MY FANCY PRICKLY WEDDING SARI
My wedding sari reflected the fashion of the time – silver lace, further embellished with dainty rainbow-hued, hand-worked sequins. It had been carried in state from Singapore by an accommodating airhostess friend who bought the fabric by the yard off a roll, such delicacies being as difficult to come by in Mumbai, as Swiss chocolates. The sequins formed a garden of glitter all over the floral outlines and along the scalloped border. I intended to look like a Parsi princess, even as the stiff fabric enveloped me cage-like, perhaps reflecting my state of mind.?

To add to my nervousness on D-day, I had a rude shock. The fancy lace was too short – length and breadth! No-one had noticed. Add to that the fact that the pallu had to drape coyly over my head. The pleats up front were cut to three, two, one and finally almost-none, as I draped and re-draped the miserable length of material. After a long while, when I did not know that the head priest from Navsari had almost staged a walkout on the late bride, I finally managed to get the metres around. In all the fuss and strain of being somehow clothed for my own wedding, I ignored the fact that the scallops at the top edge of the sari had also been embroidered with sharp little pieces of plastic – the sequins. Teetering on the edge of the fabric and clinched tightly by my petticoat, these incisors bit deeply into my waist all evening long. Right from the moment that I finally arrived at the ‘baug’ full of muttering, sweltering relatives and friends and ran down the aisle with my Dad in hot pursuit, trying hard to give away his daughter as elegantly as possible….?

Lesson learnt: rehearsals and trials are a fact of life that must be adhered to. And, uncomfortable weddings do not make uncomfortable marriages. In fact, quite the contrary!?
- SHIRIN MEHTA

THE LONG AND SHORT OF IT
Ever since I had watched my mom in her soft chiffons rush off for operations and return with nary a wrinkle on them, I had dreamt of sashaying out in the smooth drapes. Real life writ a different destiny though. I remember my first tryst with the long length of fabric – a nine-yard version that I donned for a third standard dance performance. All grown up, in the tenth standard, prim and proper and a prefect, I – like others of my ilk – wore my mom’s sari to school and walked with careful steps in and out of classrooms.

For years, saris flew from my mind as I got busy with books, until romance flew into my window. ?So, when I wanted to look all the more mature (sigh, love actually) I would pull out one of the few saris I owned – borders were in with a vengeance, as were lighter silks. Luckily blessed then with a slim frame, I could proudly sport blouses that showed as much as they hid…and walked around with a pallu that swished magically almost down at my ankle. On my wedding day, my airhostess aunt showed me exactly how to get the perfect pleats and faultless fall which worked well for occasions and festivals, till time and girth, alas, outdid me. Using all sorts of inventiveness to lengthen the pallu, even as I battled narrower pleats, by starting to drape it from different places around my waist, I also literally had many ‘extensions’ stitched on its inner side!

Saris have come and gone from my wardrobe, some rent by time, others killed by taste and more ignored by convenience…but there are two that occupy pride of place even today. In search of the perfect sari to wear to an awards function, I once trooped around umpteen shops, ignoring fatigued feet – till I chanced upon this black Benarasi tanchoi, with a subtle self print. Perfect, for the starry night! Alas, my Gen-Next daughter does not appreciate my collection and has begun her own. Again, I see soft chiffons with a trace of shimmer or sequins hanging in her closet. There is one piece though that both of us are fond of. A small rectangular silk shela, which was given to me on D-day by my mother and which demurely covered my head through my nuptials. I will gift it to my daughter on her important day…. So what if it is short and small? This is one drape that me and mine will never outgrow!
- SHRADDHA JAHAGIRDAR-SAXENA

THE COLLECTOR?
If I may say so myself, the immodest collection of saris I own does do me proud. Wrapped lovingly in soft mul covers, with a sprig of lavender, on soft silk hangers for support, they remind me of memorable shopping expeditions and adventurous hunts alike. For years I searched and scouted, in the bylanes of Paris, hoping to find just those few yards of feathery light Chantilly lace, in just that right shade of gold, which I could transform into a delicately scalloped sari, coupled with a shimmering Swarovski bustier. My years of dedicated focus did bear fruit finally – in Varanasi, at a wholesaler who exports lace, silk and georgette worldwide (made sense to grab a rich crimson Benarasi brocade and a lemon mokaish net as well). Then there’s the pale pink chiffon lightly sprinkled with pearls, bought at Tarun Tahiliani’s sea-facing store when it first opened in Mumbai. My mango-bordered piece tells a delightful story too. From Pydhonie to Jodhpur and Kolkata, I’ve managed to source gotas, metres of zardosi encrusted patches and mirror work trimmings, all coming together on a fuchsia base, emerald drops added on the edges, with a multicolour thread work choli by Pallavi Jaikishan. While the ivory chikan and silver sequinned Abu-Sandeep remains a prized heirloom. But here’s the ultimate challenge; not cataloguing or colour-coding them, not care and upkeep, but actually wearing them! Without tripping or ripping or unravelling them once I have finally gotten into one. Multiple sari pins, Lycra petticoats with slits, pre-stitched pallus and pleats may help ease the discomfort to some extent but I’m still lost at sea like a frozen mermaid; fitted to the gills and unable to do anything except stand about statuesquely. Does this execution snag dilute my enthusiasm in amassing the numbers and varieties required to qualify me as a Guinness Records contender? Not at all. I am happy to continue with my mission as gatherer, admiring my winners and hopefully passing on these unworn treasures to a deserving offspring some day.
- NISHA JHANGIANI

THE PLEATING OF AGE
There’s something sexy about a low-waisted lehnga with a shimmering choli – it’s the eternal ‘come hither’ which is playful, young, flirtatious and so very Navratri, when you’re totally on a high with all the eligible men checking you out. A sari in its very drape is elegant sophistication – it is too mature somehow – like you need to tread carefully before stepping into those pleats! I think that’s exactly why for the longest time, I stuck to lehngas that spun out into an umbrella-shaped twirl as I danced the nights away at various sangeets and dandiya-raases. They made me feel carefree with anticipation, like the stars of the night had many memorable tales left to be told as they winked against the delicate mirror-work embroidery on my outfit. I even got married in a lehnga; and it made me hold onto my youth, unconsciously and tenaciously. Three years after my wedding, I felt the desire to be, to look different – to be more woman, less girl. I tentatively plucked the folds of a beautiful vintage black-and-silver sari that my mother wore to my reception, and drew it to myself. I found a different person looking back at me in the mirror – someone who walked not floated, stood up straight with grace and dignity. From the moment I stepped into pleats it took me years to learn how to get it right (I still struggle occasionally), I began to walk in yards of fabric that I still often pull out with my bejewelled shoes at the very moment I am to enter an event, but I never looked back. I’ve steadily begun to turn a girl’s closet into a woman’s tresorie, replete with beautiful variations of the nine-yard magic drape that makes me more woman – every time I wear it.
- SITANSHI TALATI PARIKH

THE WHITE STUFF?
The most remarkable thing anyone can find to say about my style is that it is ‘typically Bombay’ – which I suppose means that I would wear the same thing to a champagne brunch that I would wear in a fast train. There are women who can handle both occasions in a sari. This is not my scene. I love all those things a sari is supposed to signify – femininity, elegance, cultural ties, family traditions. But I’d rather write a book about them than wear them.

To balance it out, there is one quasi-sari I love: the Kerala kasavu. My community’s traditional off-white cotton weave embellished only with simple borders of gold thread, is worn by Malayalis irrespective of religion and gender to all their lives’ big occasions. It’s mundus for the men, but the ladies wear the ‘set,’ which is the two-piece wrap/drape that the undiscerning eye mistakes for a sari. I usually take the myth of South Indian austerity with a pinch of salt, as anyone who knows about our movies, gold consumption, and Gulf remittances will do. But the kasavu is really about simplicity: a joyful, tranquil, universally flattering idea of luxury. It is timeless, but it’s also slightly Gandhian (the gold may be real, but hey – most of that set could be spun on a charkha). My family transplanted itself to Mumbai soil generations ago, but the kasavu is my glimpse of a different homeland, whose aesthetics I understand and whose language I speak. ?

For a woman of my age and station, the wearing of a sari generally correlates with weddings – either an appearance at someone else’s, or to enhance the prospects of your own. This is not my scene either. Hollywood says that the civilised woman begins to dream of her wedding at age 12 and micro-manages it all the way to the altar. I, on the other hand, am the girl who wrote the elopement guide for this magazine last year. I usually do jeans – but I think I’d catch both the train, and the post-marriage reconciliation family brunch, in a kasavu. ?
- SUPRIYA NAIR

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