Almost Gods: Why Ranveer Singh, Alia Bhatt and Kanye West Are Wearing This Fashion Brand

At 22, Dhruv Khurana was parking his car when his phone rang — on the other end was stylist Nitasha Gaurav, gently warning him that people might not “get” the piece she’d just pulled for Ranveer Singh. It was one of the first eight garments Khurana had ever made for Almost Gods: a bold, impractical red hoodie that didn’t quite belong to any existing market in India at the time. “We didn’t know red would become our colour,” he says now, recalling how instinct drove those early decisions. “It just felt culturally exciting, like it spoke to the zeitgeist.”

What happened next has since passed into Indian fashion folklore. Singh wore the hoodie, live-streamed in it, rapped in it — amplifying a young brand that hadn’t yet figured itself out. Today, search “Ranveer Singh red hoodie” and the brand pops right up. Khurana still has that exact piece, signed and framed in his office, marking where it all began.

The vision is clearer, he tells The Hollywood Reporter India, sitting on a bench outside his Bandra store. The team is celebrating eight years of the brand that evening, so a DJ is blaring music inside. Some of the original pieces, including Singh's hoodie are all on display. What began as a series of fragmented, intuitive ideas has evolved alongside India’s own streetwear ecosystem — one that barely existed when Almost Gods first entered the conversation. The stakes are different now, but beneath the growth, the team, and the business of it all, Kurana insists one thing hasn’t changed: the desire to make something that leaves a dent in the universe — even if, at first, no one quite understands it.

Excerpts from the conversation:

THR INDIA: Dhruv, 8 years in, who do you think holds the power in fashion in 2026? Is it the consumer? The creator? A celebrity? the algorithm?

Dhruv Khurana: It’s diversified. The whole ecosystem has to work together. That’s what’s so exciting about brand building —there’s so much out of your hands. The perfect example was the knit sweater Loewe made during COVID. People saw it and started knitting it at home. That led to Loewe gaining so much cultural capital and weight, and it fed into itself. You’re just throwing a hundred darts at the board and hoping something lands.

THR INDIA: What’s been the most defining moment for your brand so far?

DK: The opening of the Dhan Mill store was a chest-thumping moment, and a global collaboration like Fila was also a big one. But for me, just walking into my office or studio and seeing a team of people working on this is really crazy.

THR INDIA: What’s also crazy is that somebody sending you a Snapchat of Ye wearing your clothes didn’t make the list. How did that happen?

DK: Kanye’s producer on Ye, Mike Snell, came by our space when we did an event in Dubai. He picked up a bunch of things, and a piece literally had a distorted print of Kanye on it because I wrote my final college paper on him. When he was making the Ye album, I got a Snap saying, “Yo, he’s wearing it.” That was so full circle.

THR INDIA: Since then, a lot of artists have worn your clothes — Diljit Dosanjh included.

DK: Yeah, but that’s not what’s driving me anymore. There are always going to be those five, seven people down the line who will bring that excitement again. But now it’s about building on that. The end goal is not just to build a clothing brand — that’s such a small one. The goal is: how do you break out of India? How do you get people to see India as a place that can generate cool cultural capital and clothing? That changes perception. It allows us to operate globally as Indians.

THR INDIA: In a Culted interview, you said it’s harder to sell India to India than to get validation abroad. Is that still true?

DK: I think so, but it’s changing. The ecosystem has changed. We’ve realised the vernacular for India doesn’t need to be so limited. There are people doing India in very cool ways today. You can find a global definition of that Indian conversation. It doesn’t need to look like FabIndia or traditional craft; that’s just one language. I grew up listening to Linkin Park, for instance.

THR INDIA: What are you listening to right now?

DK: A lot of Fred Again, Above & Beyond (it’s electronic music but about love and connection, you know) Skepta, UK Garage and John Bellion.

THR INDIA: Have you worked with any of them?

DK: It’s under NDA, so I can’t say (smiles).

THR INDIA: What’s the biggest misconception about your brand?

DK: Being a 'hype brand' is definitely one. It’s like when streetwear was peaking — drop culture, sneakers — but that’s not how I want us to be perceived. That said, every brand needs a bit of that energy; it feeds the brand. But, we’re trying to be more thoughtful and tasteful.  

THR INDIA: How long do you maintain archives?

DK: We have one of every piece we’ve ever made — 800–900 pieces sitting in the archive. My warehouse manager is quite annoyed — she wants a proper system because people keep pulling things out. But I love it. That journey matters to me. I started with eight pieces and had no idea what I was doing. I learned pattern-making on YouTube, studied Junya Watanabe and JW Anderson without any real context, and tried to play within those systems in India.

THR INDIA: What about collaborations and celebrity endorsements — how do those work out?

DK: We’ve never reached out to celebrities. For collaborations, sometimes they reach out to us, but I’ve also cold messaged people saying, ‘You’re doing something cool, let’s work together.’ Sometimes they respond, sometimes not — and that’s fine. What’s cool is when people I reached out to at 22 come back now wanting to do something together.

THR INDIA: Do you design with a muse in mind?

DK: My team is after me to [get one], actually (laughs).

THR INDIA: What’s next?

DK: We’re opening a [store in] Hyderabad in July. It’s a massive space, and we already have a huge community there. Our team is growing — we’ll be around 40 people by the end of the year. We’re investing in new design work and more with craft. But honestly, I just want to have more fun. I think I’ve been too strict trying to follow the [“global brand checklist.”] I got married last year, and that was big. Now I want to work with people I like, do cool things with my friends.