After two years she was appointed into the Council of Fashion Designers of America. While she gives credit to her  Indian heritage for her commitment to designs that are simultaneously demure and sexy, her androgynous Spring 2012 collection, draws its aesthetic inspiration from a 1992 movie entitled, The Lover, a forbidden romance set against the backdrop of colonial Vietnam. In August she will be launching a footwear line as well.

Rachel epitomizes the self-assured woman she designs for, though she says it’s a persona she embraced quite recently. “I was raised to be a good Indian girl,” she says, hinting to her modest, formative years in California, when a copy of Vogue was considered a splurge. She said that “What I didn’t learn till my 30s is that until I take care of myself, I can’t take care of others.”  “There’s beauty in putting other people first. But there has to be a balance,” she added.