“I am really excited to attend the award ceremony and hold my trophy. I have worked hard to win that.” says the thrilled and talented Pearlite Pooja Verma. She has made Pearl Academy proud by winning Bronze medal at the prestigious International Design Awards (IDA), Los Angeles, US, for her entry ‘The Post Apocalyptic Bride’. Pooja, who is completing her undergraduate course in Fashion Design from the Academy this year traveled to the States to attend the ‘IDA Bi-annual Gala Awards Ceremony’ which were scheduled on May 4, 2015, at the Harmony Gold Theater in Los Angeles. She was awarded with a trophy at the ceremony for her triumph.
Dr. Veena Dutta, Director, Pearl Academy-Jaipur campus, rejoices this victory of Academy’s student and says, “Pearl Academy Jaipur has been a nurturing cradle to many young talents and will continue to be so in the future too. It is a matter of pride for us that our students are winning at platforms which are International and reputed. This will boost their moral and confidence to a great extent and help them a lot in their future endeavors. Our heartiest congratulations to Pooja and we wish her best for her career.”
When asked about her inspiration, Pooja says, “The seed for the inspiration – a vision of a post-apocalyptic was sown in my head even when I was very young. I have grown up with a fascination for Sci-Fi movies which were viewed for entertainment value only. But later on, their underlying themes began to resonate with the state of the world and it was truly a disturbing eye opener for me. I have dealt with similar themes in my previous design projects also in a bid to channelize my fascination and angst.” .
Pooja throws more light on the project and says, “The concept focuses on post-apocalyptic fashion using materials that remain behind when everything else decays. I used a discarded car cover and some deflated tires to create this ensemble which is a wedding gown created by and for one of those who would live through the destruction and still have the will to love and nurture a bond with a fellow man. The idea was to focus on the vestiges of automobiles. Automobiles, in my limited opinion, are one of the reasons for the rapid deterioration of the planet. I wanted to satirize the redundancy of automobiles in a post-apocalyptic world by using the remnants alone.”
“This project has been a very personal one as it is a convergence of all the values I’ve picked up in my design education-along with my love for working with alternative materials and Avant Garde fashion. It has been a journey full of tribulations, considering the internal conflicts that I faced while trying to create a new sartorial language for the era that is inevitably neigh based on my whims but I always received continued encouragement from my family, friends and teachers which sort of validated my intent. And winning the IDA bronze further validated my beliefs and gave me a hope to continue on this journey I have embarked upon with new found confidence and vigor,” she adds.
