The sari experience, part three: tailoring and the one minute sari

This is part three of a series of blog entries titled The Sari Experience. My good friend, Sabrina is having an Indian wedding ceremony and I get to wear a sari to the event. I’ll be writing a series of blog entries about my sari experiences; shopping for it, the fitting and finally the wedding. I hope you enjoy reading these entries and come away with a few pointers should you have to get your own sari.

** Related blog entries:

Tailoring and the one minute sari

GTA Mall is a one stop shopping centre for all things sari. I was lucky enough to purchase all the components for my sari within 45 minutes of walking into the first two stores: petticoat, material for the choli and jewellery. To complete the outfit I had to visit a tailor who could create the choli and sew a one minute sari.

What is a one minute sari? The sari fabric is sewn together with several hook–and-eye closures, is pre-pleated making it one size fits all and lessens the stress of having to pleat all five meters of the fabric by yourself. As a result, you have a ready-to-wear garment where you literally wrap the sari material around your waist, throw the fabric over your shoulder and voila, you’re ready to go.

There are several tailors in the mall so Sabrina and I randomly picked one on the second floor, Crown Tailoring. My seamstress was Chitra who has over 20 years of experience creating saris. It typically takes her 1.5 hours to create a sari and choli, however it would be two weeks before I could pick mine up as it was wedding season and she had a lot of customers waiting for theirs to be made.

Chitra demonstrates how to put on a one minute sari

After two weeks I came back to pick up my choli and sari. Chirta had everything ready and I fit both pieces. I’m definitely a novice when it comes to Indian dress as I put the choli on backwards giving Chitra and I a very good laugh. The bill came up to $48 for both the choli and the one minute sari.

Sari tailoring tips:

  • Make sure to give yourself plenty of time to get the choli and sari made, because wedding season is very busy and it could take a while to have yours completed
  • The choli is very fitted so don’t wear a heavily padded bra or plan to wear one
  • Make sure all sections of the choli fits well, especially around the arms, bust and torso

Crown Tailoring, GTA Square Mall, 5215 Finch Ave East, Suite 215, Toronto, Ontario M1C 02C

(416) 609-2532