There is a particular backstage electricity at India Couture Week, the moment when a look stops being a sketch and becomes a face you cannot unsee. In the middle of that churn, actor Sobhita Dhulipala dropped a small, telling caption, “brb devi-ing”, as she appeared at India Couture Week with Nexxus New York and designer Rahul Mishra. It is the kind of line that signals a mood, but the craftsmanship is in the credits: hair by Flavien Heldt, makeup by Shraddha Mishra, photography by Ritik. The result is a modern couture portrait with a beauty narrative that does not compete with the clothes, it sharpens them.
India Couture Week, where hair becomes part of the garment
At India Couture Week, beauty is never an afterthought. A braid can echo a neckline. A centre part can change the way embroidery reads under flash. That is why the pairing of Nexxus New York with Rahul Mishra matters: it frames hair as construction, not decoration. In Sobhita Dhulipala’s set of images, the styling leans editorial, clean lines, controlled shine, and a finish that holds up under the specific brutality of runway lighting and close range cameras.
For Nexxus, which positions itself around salon performance and repair, couture week is a logical stage. The brand’s global story has long been anchored in science meeting styling, and in a week built on technique, “performance” is not a marketing word, it is a requirement.
Rahul Mishra’s couture language, and why it photographs the way it does
Rahul Mishra has built an international reputation for couture that rewards proximity, his surfaces often reveal themselves in layers, from a distance you register silhouette, up close you find labour. That visual density is exactly why a beauty look has to be calibrated, too much gloss and the camera flattens detail, too much drama and the garment loses its hierarchy.
What works here is the clear division of roles. Hair by Flavien Heldt reads as intentional structure rather than “party hair”. Makeup by Shraddha Mishra stays camera fluent, refined skin, emphasis placed where it will survive both stage light and a lens that captures everything. Together, it lets the couture do its most important work, hold attention without noise.
The caption tells you more than it seems to
“Devi-ing” is a playful shorthand, but it also points to a recurring red carpet and couture week instinct: India’s current style icons are less interested in costume and more interested in character. The strongest looks land when the reference is felt rather than literal, a posture, a gaze, a certain severity of line. That is what gives these images their charge.
Where Nexxus New York fits into the ICW beauty economy
Backstage, hair is logistics as much as art, heat, humidity, pinning, re pinning, and the reality of multiple quick changes. A brand partnership only works if it solves problems for the artists actually touching the hair. Nexxus’ presence at India Couture Week signals a continued push into the region’s fashion calendar, where the beauty conversation is increasingly about finish and health in the same sentence.
For readers tracking season-to-season shifts, this also speaks to something bigger: couture beauty trending away from overworked complexity and toward legible technique. You can see it in how Sobhita Dhulipala is photographed here, the look is built to be held, not just worn for a single walk.
If you are watching the week for what will filter into real wardrobes, keep an eye on the way hair is being treated as styling architecture alongside couture, especially in brand and designer pairings like Nexxus New York and Rahul Mishra. It is where the next set of red carpet cues usually begins.
External references: the official Fashion Design Council of India site for FDCI event context, and Rahul Mishra’s official brand site for the designer’s couture house information.
Photo Credits
Images courtesy of their respective owners. Hair: Flavien Heldt. Makeup: Shraddha Mishra. Photography: Ritik.
