By Shilpa Raina, IANS,
New Delhi : Gone are the days when showing it off or talking about it was a taboo. Today’s woman is not only experimenting with her intimate wear – lingerie – but not shying away from revealing it too.
“Initially there was lot of shyness among Indian women about their inner wear so they never used to discuss it but the modern Indian woman has come out of the cocoon. They are demanding comfort in their lingerie and hence experimenting with different lingerie styles too,” Marks and Spencer’s marketing head Nandini Sethuraman told IANS.
“Women have become very confident and know their mind. They have also started realizing the importance of a good innerwear as a perfect fit gives your body perfect shape too. They now look for comfort, quality and durability in their inner wear,” she added.
The market today is flooded with colourful lingerie with perfect fits, different designs and materials, unlike some years back when only monotonous designs, boring colours and broad straps were available.
You can splurge on sensual thongs, bodices, bloomers, corsets, maternity bras, sports bra, camisoles and much more.
“There is a wind of change in the Indian market as youngsters are demanding bras that have transparent, colourful, halter neck straps to suit their dressing. These options were not available earlier but with attires becoming Western, the demand for comfortable yet stylish bras is increasing,” explained Nalini Gupta, CEO Genesis Colors, holding company for Bwitch.
“More and more women are opening up and have realized that lingerie is something that is very close to them, so they do not mind flaunting their stylish and chic bra straps. Now you can get a bra for every occasion,” she added.
Agreeing with Gupta, Triumph’s managing director (India and Sri Lanka) Thorsten Allenstein, who has been looking after Indian market since 2005, says that Indian women are taking inspiration from the West where lingerie is given the same importance as the outerwear.
“Indian women, especially the cosmopolitan crowd with their exposure to and experience of international brands, know their mind and they do not mind shelling out money on good lingerie, for them it is an investment,” Allenstein told IANS when he here to launch their first flagship store in Connaught Place.
“In a country where importance is given to outer wear, people are coming out of this shell and are splurging on their inner wear because that gives them a feel-good factor,” he added.
These inner wear are priced at anywhere between Rs.200-Rs.3,000 and are available in different materials like lycra, chiffon, net, rayon and cotton too.
However, Allenstein feels Indian women still do not know their bra size and the lingerie brands are trying to educate women about their perfect fit.
“In a recent survey done by our brand, we came to the conclusion that most Indian women wear wrong bras because of lack of knowledge about their sizes,” Allenstein said.
“Our main aim is to educate them to find the right size and for this we have trained our staff so that they can guide them to find the perfect fit,” he added.
Allenstein also feels that another misconception that Indian women have is that cotton fabric is the best for lingerie.
Elaborating, he stated: “The Indian perception is that cotton is the best fabric for lingerie, which in fact is wrong, and we want to change this perception.”
“Though we have cotton bras to satiate the desire of Indian women and the response has been outstanding, but we feel that it is very important for them to come out of this mindset and start experimenting,” he added.