Prada sandal row exposes flaw in India's push to protect culture

[Sanjay]

Source: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-06-26/what-the-prada-kolhapuri-sandal-dispute-revealed-about-protecting-traditional-cr

[Hemant]

India is racing to give its handicrafts the same kind of legal protection that Champagne enjoys. A recent spat over Prada's Kolhapuri‑inspired sandal shows why that could be tricky.

Akanksha Singh for Bloomberg News

In June 2025, luxury fashion brand Prada sent a braided brown leather sandal down a runway in Milan. Within days, the design was trending in India - but not for the reasons you'd expect. Prada's sandal looked a lot like the Indian Kolhapuri, a traditional sandal named after Kolhapur, a town in western Maharashtra. Headlines, think pieces and social media videos quickly called the brand out for cultural appropriation.

In Maharashtra, leather artisan Shubham Satpute saw the Prada sandal as the controversy spread online. "There was nothing wrong with [Prada] taking inspiration, but we felt the term 'Kolhapuri' should have been used," he says. After the initial backlash, Prada acknowledged the design's Indian roots.

Satpute's family has been making Kolhapuris since 1902. To the untrained eye, they might look like any other open‑toed leather sandal. But to be called a Kolhapuri, they must follow a strict set of guidelines: buffalo‑leather soles, goatskin uppers, leather tanned with salt, limestone and locally made vegetable dyes. The sandals must also be hammered, pierced, stitched and braided by hand, and they can only be produced in designated districts across Maharashtra and Karnataka.

These guidelines come from geographical‑indication (GI) certification - a legal tag governments give to products tied to a specific place. Once a GI is registered, its name can be protected through domestic laws and sometimes international agreements, limiting who can use it. GI registrations have surged lately, and in some cases they've become big success stories. The origins of Champagne, Tequila and Darjeeling tea are widely recognised partly because GI certifications link their identities to their geographic roots.

[Read the full story here.](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-06-26/what-the-prada-kolhapuri-sandal-dispute-revealed-about-protecting-traditional-cr?accessToken=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJzb3VyY2UiOiJTdWJzY3JpYmVyR2lmdGVkQXJ0aWNsZSIsImlhdCI6MTc4MjQ5MzI4NCwiZXhwIjoxNzgzMDk4MDg0LCJhcnRpY2xlSWQiOiJUSDdVV0lSS1YyVEUwMCIsImJjb25uZWN0SWQiOiJEMzU0MUJFQjhBQUY0QkUwQkFBOUQzNkI3QjlCRjI4OCJ9.iQXp3bhMvlswnwy-Rqy74nmhW7zPI2KS-52aa_aSizM)

[Vikram]

What's the flaw?