Sabyasachi Mukherjee leafs through Anushka Sharma's wedding lookbook

When Anushka and I started talking about her wedding outfit, she was very clear that she wanted to become a Sabyasachi bride. Anushka follows us on Instagram, like many other Bollywood actresses. They like the fact that the look is very consistent, it's very identifiable and it's very traditional.

She wanted to float around in her lehnga

Anushka is a Pahari girl, and I think for her side of the family, culture, tradition are very, very important. She wanted to do the works... the jhumkas, the mathapatii, the nath, two dupattas... But she was getting married in Tuscany, so she wanted to be in sync with what the natural surroundings of Tuscany would be. In Tuscany, you would be conspicuous if you were wearing a red lehnga, especially when there is no sun. I knew the wedding would be in winter and there would be little sunlight, so it would be best to keep the colours pale.

Anushka is a very understated girl. She didn't want the lehnga to be heavy. She said she wanted to enjoy her own wedding, so she wanted to be able to float around in the lehnga. She wanted the lehnga to be understated, without too much of bling. She is unlike many of her Bollywood counterparts. Anushka truly believes less is more.

I followed her brief and we made two swatches for her, out of which she chose one, and we all unanimously decided on that. Allia Al Rufai was styling her look. So Allia, Anushka and me all decided that we would go for a pale pink. And there would be European flowers on it... so there were little birds, little old French and Italian riviera florals.

The overall look was supposed to be very quiet and subdued. We teamed it with Sabyasachi jewellery. The jewellery was made in uncut diamonds and it was strung together with tourmaline beads, and with pale pink spinel. So the whole look was tone-on-tone... We took a month-and-a-half to put the whole Anushka wedding wardrobe together.

SHE WANTED TO WEAR SINDOOR FOR HER DELHI RECEPTION

For her Delhi reception, Anushka wanted to wear a sari and she wanted to wear sindoor. So I generally suggested to her if she would want to wear a red Benarasi. For me it was a wish fulfilment, because I have seen every Bengali bride getting married in a red Benarasi. Also, a lot of north Indian girls, especially from Uttar Pradesh, they wear a lot of Benarasi saris. What I liked about her was, it was not an inaccessible piece... a lot of middle-class and upper middle-class girls can also wear a Benarasi sari.

What excited me about this is this is how clothing should be. A lot of people want to go for things which are exclusive, but Anushka was very inclusive. She wanted to wear something that was part of her tradition and I did not give her something that was very designer. I gave her something very traditional and something that a lot of girls can go into the sari shops and buy for themselves.

You know Anushka is not an art-house actress, she's not Vidya Balan... she's more of a mainstream girl. And when a mainstream girl has the guts to wear mainstream clothes for her own reception, when she has all the money and the power to ask for anything she wanted that's what I love. Today if Anushka Sharma wanted to get married in any couture outfit, any designer in this country would open their back offices to make sure she would get what she wanted.

I liked the fact that she had a lot of clarity. She wanted to wear sindoor, which was the point from where the whole look started. And then we decided she would wear mogras in her hair, she would wear a red bindi. She wanted to wear jootis, she wanted to wear bangles on her hand.

Her look was sorted in exactly five minutes. It is not something unusual, it is something you have seen over and over again and that is what is magical for me. That you have the option of choosing so many things, yet you choose something that is closest to your home.

I got a lot of flak for Anushka's Delhi reception outfit because a lot of people said Iss mein designer kya hai?' But the comments made me smile because that is exactly what we wanted to do, we wanted her to be accessible, we did not want her to sit in an ivory tower.

Of Anushka's wedding looks, the one closest to Sabya's heart is...

The wedding ceremony, because everything was perfect. It made for beautiful pictures. But from a socio-political point of view, it was the red Benarasi sari

SHE WANTED TO WEAR VERY BRIGHT PINK FOR HER MEHNDI

For the Mehndi, she had seen something from our campaign Big Love, where we had done striped blouses with floral lehngas. Here we did a floral blouse with a striped lehnga, we reversed the look for her. She wanted to wear something that was very simple and sporty and young. Her only demand was that she wanted to wear a very bright pink, so we did a pink-and-orange lehnga for her.

SHE WANTED ELEGANT AND QUIET FOR HER BOMBAY RECEPTION

For her Bombay reception, she wanted to be glamorous, but again Anushka being Anushka, she wanted it understated. She wanted it elegant and quiet. So there was a lot of bling in it, but because the colour was almost like a mouse brown, almost like a vintage grey, it looked muted. And she wore solitaires with a diamond necklace; she didn't go all out and wear too much jewellery. She had open hair and she looked young and fresh. And I liked the fact that she held her own while many guests at her reception went over the top. I think when you decide to be yourself for your own wedding, that's a sign of modernity and class.

It's too soon to feel the effect of the Anushka wedding on my business, it'll take six-seven months to feel the effect. You see, why Anushka's bridal look became very big was because it was a perfect combination of cricket, Bollywood and a very established bridal brand. I don't know if Anushka's wedding will really impact us, because I don't want to be boastful about it, but we are the number one wedding brand of the country. The brand has an iconic following. Probably it just makes existing customers happier to see what we have done with Anushka's looks

Sabya on the Anushka impact on Brand Sabya

Anushka wedding picture: Joseph Radhik
Pictures courtesy @sabyasachiofficial