Gold dresses, flower markets and sitars: Pirelli’s 2027 calendar features an all-Indian cast and was shot entirely in India. Against the ancient walls of Jaigarh fort near Jaipur, model Bhavitha Mandava stood barefoot and draped in gold.
Model Bhavitha Mandava
Mandava, who grew up in Hyderabad, was catapulted from obscurity as a student at New York University to become one of fashion’s most recognised new faces. This year, she became the first Indian woman to open the Chanel catwalk at their Métiers d’Art show, and her Chanel outfit for the Met Gala became an international talking point. She is among the all-Indian cast of women in the first Pirelli calendar shot entirely in India.
History and Criticism
Launched in the 1960s as a marketing giveaway for the Italian tyre company, the Pirelli calendar is now one of the most influential publications for fashion photography, featuring almost every famous supermodel of the past six decades. For decades it faced criticism for lack of diversity and sexual objectification. The 1987 calendar included a topless 16-year-old Naomi Campbell among an all-black lineup. By 2016, Annie Leibovitz shot a calendar celebrating diverse influential women. In 2018, Tim Walker used only black models with an Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland theme. A return in 2025 to sensual and nude images drew criticism in the post-#MeToo era.
Indian Representation Shift
The decision to shoot in India comes amid a shifting landscape for South Asian representation in fashion. While Indian craft, fabrics and embroidery have long influenced top fashion houses, their contribution has rarely been acknowledged. In March 2023, Dior staged a show at Mumbai’s Gateway of India, the first major European luxury house to present a full runway show in India, with Indian embroidery workshops at the forefront. In June 2025, Prada faced controversy after its runway showed leather sandals similar to traditional Kolhapuri chappals; after backlash, the fashion house admitted their Indian origins and sent a delegation to meet artisans.
Cast and Photography
Mandava, 26, said she initially had hesitations prompted by the history of the Pirelli calendar and how it would work in India’s more modest culture. “I’ll be honest I wasn’t very enthusiastic about the past eroticism of the Pirelli calendar and those associations,” she said. “But I’m so glad, they have actively made an effort for me to feel like I belong.” She celebrated Pirelli’s decision to champion India’s “beauty and diversity” but cautioned against trying to make women such as herself “representations” of an entire country or race. “I like to think my race isn’t the most interesting thing about me,” said Mandava. “I’m happy that whatever I’m doing is providing representation but I also don’t think about how I’m representing India. That would just be too daunting.”
The project was initially envisioned as a collaboration of two photographers: Raghu Rai, one of India’s most famous, and Norwegian photographer Sølve Sundsbø. After Rai’s death in April, his photographer daughter Avani Rai agreed to take on his part. “My father was always my audience,” said Rai. “And initially I thought: if he’s not going to see these photos, then why should I shoot? But then I started talking to him in my head and he started showing up in divine spaces.” She focused on capturing an essence, contradictions and “multiple coexisting universes”, and took the project back to the streets of Delhi’s old city, its flower market, gullies and old cinemas.
Other Participants
Anoushka Shankar, whose genre-bending music has revolutionised the traditional sitar, will appear with her sitar. “If I think of how it felt for me as a teenager growing up in the UK or in the States, as a south Asian, we weren’t thought of as the beautiful people,” she said. “I would feel a little bit self-conscious about being Indian when I walked into certain rooms. But watching the last decade or so, south Asian presence in mainstream global culture has really changed that.”
Padma Lakshmi, the model and chef born in Tamil Nadu, returning to shoot in India for her second time in the calendar, said: “Coming back to India to shoot this makes it feel, in a way, a lot more feminine. I was raised in a house of Indian women, and I associate my earliest talisman of femininity with those women.” At 55, she is among the oldest women featured. “For so long we saw only one kind of Indian beauty, manufactured to certain tastes or certain narrow stereotypes,” said Lakshmi. “But this shows the many faces of what it means to be an Indian woman globally.”
