How a cross-continental flight and some careful seamstress work helped one bride combine two cultures on her wedding day.
sunshine filtered through the windows of my grandmother’s apartment, we ran our hands over the chiffons and silks. While we inspected and admired, my mother tried to recall the occasion each was last worn by her mother-in-law, who was sleeping—as she now does most of the time—in the next room. “This gray one,” she’d muse, “I think she wore that to your uncle’s wedding.
My parents come to India for a few months in December and June, staying at my grandmother’s home which is also my father’s childhood home. Every winter, my brothers and I join them for a week or so, lately with partners and children in tow. Examining these heirloom fabrics has become a yearly ritual for my mother and me, a moment alone spent marveling over the handiwork, and ensuring that each garment is stored with its matching accoutrements: a and petticoat.
This iteration of our annual inspection carried within it a specific purpose. In December 2018, I would be ceremoniously draped for my own Parsi wedding ceremony. I pawed through the fabrics, inhaling the earthy scent of mothballs and cedar. Ultimately, I chose a red, a heavily-embroidered silk sari most commonly worn by Parsi women. Festooned with birds and flowers sewn at least one century ago, the bold crimson material felt auspicious, heavy, decadent.
Coupled with my engagement ring, a cocktail ring from the 1950s belonging to my great-grandmother, I brought the legacy of these women into the newest phase of my life. On the last morning of 2018, the day after our Indian wedding, I hung up the redand set it aside to be cleaned. Helping me fold the fabric, my mother turned to me.
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