Two labels, one studio, zero (real) drama

Tucked away in a leafy corner of Delhi’s Vasant Kunj is a sunlit studio that feels like stepping into a secret world—part vintage salon, part garment atelier. There’s no signage, no name on the door. The space belongs to two of Delhi’s most promising young designers: Yash Patil, founder of That Antiquepiece, and Somya Lochan, the mind behind Quarter. The two labels couldn’t be more different in aesthetic, but their founders have formed a unique friendship—a kind of creative marriage that outlasts moods, trends, and even fights.

Their labels diverge in obvious ways. That Antiquepiece is steeped in history—corset gowns, bias-cut slips, opera coat-inspired drapes. The kind of clothes that seem to belong to another time but wouldn’t look out of place if worn today. Quarter, on the other hand, leans futuristic: a cerebral take on luxury menswear that remixes Indian textiles into something sharp and unexpected. Think a khadi jacket with an exaggerated collar or blazer with intricate hand embroidery on the sleeves. But inside their shared space, their styles don’t clash; they coexist in harmony.

The studio itself is a testament to their push-pull relationship. It’s filled with oddities—silk brocade teddy bears casually lounging on a vintage two-seater, strings of pearls draped over ship figurines, two mood boards on either side pinned with swatches of gossamer silk, rusted nails, and a cartoon pigeon that reads “STOP PANICKING”. Somehow, it all makes sense.

“That Antiquepiece became what it is even before Yash knew what it was. The brand launched itself,” Lochan tells me of the beginning of their labels. “We kept having discussions about it being high time that he moved into a studio and made something out of it. It was also when I decided to start Quarter and get a space. It was a temporary setup. Yash said he would come by, create a few pieces—and if it sticks, it sticks. And it stuck.”

The studio is compact, homely in a way that’s poetic—bolts of fabric, racks filled with garments, coffee cups, and the kind of energy that only two people truly in sync can generate. “Today’s special is Vietnamese cold brew,” Patil announces, handing over a blue coffee cup and a straw.

It’s a few weeks after their Lakmé Fashion Week debut, where both Lochan and Patil showcased their collections as winners of the GenNext programme. The prep, by their own admission, was a little insane. Between them, they did 75 to 80 looks, each constructed by a small team of artisans who they brought from Delhi to Mumbai for the show. “It was important to us that the people who made the garments were the ones backstage dressing the models. There was a sense of ownership, and everybody was teary-eyed,” recalls Patil. “Each look had two or three layers. It was madness. We could have made simpler clothes. But then we were like, we’ve got this opportunity and we’re doing this together—let’s do it right.”

And together is the operative word here.

Lochan and Patil met in their first year of college at NIFT-Bengaluru, where they studied Textile Design and Fashion Design, respectively. Their friendship began, as most great ones do, with a slightly deranged act: Lochan decided Patil’s absence from a mutual friend’s birthday party was unacceptable. So, naturally, she snuck into the boys’ hostel at 1 am and woke him up. “It was very Bollywood,” she recalls. “The guards were sleeping on the floor, and I had to step over them to reach his room. I opened the door, and I was like, ‘Yash, it’s time for you to come to a birthday party!’ He was like, ‘What the fuck! How did you manage to come here? It’s a boys’ hostel!’” (Patil did not attend the party, but the effort was enough.)

Now, years later, they share a studio, a team, and a schedule built around each other’s idiosyncrasies. Patil is somewhat methodical, neat, quietly intense. Lochan is improvisational, expansive, and a little chaotic. “I keep this place clean,” he says. “If I ask Somya to clean something, she’ll say yes and then never do it.”

“We’ve reached that stage of marriage where we don’t like each other,” she laughs.

But for all the bickering, there’s something unusually seamless about the way they work—even when their processes remain distinct. Their working relationship is an exercise in boundaries. They don’t sit down with mood boards together or sketch side by side. Their ideas incubate privately. “We don’t really know what the other is working on, at least not until much later,” Lochan says. “For the longest time, I didn’t even know what Yash’s last collection was about.” But when something gets stuck—a tricky pleat, or a fabric that won’t cooperate—they turn to each other. “If I’m stuck on construction, Yash comes in,” she explains. “If he’s stuck on a textile, I pitch in.”

Their space—two large desks in the centre, softboards on the walls, mannequins stacked with silhouettes and textures—is as much about negotiation as it is about inspiration. “When Somya is about to create, she clears everything off the table. That’s my cue to leave,” explains Patil.

Sometimes they spend hours working in silence, but they’re always tuned in. “We work best when we’re not hovering around each other,” he says. “But the moment something feels off, we’re there.”

Their bond is built on more than creative compatibility. It’s logistical, emotional, and deeply practical—like two people who’ve learned each other’s rhythms down to the coffee breaks. “If we have to show up somewhere, it’s the death of us. But people now identify us as a unit,” Patil says. “We don’t have to then have conversations with other people. We can just be there.”

They don’t live together, though Lochan would if she had it her way. “I want to live with Yash,” she says cheerfully. Patil shakes his head. “I need to breathe. I need to go home to my cocoon. I enjoy my own company.”

“I also enjoy Yash’s company,” she adds.

“Exactly,” he replies. “That’s the dynamic.”

Lochan and Patil joke—constantly, loudly, over each other—about being mistaken for lovers. “At a recent event, people were congratulating us for GenNext and some people thought we got married,” Lochan says. “Any PR is good PR.”

“I told her before the show: please open your mouth less,” Patil deadpans.

If it all sounds unusually balanced, it’s because it is—but it didn’t happen overnight. What makes their setup work—and what might make even you want to move in with them—is the permeability of it all. They’ve figured out how to toggle: between brand and best friend, between solitude and sharing, between letting go and pitching in. “It’s never smooth sailing,” Lochan says. “But we’ve learned when to say, okay, Quarter out, Antiquepiece out. Now it’s just Somya and Yash.”

“We also have roles,” she explains. “I do the hiring, firing, admin. Yash handles the finances. We have ground rules.” She doesn’t interfere in budgets; he doesn’t meddle in staffing. “Even if I disagree, I shut up.”

Patil nods: “It’s easier that way. I don’t want to fire people. I’m not confrontational. Last time I tried, it backfired—I was texting them afterward, like, please come back.” Lochan, on the other hand, is the kind of person who can let someone go and still get a polite “Good morning, ma’am” from them a week later. “I just don’t burn bridges,” she adds.

Their division of labour is surprisingly grown-up—a word that comes up more than once as they talk about the last two years. Since both brands launched, their once-laid-back studio has swelled with people and pressure. “We used to have just four or five of us,” Patil says. “Now it’s full to the brim — responsibilities, deadlines, so many humans.” If everyone leaves at 7 pm, “that’s a happy day”.

While the studio hours are typically 10 to 7, Patil doesn’t always design in those hours. “Sometimes I wait for everyone to leave, then just sit in the dark. I might light a candle. That’s when I think best,” he shrugs. “A lot of times I’m sitting there doing nothing, just scrolling on Instagram.” Lochan calls him out when she catches him sitting doing nothing on the security cameras. “I’ll text him: What are you still doing there? Go home!”

The duo insists their friendship hasn’t suffered under the weight of two growing businesses. If anything, it’s the opposite. “We’ve always said: friendship comes first,” Patil says. “Money, business, even people, all of that is fixable, but not this. It’s always been more than two brands. It’s bigger than that.”

I ask if there’ll ever be a Jean Paul Gaultier couture-style collaboration: That Antiquepiece by Quarter or Quarter by That Antiquepiece. “The fact is that’s already happening. A part of me is always going to be in her collections, and vice-versa. But if we ever have to do it officially…” says Patil. “It probably wouldn’t even be clothes,” Lochan muses. “We’d make really random products that people can never expect out of these two brands.”

“I could never do her concepts,” Patil adds. “She’s so abstract in her thinking. I’m like… what is this? But then she makes it, and it’s incredible.”

“And I could never match his construction,” Lochan replies. “Nobody sculpts a garment like Yash. Nobody. I read once that when a designer truly loves women, it shows in how they cut. That’s him.”

He rolls his eyes. “Should I sign an autograph for you?”

What the two have built together is more than a shared studio. It’s a quiet ecosystem of trust, timing, and mutual obsession—one where the lines between work and friendship are fluid but fiercely protected. “We’ve become more… adult,” Lochan says. “Like we’re actually running companies. We’re doing payroll, calculating overtime, and I often think—wow, this is serious now. But every time there’s a power cut, we’re on the balcony, just reflecting. So sometimes it feels like nothing’s changed.”