Contestant's Case to Win

Shubhra founded her own business in 2008 and created various collections embodying her vision of elegance, eco-friendly business practices and fusion flair. Her thought process behind Shubrah.com was to create a collection with minimal waste and environmental impact. Embodied in the sourcing of organic or all natural fabrics, recycled paper hangtags on all the products and using cloth bags for shipping to her customers. Using no paper products for catalogs, paper flyers or promotional materials, Shubrah.com relies on web marketing and word of mouth trunk shows and sales. Polluting the waters of any country by dyeing fabrics with harsh chemicals, tanning leather or killing animals for fur is not what this designer likes to do. The lasting thought behind her fashions is beautiful clothing can be timeless, of high quality and caring towards our environment. Passion, fashion and compassion are part of the company’s mission statement.

The definition of her style is fusion: applying the richness of traditional crafts and motifs from the east to contemporary fashion trends creating exquisite Indo-Western outfits ideal for today's cosmopolitan consumer. Shubhra adds, "I want my designs to be avant-garde and modern, marrying cutting edge fashion and old world, eco-friendly fabrics." Striving constantly to bring a new intellectual excitement into her designs, Shubhra collaborates with global vendors (fabric mills, factories and agents) to create the lines for women, men and children. She has partnered with a non-governmental organization (Chintan) in urban India that works on cleaning urban waste. They recycle the waste to create household products. Www.shubrah.com sells the ready to wear as well as products made by Chintan’s urban rag pickers. A percentage of the profits from Shubhra Designs, LLC are given to various non-governmental agencies in the U.S and India, for their work with women, children and other sustainable business practices.

The business is home and web based. It is surrounded by a wonderful community of manufacturers, non-profit organizations, college interns, website designers and builders, advisers and mentors, who are friends and family. As the business draws on this community for support and growth, the business also gives back to the community at large.

Shubhra also designs couture east meets west weddings for special clients. The gowns, bridesmaid’s dresses and mother of the bride ensembles are made from vintage sari fabrics or traditional Indian hand woven silks. They are made for the modern western bride who wants an eastern flair in color and fabrics.

Shubhra Bhattacharya Chandra has 18 years of experience in the field of women’s fashion design, development and global sourcing. She has worked for top U.S retailers in all categories of fashion apparel, designing and developing product lines while working with mills, factories and other resources worldwide. Shubhra has previously worked at Talbots Collection, Mast Industries, Inc, (Design and Development arm of The Limited, Inc) and Sigrid Olsen (a division of Liz Claiborne, Inc), and has extensive experience in the design, development, and sourcing of women’s fashion apparel globally. She has lead teams that can run fashion businesses on an international level.

Shubhra’s education includes fashion/ apparel design in both India and the USA. She has a B.A. in Economics (Honors) from Lady Shri Ram College, New Delhi. She was among the first of twenty-five students to be admitted to the joint program of F.I.T (New York, USA) and N.I.F.T (New Delhi, India), where she received her Diploma in Fashion Design and graduated at the top of her class as "Best Design Student". She went on to receive a Masters Degree in Clothing and Textiles, specializing in Apparel Design for Women from Michigan State University, USA.