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THE NEW DELHI

A hipster class is emerging from between the layers of the ancient capital and the home of the Raj, and they’re changing the tastes of the city.

Text: CHANTAL TRANCHEMONTAGNE

1 | 2 | 3 | MAR

A balmy Saturday night. Sitting atop jewel-tone pillows, we eat Thai below an arching wrought-iron arbour on a rooftop terrace, looking out: The city lights wink back. Once sated, we walk down the marble stairs to the ground floor, where I stand agape at the window of a boutique. A pair of impossibly high black suede boots with hand-embroidered detailing keeps me transfixed for a good five minutes, until my partner drags me away to look at another shop. I almost forget where I am except for the cow sluggishly sauntering past the front door of the building. This is Delhi.

It’s not just the cow that clues me in. Outside, we’re faced with mud, dusty smog that clogs our lungs, honking cars speeding by in alarming proximity, the heavy smell of dense human musk and people scavenging for food despite the late hour. This is the Delhi most of us hear – and are sometimes even warned – about. Not often are we privy to the other side: the world of fabulous boots, designer boutiques and trendy restaurants.

Before leaving home for the imperial city, I had read an article discussing the emerging young middle class in India. According to the report, this new set is freely spending money on everything from fashion to food, entertainment to electronics. Unlike their parents, who treat saving as a virtue, young Indians are joining the global culture.

Barista, a European-style coffee bar-cum-Starbucks-wannabe, is cited in the article as a magnet for youth culture. I want to see it, and my partner aches for a real coffee in a city where instant dominates. But first, we have to get there – to the bustling epicentre, Connaught Place, a circular arcade of shops and businesses that forms the downtown core. As we discover, getting there (and anywhere in Delhi, for that matter) is quite a ride.

Our 26-year-old driver, nicknamed Noni, takes our lives in his hands through the streets of Delhi. He ferociously competes for space with the other cars, buses, trucks, auto rickshaws, bicycle rickshaws and horse- and human-drawn carts that often kiss each other’s bumpers or come within millimetres of doing so. No vehicles – save for the high-end cars like Mercedes sedans (nobody messes with that kind of money) and old-school steel Ambassador cars (nobody messes with indestructible machines) – are spared signs of collision. Ninety percent of all vehicles lack intact side mirrors, but it doesn’t matter; nobody uses them anyway, including Noni. We resign ourselves to trusting his instincts.

The only thing keeping my eyes from welding shut is the fear of missing out on the work of Edward Lutyen, the architect commissioned to build the new capital in 1911. His designs contrast sharply with Old Delhi to the north, the 350-year-old city once ruled by Shah Jahan’s Mughal dynasty, from the 17th century until the arrival of the British. (During Delhi’s 2,500-year old history, six other dynasties inhabited the Delhi area). Whereas the old city reveals an Islamic influence, Lutyen, for the most part, rejected Indian architecture and embraced classical European style in New Delhi. As we turn onto the three-kilometre-long Rajpath, formerly known as King’s Way, we see his Rashthrapati Bhawan, once the viceroy’s house and now the president ’s residence, sprawled over nearly two hectares with a 55-metre cupola towering overhead. Bracketing the boulevard is India Gate, the war memorial designed to resemble another imperial symbol, the Arc de Triomphe. The opulence of the avenue, lined with canals, fountains and green spaces, realizes Lutyen’s vision of New Delhi as the capital of the one-time Jewel of the British Crown. But his original design, intended to accommodate 75,000 people, struggles to support a rapidly growing population of 12 million.

Acutely aware that we’re not yet equipped with the degree of finesse required to cross the street on foot, we’re grateful when Noni drops us off at Barista’s door. Ten years ago, places like this didn’t exist because locals went to work and relaxed at home. Now the younger generation flocks to so-called third spaces like Barista to socialize and drink coffee. We survey the room: Hipsters revel in their coolness, businessmen and women share conversation and chicken tikka sandwiches, and teenagers talk into their cellphones instead of to each other. "What do you think?" I ask my partner, referring to the happening scene. "Better than Nescafé," he replies, clutching his mug with both hands.

Delhi’s new young money shows its face again when we chance upon a factory sale at one of the hotels. Clothing, piled half a metre high, spills onto the floor. Sales girls crawl over the heaps to help mostly twentysomething customers hungry to get their paws on Tommy, Perry, Ralph, Hugo… anything designed by the big boys of the Western fashion world. Anything labelled Gap, Adidas or Banana Republic is popular too. The girl next to me gets smoked in the head by a flying Anne Klein blouse, a steal at 399 rupees, a little over $10. She takes a brief look and tucks it under her arm. I remark to the young guy staffing the cash that the crowd seems relatively civil, and he laughs. "They have been known to fight. Luckily, nothing has happened today."

Is this orgy of North American-style consumption really the new norm in Delhi? For insight, I look to Vivek Sahni, a renowned graphic designer embedded in the city’s trend-setting scene. Against the backdrop of the busy new Louis Vuitton store in the lobby of the Oberoi Hotel, he confirms my suspicions. He explains that before the 1990s, the socialist government suppressed imports and nationalized the banks – two factors that discouraged spending. When economic liberalization arrived in the early 1990s, investors entered the country and brought the trends of the wider world with them. "Then TV and the Internet arrived," says Sahni. "Everybody saw what was happening elsewhere, and they wanted it too." To prove his point, he gestures to a young man with a Beckham-inspired faux-hawk coupe walking by. "Look at his haircut. Nobody had haircuts like that before!" My partner and I ply him for more examples on where to spot the hipsters in their natural element, and he recommends we visit his friend’s nightclub F Bar, the newest player on the nightlife scene.

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