Indian menswear label Countrymade presented Material Memory, its Spring Summer 2027 collection, at Lakmé Fashion Week x FDCI. First previewed in Daikanyama, Tokyo, in September, the collection arrived on the Indian runway with a softer, more relaxed take on the label’s familiar utilitarian wardrobe.
Material Memory begins with a simple thought: change does not erase what came before. It leaves a trace.
Memory has long informed Countrymade’s approach to clothing. This season, that idea moves closer to the material itself, examining what remains in a fabric after it has been worked, altered or worn. Colour fades, surfaces shift and structures soften. Rather than concealing these changes, the collection allows them to become part of the garment.
Field jackets, chore coats, truckers, safari shirts and relaxed tailoring retain the familiarity of workwear, but with lighter constructions and altered proportions. The silhouettes are deliberately understated, leaving much of the detail to reveal itself through texture, stitching and surface treatments.
Several pieces explore the possibility of one material taking on the character of another. The fine twill structure of denim is enlarged and recreated through hand embroidery, while the outlines of familiar jackets are worked into cloth, almost as though the original garment has faded away, leaving only its impression.
Indian handwork sits alongside techniques usually associated with tailoring. Bakhiya backstitching and embroidery appear across shirts and jackets, while pad stitching, traditionally concealed within a garment to give it structure, is brought to the surface in irregular patterns resembling camouflage. Construction details that would ordinarily remain hidden become part of the design.
Linen, silk twill, cotton noil, handloom textiles and selvedge denim are worked through hand applied coatings, mineral treatments and reversible constructions. Pigments settle unevenly, giving each surface its own variations in colour and depth. Mineral coatings crack like aged leather, while reversible linens are treated independently on either face, revealing contrasting colours through turned cuffs and open edges. Displaced pockets, exposed seams and unfinished details offer further glimpses into the construction of the clothes.
Indigo, terracotta, olive, brown and ivory form the collection’s palette. Denim is softened until it falls almost like silk, while silk itself is treated to recall the weight and familiarity of workwear. The resulting garments retain their utilitarian origins without the rigidity usually associated with them. They are clothes that leave room for the wearer to make them their own, gathering new marks, habits and memories with time.
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Speaking about the collection, Sushant Abrol, Founder and Creative Director of Countrymade, says:
“I’ve always felt that memory is all we really have. So much of what we create begins with something we’ve felt, seen or carried with us. At Countrymade, we often start with words and feelings, then keep finding ways to translate them into something tangible. One thought can become a texture, a stitch, a silhouette or an entirely different metaphor. Material Memory is about following those connections and seeing how far they can take us.”
Countrymade also created a short film for Material Memory, imagining what happens to garments when the people who once wore them are no longer present. Set in an empty studio, clothes begin to move, encounter and respond to one another without a human figure in sight.
Is it simply cloth coming to life, or does something of the person who once wore it continue to live within?
The presentation also features an original soundtrack, What Remains (Material Memory),produced specifically for the collection and set for release across all major music streaming platforms. Footsteps lead into the sounds of a garment factory, where the rhythms of machines gradually give way to music. The lyrics are composed entirely of questions, moving between what came before, what has changed, and the quieter uncertainties of becoming and belonging.
No answers. Only questions.
What remains, remembers.
