Fashion designer Manasi Parmar, based in Mumbai, presents Linked Love, a graduation collection that redefines wearable design through a material-first, multidisciplinary approach. With a focus on unconventional and structural materials, her work explores new frontiers in garment design, blending art, architecture, and sustainability.

Reimagining Fashion Through Materiality

At the heart of Linked Love is the integration of non-traditional materials, notably wood, into wearable forms. Parmar challenges the perception that materials such as timber belong exclusively to architecture or product design. Through experimental construction techniques, she manipulates these rigid substances into sculptural garments, demonstrating their untapped potential in fashion.

Techniques such as modular assembly, surface manipulation, and structural adaptation were employed to transform solid materials into forms that conform to the human body. This iterative design process—rooted in both fashion craftsmanship and product design methodologies—results in pieces that are not only visually striking but also conceptually robust.

A Multidisciplinary Approach to Sustainable Innovation

Parmar’s design philosophy centres around material exploration and circular thinking. Each material is selected not only for its tactile and structural qualities, but also for its potential to disrupt fast fashion norms. Wood, for instance, offers a biobased, renewable alternative to synthetic textiles. Its use invites questions about longevity, reuse, and biodegradability in clothing design.

While the garments push the boundaries of fashion aesthetics, they are also exercises in intentional design—balancing form and function, expression and utility. In doing so, Parmar bridges the gap between wearable art and sustainable product innovation, offering inspiration to both fashion and product designers seeking to explore material circularity in new ways.

Material Inspiration for Designers

Linked Love serves as a case study in interdisciplinary material innovation, encouraging designers across sectors—particularly fashion and product design—to think beyond conventional boundaries. By embracing materials typically reserved for structural applications, Parmar exemplifies how sustainability and creativity can intersect to yield radically new forms of design expression.

This approach aligns with the increasing demand among designers and consumers for ecologically responsible and material-forward solutions that support a circular economy.

Source & photos: Manasi Parmar