Designer Vidhi Singhania champions the idea of brides wearing heirloom garments—saris, dupattas, shawls—on their wedding day to feel rooted in family history. She explains that these pieces carry memories, not just fabric, and must be handled with care, preserving emotional details while subtly modernising them so each bride can make them her own without erasing their legacy.
The most special piece of garment a bride can wear on her wedding day isn’t hers at all. It’s something that has had a long history before she wears it—a dupatta her grandmother wore on her wedding day, a sari her mother bought after her firstborn’s birth, a shawl that belonged to her great-grandmother! Wearing an heirloom piece on your wedding day feels warm, nostalgic and meaningful. It’s like walking down the aisle with your loved ones by your side. Designer Vidhi Singhania echoes this sentiment. She feels that embracing heirloom pieces is a great way to experience a deep sense of belonging to the ones who came before us. In conversation with Manifest, Vidhi talks about the significance of wearing family keepsakes as a bride, her experience of working with brides who chose to wear them, and how these pieces can be modernised to suit the times.
Manifest (M): In your experience of working with brides, are you seeing more women wanting to incorporate heirloom saris into their wedding wardrobes?
Vidhi Singhania (VS): Very much so. I think there is a growing desire amongst brides today to have something in their wedding wardrobe that feels deeply personal. It may be their mother’s sari, their grandmother’s odhni, or even just a border or a piece of embroidery that has been preserved. There was perhaps a time when everything for a wedding had to be new. Today, I find young women are much more interested in knowing where something came from and the story behind it. They want to carry a little bit of their family with them, and I think that is very beautiful.
M: What does it mean to transform something that may have been worn by a mother or grandmother at their wedding?
VS: For me, the most important thing is that you are not simply transforming a garment. You are handling somebody’s memory. A sari that a mother or grandmother wore at her wedding has lived a life before it comes to you. So when we work with something like that, the idea is never to erase what it was. It is to find a way for the next generation to make it their own while allowing the original story to remain visible. There is something very special about a bride walking into a new chapter of her life carrying a little piece of the women who came before her.
M: Is there a particular heirloom project with a bride that has stayed with you? Why?
VS: There have been many, and interestingly, what stays with me is rarely the most elaborate piece. It is usually the emotion attached to it. Sometimes a bride will bring in a saree that may be old, fragile or even slightly damaged, but the moment she tells you, “This was my grandmother’s,” its value completely changes. You begin looking at it differently. Those are the pieces I remember—because the challenge is not simply to make them beautiful again. It is to make sure that when she wears it, she can still recognise the sari and the person she remembers in it.
M: What do you look for when a bride brings you an old sari and asks you to work with it?
VS: I first look at what should not be changed. That is actually more important to me than deciding immediately what we can make from it. I look at the weave, the zari, the borders, the pallu, the motifs and, of course, the condition of the textile. But I also ask her what she remembers about the sari and what part of it she is emotionally attached to. Once you understand that, you know what must remain untouched. Then you can begin thinking about how to give it another life.
M: What are some of the ways brides can modernise an existing heirloom while still retaining its original character?
VS: It doesn’t always require a dramatic transformation. Sometimes the simplest interventions work best. An old sari can be worn exactly as it is but styled with a contemporary blouse. A beautiful border or pallu can become part of an odhni, lehenga or jacket. Two textiles from different generations can even be brought together thoughtfully. And sometimes all an old sari needs is careful restoration and a fresh way of draping it. The important thing is not to modernise it so much that you lose the very reason you wanted to preserve it.
M: What do you think we gain when we choose to wear something with a history rather than something made specifically for us?
VS: A sense of belonging. Something new can be extraordinarily beautiful, but an heirloom gives you something beauty alone cannot—a connection. When you wear your mother’s or grandmother’s sari, you are wearing something she chose, touched, celebrated in and perhaps treasured for decades. And then you add your own memories to it. That, to me, is what makes Indian textiles so extraordinary. They don’t necessarily belong to one moment or one person. If we care for them, they can travel through generations, gathering stories as they go.