Designer label AMPM sheds its layers for a quiet evolution of a brand new identity

To mark 20 years of their brand, co-founders and creative directors Priyanka and Ankur Modi reinvent AMPM, lending it a fresh new avatar

When designers celebrate 20 years of being in the fashion industry, it’s more often than not a landmark moment to expand their brand and label. But for Priyanka and Ankur Modi it’s quite the opposite. “We needed a disruption,” says Priyanka Modi, who took a leap of action to reinvent their whole brand and its ethos, starting with the name. “AMPM by Ankur & Priyanka Modi was what we used to go by. Now, we’re simply AMPM,” she explains. The duo even stripped down their stores—from 12 to three—and gave their label a new identity, one that incorporates their idea of luxury and slow living with more accessible clothing and ready-to-wear collections. We spoke to Priyanka Modi about her idea of luxury, what went behind building their new minimal-style store and how art and artists have inspired AMPM’s ready-to-wear collections.

After spending two decades in the fashion industry, why did you feel the need to reinvent your brand AMPM?

Every once in a while, to take a leap forward, you need to take a few steps back. It was about three years ago when we started contemplating what lies ahead for the brand. It took some courage to analyse our past. We understood that if we were to truly solve for the future, then we had to be completely honest with ourselves and lay bare our losses and mistakes along with our wins and successes. We had to look at all our strengths and weaknesses dispassionately so that we could move forward and take only what was essential.

AMPM started two decades ago, with the aim of providing its audience something relaxed and stylish–a luxury they could experience every day. We realised we wanted to return to that premise. Over the years, we had deviated from it, however slightly, sometimes to indulge the needs of the market and sometimes simply as an experiment. But now we want to operate from our absolute core, and this time, unfiltered and unwavering. By the time the COVID-19 pandemic upended our lives, we were knee-deep into this. We were so sure about reimagining the brand that we saw this most challenging time as an opportunity, and used it to ideate, to be inspired, to imagine what we wanted to be an immersive experience.

Apart from clothing, you’ve also ventured into accessories and most recently, jewellery. Is this expansion also a part of the rebranding?

The design language we have returned to is such that it can lend itself to everything from a napkin and cushion cover to footwear and jewellery. We want to extend ourselves across product lines without limiting it to apparel. Jewellery is already a big part of the current launch. The launch of our jewellery line is part of our vision of becoming a global luxury lifestyle brand. As a natural extension of our apparel and accessories, we would like to continue to create universal products that transcend sartorial and cultural barriers, while appealing to discerning consumers around the world. For our first-ever collection, we have created truly evocative pieces–pieces that are sensual and intimate, pieces that speak of heritage and evolution, pieces that are a distilled blend of India and the modern world.

While most brands and designers are opening up stores in numerous cities, you chose to shut down nine out of the 12 stores you have. What led you to make this bold move?

One of the things we learnt about ourselves early on was that we like to do things differently–in a sense, make our own rules. At the time of envisioning the new branding, we knew that the culmination of this evolution would be across all consumer touchpoints, be it retail stores or social media platforms, and that we wanted all of it to be experiential and immersive.

We decided to close retail touchpoints that did not align with our brand story. We previously had 12 stores across seven cities in India; we closed nine and only kept three, all in New Delhi where our base is. Now we only wish to open experiential centres that are not transactional but an extension of our own home. We want people to come in and relax with a cup of coffee or listen to a music performance in an intimate setting.

Aesthetically speaking, your new store in New Delhi is minimal yet modern. Can you tell us more about the design process behind it?

Whilst designing our first physical experience, it was imperative that we were able to capture the essence of the new language we had created and that the space clearly reflected it. Even though it was a retail store, one of the first things we decided to do was to do away with the idea of it being a retail store. We realised we weren't aiming to create a store but a sanctuary, and that is what we did. We created a space which has an innate sense of discovery. We worked with a single material and enveloped the entire shell of the store in it, giving it an immense sense of space and calm. We enveloped some of the furniture too in the same material, helping the space expand and making it more tranquil.

Wood was a natural choice, adding character and warmth to an otherwise stark canvas. It was effectively used to recreate the lounge in my home and its built-in closet. Water, too, was introduced in strategic locations to soothe and soften. Our real challenge came in the way of our biggest desire–sunlight. Given our vision for all future brand spaces, we really wanted natural light. In fact, we were so sure about making it happen that we’d designed a courtyard right in the centre of the store, imagining streaming sunlight. But the DLF Emporio Mall is constructed in a manner that simply does not allow for external light to flow inside. Not willing to give up this desire of sunlight entirely, we did the next best thing–we replicated it. With that came alive our courtyard, that now mimics an actual courtyard with sunlight on a clear spring day. Unquestionably, our pièce de résistance.

Every single detail was discussed and deliberated for months on end, making sure that nothing was off-key. Even though we had doubled our space from its original size, we reduced the merchandise on display by half, giving the customer a chance to slow down, properly view each product and truly appreciate the designs.

You’ve defined your ready-to-wear collections as “everyday luxury.” What does luxury mean to you? 

Luxury, for me, is quality over quantity. It is about less clutter and more curation. It means having an expanse of space, getting my senses activated with natural materials, greenery, sound, water and anything that brings ease to my everyday life. 

You’ve worked with numerous artists as a part of your ‘art-i-culate’ initiative, including Rhea Gupte and Guneet Monga. How do these collaborations inspire you when it comes to your design process? 

Art has always been the foundation of my work at AMPM. For me, there is a direct and a very personal connection between art and fashion. Various disciplines of art have always inspired me, from 3D forms like poetry and sculptures to 2D traditional art forms. The connection is in the form of re-imagination, interpretation or adaptation with due credit, of course. How you present to your audience in your own unique voice and aesthetic, is where the true magic lies.

The art-i-culate series has creators whose work has inspired us immensely. The starting point of my inspiration for art-i-culate was Jai Khanna’s modern interpretation of the age-old craft of Pichwai. In 2019, I visited an art exhibition and found myself entranced by Khanna’s works. Just taking the basic guardrails of Pichwai, he seemed to have created his own language, one that was free of rules and full of detail and devotion. For the first time, instead of telling our story, I wanted to tell his story as well as the stories of other artists and creators like him who have freely explored their creative expression through their own unique mediums. 

Thinking ahead a decade or two, how do you see AMPM evolve in the future?

In the next decade, I would like AMPM to be called a global luxury lifestyle brand.

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