At Prada’s Spring/Summer 2026 menswear show, all eyes were on these sandals — sleek, elegant, strikingly familiar.
To Indians, it was instantly recognisable.
The Kolhapuri chappal originated in the town of Kolhapur, Maharashtra, and is stitched entirely by hand.
So what’s the issue with “inspiration”? The problem is power.
When luxury brands wear what comes from the margins — the turban, the pheran, the Kolhapuri chappal — and sell it as fashion, it comes stripped of history, pain, and meaning.
00:00This is not a new Prada design. It closely resembles the Kolapuri Chappal, a centuries-old Indian sandal now walking the runways of Milan, without credit.
00:12At Prada's Spring-Summer 2026 menswear show, all eyes were on the sandals. Sleek, elegant, strikingly familiar.
00:21To Indians, it was instantly recognisable. The Kolapuri Chappal originated in the town of Kolapur Maharashtra and is stitched entirely by hand.
00:33Artisans tan leather using traditional vegetable dyes, cut patterns by hand and stitch without using a single nail or industrial machine.
00:42This is labour. This is artistry. But when it hits the luxury runway without so much as a mention of its roots, that's not homage. That's erasure.
00:55In 2024, a TikTok by rental company Bipti described the dupatta as very European and went viral on social media as Scandinavian scarf.
01:06After a widespread backlash, the video was deleted and an apology issued, admitting that the aesthetic wasn't European after all and the naming had been a mistake.
01:18In 2019, Gucci faced outrage for sending white models down the runway in Sikh turbans.
01:26Nordstrom, a luxury department store, later sold one for $7.90.
01:31After the 9-11 attacks, many Sikh people were targets of hate crimes because of their turbans and long beards, as it was associated with Al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden.
01:44For a luxury brand to then commodify turbans and sell them at high-end prices, when historically turbans have been weaponised against those who wear them, is extortionary.
01:56In 2018, Indian designer Orijit Sen accused Christian Dior of plagiarising his textile art.
02:04The people tree design lifted almost entirely from his work.
02:09Yoga poses, floral motifs, all of it, used on an LA magazine cover without credit or compensation.
02:18But it's not just global brands.
02:20Even within India, fashion often consumes culture without care.
02:24Take the 2019 bridal campaign by Raw Mango.
02:29Their fairan-inspired collection Zuni, shot in Kashmir, was launched just two months after Article 370 was abrogated and the region was under lockdown.
02:40Photos from the campaign featuring a woman in a red fairan, shot by Avani Rai, circulated on Instagram while thousands in the valley remained under curfew, their voices silenced.
02:53As Kashmiri writer and photographer Sumayya Telly put it,
02:58there has never been a good time to use Kashmir to sell India.
03:02And yet, India profits from Kashmir in fashion, in films, in tourism and in politics.
03:09So, what's the issue with inspiration?
03:12The problem is power.
03:14When luxury brands wear what comes from the margins, the turban, the fairan, the Kolapuri chapel, and sell it as fashion, it comes stripped of history, pain and meaning.
03:27The original communities aren't even invited to the table.
