As the fast fashion industry struggles with its environmental and cultural responsibilities, emerging designer Ritul Rai offers a path forward by reimagining clothing through biodegradable materials. Her latest collection, The Last Biobloom, challenges waste, honors heritage and envisions a better future.
Developed during her MA in Fashion Design at Nottingham Trent University, The Last Biobloom is a concept-driven project inspired by the delicate beauty of bloom and decay. It draws from the natural life cycle, the way nature decomposes and regenerates, offering an alternative to fashion’s wasteful linear model.
The project takes its primary inspiration from flowers, particularly roses, hydrangeas and lilies, which are rich in symbolism and transformation. These blooms, with their short-lived beauty and deep symbolism, came to represent change, delicacy and new beginnings.
“That cycle of life and decay became the core of The Last Biobloom,” Ritul explains. “Each surface, texture and shape emerged from that idea.”
Ritul worked with agar-based bioplastics, crafting and adjusting recipes to explore various textures and transparencies. She experimented extensively by changing ingredients, altering proportions and testing combinations of natural additives to affect flexibility, gloss, strength and even scent.
The process was both meticulous and intuitive. At one stage, she added glycerine and starch to increase pliability; at another, she substituted natural thickeners like guar gum to create a silkier surface. The changing ingredient ratios meant every outcome was different, a new material each time, echoing the unpredictability of nature itself.
Ritul also pushed boundaries through surface experimentation using glow-in-the-dark dye, dual-tone dyes, crystal growth techniques and photochromic pigments that shift color with light exposure.
“The idea was to create garments that were alive in their own way,” she says. “That they could glow, soften, change and eventually decompose. Fast fashion wants everything to be fast, cheap and permanent. I wanted to design clothing that disappears gracefully, something that starts conversations, not landfills.”
The Last Biobloom is not just a material experiment,” Ritul notes. “It’s also a reflection on how we relate to the things we wear. Can a garment teach us to let go? To observe? To appreciate change?”
The silhouette of The Last Biobloom, delicate yet sculptural, mimics the structure of petals in various stages of life. Using techniques like laser cutting, raster engraving and hand-forming bioplastic sheets, she shaped garments that looked as though they’d grown organically.
This focus on biomaterials places Ritul among a new wave of designers exploring sustainable innovation at the molecular level. Biomaterials, from bacterial cellulose to algae-based fabrics, present a radical shift in fashion’s relationship with resources. Ritul’s work champions these possibilities while acknowledging their limitations. Her designs don’t just explore biomaterials as substitutes; they ask what it means to design with them ethically, intentionally and narratively.
But The Last Biobloom is only the beginning.
As she looks toward her next chapter, Ritul is laying the groundwork for a slow fashion brand that celebrates Indian heritage, craftsmanship and community-led making. While the brand has not yet launched and is in the research phase, her vision is already clear. She aims to blend ancestral wisdom with modern aesthetics, rooted in the belief that fashion can be ethical, local and luxurious.
“There’s so much knowledge in Indian traditional crafts,” she says. “From handloom weaving to natural dyeing, hand embroidery to block printing, these methods have always been sustainable. They were designed with nature in mind.”
Ritul’s goal is to build a London-based brand powered by the artistry and soul of Indian craftsmanship. Her process begins with research and respectful engagement, understanding not just how things are made but why and by whom. She believes in giving artisans visibility and creative agency, ensuring that collaboration replaces appropriation.
“So much of global fashion takes from Indian culture without acknowledgment,” Ritul says. “But I don’t want to extract. I want to co-create, to build collections that honour these communities, their techniques and their histories.”
Designers like Rahul Mishra and Gaurav Gupta inspire her deeply. These are creatives who have redefined Indian fashion on a global stage while staying true to their roots. “They’ve shown that heritage isn’t something to preserve behind glass; it’s something you can wear, reinterpret and celebrate.”
Ritul envisions garments that carry cultural memory while speaking to contemporary lifestyles. She imagines silhouettes that are modern yet made slowly, and textiles that are luxurious yet kind to the earth. She plans to work with artisans across different regions in India, integrating indigenous techniques with thoughtful design systems.
Beyond aesthetics, Ritul’s approach to fashion is also systemic. She’s deeply interested in regenerative design and circular fashion. Her future brand aims to be transparent in its supply chain, intentional in its processes and holistic in its storytelling.
Her training in sustainable design has already equipped her with the tools to lead this vision. From experimenting with zero-waste pattern cutting to working with biomaterials and natural dyes, she blends innovation with intuition, balancing the future with the past.
Ritul’s research is ongoing. She continues to study traditional craft communities, material cultures and sustainability frameworks. For her, design is a way to ask questions. How can we design garments that return to the earth? How can we uplift the hands that make our clothes? How can we slow down fashion while deepening its meaning?
The Last Biobloom was about the future,” Ritul says. “It asked: what if fashion didn’t have to end up in landfills? Now I want to take that idea and connect it to something older — like shared traditions and cultural knowledge. I want to create clothes that are honest, respectful and made to last.”
Ritul Rai was awarded the Sublime Magazine Good Brand Award 2025 in the Emerging Designer category, in recognition of her contribution to advancing social and environmental sustainability in the fashion industry.
