Ritika Ramesh is a BFA Fashion Design student at Parsons New School for Design, New York. Born in Chennai, India, she resides in Jakarta, Indonesia, living in different parts of South East Asia throughout her childhood. Her travel and living in different countries has inspired her to explore different cultures, people and traditions. Her curiosity and passion in exploring culture has led her into field of fashion and design where she began exploring different mediums.

Her own relation to India and feeling of rootlessness has led her to designing heritage inspired clothes. Being brought up as a third culture kid, Ritika began exploring her roots and her connection to her country only to realize her feeling of disconnectedness. Although she associates herself as an Indian, she wasn’t identified as one in India. She was looked upon as an alien. This had led her into her exploration with different cultures and their narratives.

Ritika pursues both fashion and her textile design along with recently delving into knitwear. She wants to explore different material treatments such as smocking, embroidering, pleating, knitting, beading, dyeing, etc. Her work is aiming to bridge the gap between these textile treatments with a more structured, feminine, design. She wants to use her narrative to help explore into different techniques to create her designs. She finds inspiration in her travel, childhood, history, people’s stories and cultures.

Living in the heart of New York’s SoHo, she is surrounded by people, fashion storefronts, light, reflections, music, vibrations, marching crowds, police sirens…  This constant flow of energy gives her the inspiration to explore. She believes in being curious and researching different periods in history, fashion and stories as an important part to create a unique perspective. Through this, one can create their own story. She plans to use these inspirations to create more urban, streetwear collection that anyone can wear. She wants to use the idea of ‘rootless’, to create a more modern womenswear collection with accessories and knitwear. Ritika wants her collection to include everyone who feels disconnected and unincluded.

After her degree at Parsons New School for Design, Ritika aims to become a knitwear/womenswear designer. She one day, wants to work in Paris, France.