'Mani Ratnam Sir doesn't always have a very clear vision'

'He knows what he doesn't want and likes exploring the rest with his cast and crew, so it's like a journey of making something beautiful together.'

One of the best things about Mani Ratnam's visually arresting historical Ponniyin Selvan-1 is its characters, looking regal and resplendent, whether on the battlefield or in song.

Due credit goes to Costume Designer Eka Lakhani, who has designed for many films like Sanju, Lust Stories, Fanney Khan and Haseen Parkar.

"Designing for kings and queens does make my work look really beautiful and larger than life, and I enjoy doing it a lot," Eka tells Ronjita Kulkarni/Rediff.com.

"Customising costumes to match an era we haven't really lived in, but have visualised is very challenging, but I enjoy the process a lot. I feel that for me, contemporary films are a bit easier. It's the language that I understand better. I feel I can do better justice to them."

The charm of working with a director like Mani Ratnam is something else, of course.

"Working with Mani sir is magical," she says. "He's like a school for me. I learn so much more about fashion, films, costumes, about my design sensibilities and how much I can push myself."

What was Mani Ratnam's vision for PS-1?

"His vision is... he doesn't always have a very clear vision," Eka reveals about the film director acknowledged as a master of his craft.

"He knows what he doesn't want and likes exploring the rest with his cast and crew, so it's like a journey of making something beautiful together. One has to experiment. While filming, we often change things according to ideas that Mani sir has just got. It's not like we follow a rule book or a plan. We make changes while filming."

Eka takes us through the styling for each of the top actors in the film.

Vikram plays Crown Prince Aditha Karikalan

Vikram and Ravi are princes, so we have gone all out for them.

Mani sir gave me adjectives for them and we had to design a look around that.

So the character description for Vikram sir's character is that he's really aggressive, a go-getter, brave... so his aggression and passion had to come out in the clothes he wears.

He has a dark side too, so we have played with deeper and darker hues like blacks, indigoes and burgundies.

His clothes had a rough and tough edge to it.

The motifs are stronger.

His war armour has the emblem of a tiger because that was the Chola emblem. That ferociousness of a tiger is what we wanted to see in him.

We used the tiger claws as his signature piece of jewellery.

We have also used rubies, diamonds and sapphires set in gold for it to look royal.

His armour looks hard, with a chest plate and base armour. He has tiger faces as his thigh guards.

The whole armour is engraved with a battlefield on the chest plate and the engraving is so detailed that the naked eye will miss the details.

 

Jayam Ravi plays Arulmozhi Varman

He's the king of the people, he listens to people, loves them.

He's an elephant whisperer.

There's a soft side to him, a Buddhist influence on him. So we have given him softer colours, purer colours like whites, gold and ivory. This was for his royal look.

For his war armour, we have used elephant tusks as his motif.

His armour colour was a softer brown.

But since he's a warrior and just as strong, that came out with his hard armour.

 

Karthi plays Vanthiyathevan

Vanthiyathevan is like a messenger, and he's constantly travelling in the film.

So in the entire film, he's on a horse.

When you are travelling, you would have protection, but it would not be as heavy as war protection. So we have given him armour made of soft leather. The leather is of such quality that wherever it would bend, a texture would be formed there, so texturing was really important when he used his armour.

It was made in a way that it would be comfortable when he is sitting on a horse or in water...

 

Aishwarya Lekshmi plays Poonguzhali

She likes to call herself the princess of the ocean, but she's actually a boat girl.

Her look needed her to be comfortable when she is rowing a boat or jumping across, going underwater. A fisherwoman's look almost.

Since she's a boat girl who is fighting the strongest of waves in the ocean, we need her outfit to be draped in such a way that it would be easy for her to do these activities.

We still wanted her to look sexy, so we have experimented with a lot of backless bustiers.

We used thread jewellery and oxidised jewellery.

Her hair was kept a little wet and tied in a bun. Often, we see a flower behind her ear.

It was the way Maniam (Selven) had illustrated her character in the book written by Kalki Krishnamurthy.

 

Trisha plays Princess Kundavai

Trisha is born a princess so she is very authoritative.

She's like her brother Aditha. She commands respect.

She's born into royalty so jewels are everyday for her, she's used to them. We gave her pleats because it helps with the poised look.

Trisha has a big bun on top of her head. It gave her a very erect and firm look, which helps in showing her courage and authority.

The jewellery in her hair made the hairdo even heavier and she would need a backrest during the shoot.

 

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan plays Nandini

Nandini is not born a princess, but she acquires royalty when she marries.

Mani sir wanted her look to be very mystical and magical, so we have given her a layering.

We have given her almost corseted outfits, which look like sculptures and then draped with opaque and translucent drapes on each side. So you can see the jewellery she has worn under the translucent drapes, like arm bands, but it's not in your face.

She also has a dark side.

She's someone who is very aware of her beauty, so we have used deeper colours like burgundies, blacks, sapphire blue and emerald green.

Nandini's hairdo is on the side of her head; that's how it was illustrated in Maniam's illustrations and we used the same hairstyle, when she's addressing the public or out in her full glory.

Trisha's big bun was on top of her head.

Also, since Aishwarya's wealth was acquired, we show more jewellery as compared to Trisha.

That was the basic difference we did with them.

 

Sobhita Dhulipala plays Vaanathi

She's a dancer, and we wanted a musical vibe to her, a little more free-flowingness.

She needed to have some innocence about her and for this, we have used a version of a half sari or a pavadai chatta where we have given her these kanjeevaram lehengas and drapes that go with it.

Her jewellery is delicate so that it shows her innocence.

We have used the purest forms of kanjeevaram silks for these women, made from weavers across south India.

We realised that for a film like this, we wanted to show more silks rather than embroideries.

We used zari and gold in the weaves.

 

'We had at least eight rounds of look tests with each actor, and every round had about 20-30 looks'

The most challenging part was for it all to come together.

We had to crack their elaborate hairstyles, the outfits and jewellery.

Silk is not the easiest fabric to drape, so we have to figure out a way of constructing it.

If we cracked one thing, the other would not work out so we had to go back to that.

We had to do a lot of experimenting, and for that I prepared hard for the film.

Mani sir sent me to Thanjavur to study the temples and the statues to get a sense of the idea in January 2019. I met the weavers then as well.

We had researchers and historians, who were guiding us at every step. For instance, the Cholas were Shivites, so we had to stay away from everything that denoted the Vaishnavite culture.

We had to see what hairstyles were authentic, what tilak they used, what fabrics were authentic.

We had at least eight rounds of look tests with each actor, and every round had about 20-30 looks. We would show them to Mani sir and he would like some things and not, and we would have to change that.

There was a lot of back and forth, also with (Cinematographer) Ravi Varman sir, who was approving the colours and (Art Director) Thota Tharini, who was looking at the authenticity.

It was a very lengthy process.