Verma and Karuna Laungani have created block prints in the shape of a bejewelled blue horse, a black cockatoo, and a dapper seahorse, among other wonderful creatures. Would they cuddle together in a pile? Most definitely.

​The garden outside Jodi’s studio space in Wanowrie, Pune, smells of petrichor and is abloom with fuchsia and bougainvillea. The walls are covered in forest green and indigo murals of flowers and curious otherworldly creatures that mirror the label’s aesthetic. As we climb up to their second-floor office, you can hear RD Burman’s boisterous vocals singing ‘Mehbooba’, the classic hit from Sholay, which trickles up from the first floor, where it powers the team’s master tailors at work. Inside the conference room, Buddy, an indie who has been part of the Jodi family since he was a pup, is on his afternoon siesta.

The two friends turned business partners took a leap of faith when they launched Jodi a little over a decade ago. “It wasn’t from a business sense that we approached Jodi. We didn’t think of ROIs and ROAs. We wanted to have fun with craft,” recalls Laungani. “Fashion was an open playground for us,” adds Verma.

While Verma trained in Communication Design at NIFT, New Delhi, Laungani studied Fashion Design and Apparel Manufacture at Sophia Polytechnic in Mumbai. The two met while they were in their twenties and working as stylists for the fashion magazine Elle India.

In two separate studies, psychologists Hajo Adam and Adam D Galinsky, who coined the term “enclothed cognition”, pointed out that clothes can influence one’s thinking and behaviour. If you step into the Jodi store or browse their website, you’re left without doubt that each of their pieces engenders a sense of cheer. I’m thinking of their freewheeling block-print designs that are inspired by Indian motifs but might come in offbeat colour combinations, be magnified in scale, or used as playful accents on contemporary shapes. Similarly, their silhouettes capture a carefree spirit—think easy, belted maxi dresses, ruffled skirts with high slits, silk pantsuits, or loose wide-leg jeans. These are clothes designed to run, jump, and play in, even if you’re wearing them at a wedding.

The brand was meant to be an extension of what they wanted to do—“live joyful lives”. “So, whether that meant taking work at our own pace, travelling to see the world or bringing back something that would inspire a new collection, we wanted to do it all,” says Verma, who creates those distinctive prints for each collection.

While some of their designs may be gender-fluid, Jodi holds a firm stance on gender in the workplace: women outnumber the men in the studio. “What would it look like to create work for women who also wanted to lead fulfilling lives, do what they want to do and still run a successful business? A lot of times, work isn’t created for women, but men,” says Verma. “Both work and play are equally important to us,” chimes in Laungani, who has a four-month-old waiting for her when she returns home. Verma, who is mum to an eight-month-old, adds, “We don’t ever come into the office thinking that we have to get to work.” Having babies just a few months apart from each other is not the first time their lives have been in sync—they're both one half of a twin, hence the brand name Jodi, which means pair or couple in Hindi.

Does this mean that Jodi will soon have a clothing line for kids? “We used to have a Mini Jodi collection a few years ago, but we don’t know if we will launch one again,” says Laungani. Instead, last November, the two of them set up a new store in New Delhi’s tony Khan Market neighbourhood (their second store in the country; the first was in Mumbai) and so they’re focussing their attentions on building that retail presence.

With names like Grammy-nominated sitarist Anoushka Shankar favouring the brand and Bollywood actors like Sonam Kapoor and Karisma Kapoor wearing Jodi regularly, popularity has been within reach for the label. It’s the sale numbers that are tricky. While most are willing to pay heavily for wedding couture, the market for the handcrafted supply-based-on-demand kind of clothing that Jodi makes is extremely volatile. “But we’re figuring it out by not over-producing and still having enough stock in the stores,” says Verma.

What does their vision for the future look like? “We want to be replaceable—that would be our legacy, Jodi’s creative expression needs to outlive us,” says Verma. No hogging the limelight or runways. “What we want is for Jodi to become a global brand. Indian homegrown brands are so much better in terms of quality, craft, textile, and design, and deserve to take centre stage on a global platform,” says Laungani.

When Jodi started in 2014, the duo had employed one master karigar and another staff member to handle the administrative work. The enterprise now includes 50 people. Their next collection is already in the works. “We’re currently working with clamp dyeing and bandhini,” offers Laungani. They point to some samples that lie on the table. A print of candy-pink flowers with teeny green crickets hovering on the stems might make it into the new range. “We end up going back to blues, greens and reds. And white with colour,” says Verma. “In terms of motifs, there is a lot of flora and fauna—nature has always been a big inspiration for us,” adds Laungani. And so, the cycle of life comes full circle.