Mumbai’s Kala Ghoda has long been the city’s cultural nerve center, home to galleries, independent bookstores, and spaces that have shaped the city’s artistic conversations for decades. Into this landscape comes Chorus, a new multidisciplinary atelier that has just opened its flagship location at Mittal Avenue. Co-founded by mother-daughter Karishma and Avantika Swali and grounded in the 40-year legacy of Chanakya International, Chorus positions itself as a space where craft meets contemporary expression across multiple disciplines.
Chanakya International, founded in the 1980s, has been known for its embroidery and textile work, particularly its collaborations with international fashion houses. Chorus represents a shift from this B2B model toward direct consumer engagement, building on what the Swalis learned from Moonray, their previous venture that focused on ethical making and conscious design. Where Moonray gathered a community around purposeful consumption, Chorus expands that framework across five distinct verticals.
Co-founder and Creative Director Karishma Swali, said, “Chorus is a space beyond fixed definitions, where disciplines blur and the unexpected takes shape. Whether in clay, cloth, or scent, the medium is never incidental. Each carries its own voice, and for us, it always begins with listening.”
Spread across three levels, Chorus houses a ready-to-wear collection built around architectural silhouettes and precise tailoring, with materials chosen for provenance, performance, and responsible innovation. Chorus Edition functions as its couture arm, drawing on Chanakya’s decades of expertise in needlework and embellishment. Each made-to-measure garment involves thousands of hours of embroidery, draping, tailoring, cutting, and assembling by 13th-generation master artisans, with silhouettes that reinterpret costume history through deconstruction.
Chorus Concept operates as an artistic studio creating woven textiles, sculptural ceramics, and mouth-blown glassware that explore the dialogue between inherited techniques and contemporary expression. Chorus Wellness produces hand-poured candles and a modern apothecary of small-batch, plant-based formulations including cold-processed soaps and botanical body oils. A café within the flagship treats food as another form of shared artistry, creating space for conversation alongside material encounters.
This multidisciplinary approach reflects a broader shift in how Indian luxury brands are positioning themselves. Rather than focusing solely on fashion or home, several brands have begun creating ecosystems that span lifestyle categories, from Pero’s expansion into home goods to Good Earth’s long-standing integration of fashion, home, and food. Chorus enters this landscape with craft as its organizing principle, treating it not as heritage preservation but as an active, evolving practice.
Behind this vision is a design collective that includes Karishma and Avantika Swali, LVMH Prize-winning designers Tina and Nikita Sutradhar, artist and designer Joohi Mehta, embroidery specialist Renu Sahu, and 13th-generation master artisans. Tina and Nikita Sutradhar, who won the LVMH Prize in 2024 for their brand Dôen, bring experience in translating craft into contemporary luxury markets. Their inclusion, along with specialists across embroidery and artistic practice, suggests Chorus is building expertise that spans both making and market positioning.
“Moonray was born as a space of joy where craft, consciousness, and beauty met with ease. In just a few years, it gathered a thoughtful community that valued the ethics of making and a shared commitment to purposeful design. As its roots deepened, so did its voice. It became clear that what was taking shape was a world that required more dimension, more language, more possibility. Chorus is the next chapter. A natural progression and a deeper articulation of what began with Moonray,” said Ms. Swali.
Chorus is now open in Kala Ghoda, Fort, Mumbai. Additional locations are planned at Palladium in Mumbai and Dhan Mill in Delhi, expanding the brand’s presence beyond its flagship.
For a brand built on craft as dialogue and material intelligence, the real test will be whether it can translate that philosophy into sustained engagement in India’s competitive luxury retail landscape.
