Prreeti Jaiin Nainutia on building luxury fashion house Nirmooha, balancing creative vision with business realities, and shaping the brand’s future alongside her daughter Boddhe.
By Nichola Marie
Nirmooha has grown and evolved significantly since you founded it in 2016. Today, you are shaping its next chapter alongside your daughter, Boddhe. How has working together influenced your creative vision and the direction of the brand?
Working with Boddhe has brought a completely new energy and perspective to Nirmooha. I founded the brand in 2016 with a very instinctive approach to design, and over the years that instinct has evolved into a much larger vision.
Boddhe belongs to a different generation. She looks at fashion, culture, communication and the way people consume luxury through a very contemporary lens. I bring experience and an understanding of the Nirmooha woman, while she brings a fresh point of view and is never afraid to question the way something has always been done.
What I value most is that we don’t necessarily agree on everything. Those conversations push us creatively. The result is a Nirmooha that is becoming sharper, more relevant and more global, while remaining rooted in the philosophy and design language with which I started the brand.
Nearly a decade into your journey, how have you changed as a designer, entrepreneur and leader?
When I started Nirmooha, I thought primarily like a designer. Today, I think simultaneously as a designer, entrepreneur and leader.
Fashion has taught me that creativity alone cannot build an enduring brand. You have to understand business, people, finance, communication, technology and, most importantly, your customer. I have become far more decisive and disciplined over the years.
As a designer, I have also learnt the power of restraint. Earlier, there was perhaps a desire to say more through every garment. Today, I am more interested in clarity: a strong silhouette, thoughtful craftsmanship and a distinct point of view.
As a leader, my biggest evolution has been learning that you cannot build something meaningful alone. You have to create a team, trust people and allow them to grow with you.
Building a fashion house from the ground up is rarely a linear journey. Were there moments when you had to make particularly difficult choices or rethink your approach?
Many times! Building Nirmooha has definitely not been a straight line.
There have been collections that worked beautifully and others that taught us difficult lessons. There have been decisions about expansion, production, retail and partnerships where I have had to choose long-term brand value over an easier short-term opportunity.
One of the biggest lessons has been knowing when to say no. Growth for the sake of growth can actually dilute a luxury brand. Every collaboration, retailer, collection or opportunity has to make sense for the larger identity you are building.
I have also learnt not to be afraid of changing direction. If something isn’t working, holding on to it simply because you have invested time or emotion in it is a mistake. Fashion requires conviction, but entrepreneurship also requires the humility to adapt.
Nirmooha has achieved several significant milestones, from showcasing at international fashion weeks to opening its first flagship store in Kala Ghoda, Mumbai. Which milestones have given you the greatest sense of achievement, and why?
Every milestone represents a different stage of the journey. Showcasing season after season at FDCI x Lakmé Fashion Week gave Nirmooha a strong platform in India, while Arab Fashion Week and Paris Fashion Week were important moments because they allowed us to present our design language to an international audience.
But opening our first flagship store in Kala Ghoda feels particularly emotional. A fashion show lasts a few minutes. A store gives the brand a permanent home.
For years, Nirmooha existed through collections, runways, exhibitions and conversations. To now create a physical space where someone can walk in and experience the entire Nirmooha universe feels like a very significant step.
At the same time, some of my proudest moments have been quieter ones: seeing a woman choose Nirmooha for an important moment in her life, or watching someone from my team grow with the company. Those moments remind me why the journey began.
As the business has grown, what have been the biggest lessons in managing the commercial side of a luxury fashion brand while protecting the creative vision behind it?
The biggest lesson has been that creativity and commerce cannot be treated as enemies. For a fashion house to survive and grow, the two have to strengthen each other.
You need to understand what sells, what your customer wants, your margins, production timelines and inventory. But if every creative decision is dictated by a spreadsheet, eventually you lose the reason people were drawn to the brand in the first place.
For me, the balance is to listen to the market without allowing the market to design the collection.
Some pieces may be more commercial, while others exist to push the brand’s creative language forward. Both are necessary. Protecting that balance is probably one of the most important responsibilities I have today.
Nirmooha’s new chapter is about evolution as much as expansion. What are some of the changes you have consciously made to the brand in recent years, and what prompted them?
We have become much more focused on what Nirmooha should stand for.
The evolution has involved refining our visual identity, strengthening our silhouettes, becoming more disciplined about our product offering, and creating greater consistency across design, communication, retail and the digital experience.
Our recent collections reflect this shift as well. There is more confidence in structure and minimalism, balanced with fluidity, craftsmanship and detail. Equinox: Neither One Nor the Other, for instance, explores dualities such as strength and softness, structure and flow, masculine and feminine.
The flagship store is another important part of this evolution. We are no longer thinking only from collection to collection. We are thinking about building a complete fashion house with a recognisable identity and a long-term future.
What do you consider your greatest achievement so far, not necessarily a professional milestone, but something that makes you feel proud when you look back at your journey?
My greatest achievement is that I was able to build something of my own without having to choose between my family and my ambition.
I started Nirmooha at a stage in life when many women are subtly told that it may be too late to begin again. I didn’t accept that. Building the brand while raising a family has taught me that there is no fixed age or prescribed timeline for ambition.
I am also deeply proud when the platform we have created can extend beyond fashion. Whether through tree-plantation initiatives, Mitti Ke Sitare for underprivileged children, or supporting acid-attack survivors through The Confidence Walk with the Divyaj Foundation, I believe achievement becomes more meaningful when it allows you to contribute beyond yourself.
And today, being able to work alongside my daughter makes the journey feel as though it has come full circle.
As you build the next chapter with Boddhe, what is the legacy you hope Nirmooha will create, and what do you hope your own journey will inspire in the next generation of women entrepreneurs?
I would like Nirmooha to outgrow me.
The real legacy of a fashion house is not how many shows it has done or how many stores it has opened. It is whether it develops a language strong enough to be recognised and relevant beyond its founder.
With Boddhe joining the journey, I see Nirmooha becoming increasingly contemporary and global, but I want its core values to remain intact: individuality, craftsmanship, strength, restraint and freedom of expression.
Personally, if my journey can communicate one thing to other women, it would be that ambition does not have an expiry date. You can be a mother, a wife, a daughter and still have an identity and dream that belong entirely to you.
I started Nirmooha because I wanted to create. Nearly a decade later, my ambition is bigger: to create something that can continue, evolve and have meaning long after me.
