An exhibition of crystal-enhanced wedding paraphernalia.
Take Vivienne Westwood (and J J Valaya), John Galliano (and Abu Jani), Zuhair Murad (and Farah Khan), Otazu (and Ravissant) and heaps of crossover brands like Frazer & Haws and Judith Leiber, sprinkle liberally with Swarovski, get in a galaxy of the glitterati and the paparazzi — and you might again have a design show like the Crystallized Swarovski Elements Wedding Initiative.
Jointly organised, or at least equally-paid-for by the crystal company’s Austrian head office and the Indian subsidiary, according to country head Sanjay Sharma, here was an attempt to provoke designers into using crystal, or more crystal, for the (according to a prominent wedding planner) Rs 1,25,000 crore Indian wedding industry.
And did it work! From snob brands like Ravissant, Ogaan and Ritu Kumar to staples like Satya Paul, Magppie and Jaquar, to, er, luxury-challenged names like CTC Malls, Deepam Silks and Venus Hotelware, they were all there wearing their robes of crystal and shine.
Rohit Bal and Ravi Bajaj created jewelled jackets for grooms, Catwalk and Joy lent sparkle to their stilettos; corsets and chairs, cocktail shakers and curios were on display not in some gauche mockery of the Indian wedding but in an international celebration of style. For sharing the same space with them were wedding gowns and dresses and kimonos and veils and hats and bags, little tent-cards identifying their stylists as Vera Wang and Armani, Zandra Rhodes and Julien MacDonald, Christofle and Azzaro.
The ¤2.56 billion Swarovski company came up with the idea of showcasing the best elements of wedding and trousseau-related designs from (and across) different cultures and geographies, to interact with local designers in a marriage of styles and enthuse them sufficiently to work with more crystal. Its use in dresses and gowns was customary — but bejewelled paintings and dolis and baggage, tableware and cutlery?
This response, says Sharma, has been heartwarming. Certainly, there was enough to keep visitors enthralled, from the maverick (a pair of chairs with glittering hearts by Manish Arora) to the mundane (knife handles by Magppie), from the sexy (Triumph lingerie) to the conservative (Kanhai religious paintings), from the celebratory (Sugar Craft cakes) to the banal (Rahul Electricals’ nail files). “You cannot measure the success of this exhibition in monetary terms,” insisted Sharma, though he had no doubt the wedding industry will see a surge in the market for crystals, not all of which is Swarovski.
Certainly, Sangeeta Assomul of the Marigold group, represented at the initiative with its Lieber minaudieres, said she did not anticipate a significant fallout before the month was out. “It will take time for people to react to what they have seen, and then contact or write to us,” she pointed out.
But if building sizzle in the wedding industry was one of its purposes, Swarovski India seems to have pulled it off with panache. Especially since, unveiled as a more permanent record of the exhibition, was a lavishly illustrated book, Unbridaled (¤44.95) where, amidst an international galaxy of designers, India has found a small but significant part.
