How a designer brings the bridal vision to life

Since 1984, Chandan Fashions has been sitting at the heart of Gerrard Street, Toronto, Ont., and selling South Asian bridal wear, such as Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, to its customers.

What was once started by husband and wife is now a family business passed onto the son, Chandan Singh, who is also the lead designer at Chandan Fashion.

“It’s my job to present all the options available to them [the brides]. It’s my job to go back to India every month and coordinate and shop and find what options are available, what’s the latest thing, let me bring back something new,” Singh said. “I want the bride to dictate what she wants because it’s her day not mine.”

Singh (left) doing a bridal consultation. “We have dresses and we do custom. We’re going to custom make her something. We’re doing one bottom, one blouse, a different colour, a different fabric. We’re going to create something from scratch for her. Depending on what it is, a lighter outfit will take three months and a heavier outfit will take six,” Singh said. The bride (right) is aiming for a floral theme for her upcoming summer wedding in 2018. “They want to do blush pink, they might even think about ivory,” Singh explained.

Red is a common colour for an Indian bride. Singh says 80 percent of his clientele go for red because it is a colour dated to tradition centuries ago. The most common explanation is that planet in charge of marriages is Mars, which is red in colour. Also, it’s known as the colour of love. There’s also the relation the colour holds to the rising sun in Indian context. The most common style for a bridal attire is a lehenga, which is a skirt and blouse (similar to a crop-top). Materials used to make bridal wear are silks, pure silks, raw silks, velvets, chiffons, etc.

Traditionally, every Indian outfit will have some sort of embroidery on it, unlike a Western outfit where it’s just fabric and stitching. “Conversely, in Indian outfits, you’re finding embroidery in every single outfit. There’s almost nothing in the store that doesn’t have embroidery on it,” Singh said. Embroidery can range from thread work, Swarovski crystals, plastic beads, pearls and micro-pearls, zardozi (left), “which is metal spring that they make into a pattern.”

When speaking about embroidery work, Singh said, “There’s no right or wrong way to do it. It just depends on what the bride wants. Nowadays, the current trend created by India’s biggest designer, Sabyasachi, is sequence. So, a lot of our new outfits have sequence on it.

Another traditional attire is the saree (right), which is draped around the waist with one drape over the shoulder and a bares a midriff, although there are many more. However, “In the past 5 years, we find that they’ve really declined in popularity. A lot of people like the flow-lines and the maneuverability of a lehenga,” Singh said.

Chandan Fashion’s bridal outfits start from $500 and go up to $1000, depending on how light or heavy the outfit is. A lighter one will go up till $2500, and take up three months (if it’s custom made) and a heavier one will go up to $8000 and take six months to make. Pictured on the left is a type of bridal outfit which is more like a gown.

“Depends on what your budget is, we really try to cater and have something for everybody," Singh.