Sunday 30 August 2015

COPYCAT DESIGNS & DRESSES #13: The Green Anarkali Dress by Sonas Couture

I thought I'd post about this dress, which I ordered a long time ago (about 7 or 8 years now!), that I ordered through a friend from her contact in India.

Green and gold are my favourite colour combinations when it comes to Asian clothes, although weirdly enough I don't have many clothes in these colours (my wardrobe just feels like its full of blue dresses right now!)

I originally ordered this dress a few years ago, and found that it was too heavy to wear to my friends' weddings, which is when I wanted to wear it - back then I wore a lot less heavier outfits that I do now and it just felt too dressy for a guest to wear! I then decided to save it for my engagement, should I have one, although in the end I didn't have an official engagement so I never wore it, To be honest, even if I had an engagement, I would probably have gone with something else, perhaps because I felt like I outgrew the style of this outfit.

My opinions of this dress also varied over the year - when I first ordered it I was astounded at how long it was and didn't like it, and packed it away. A few years later I pulled it out (when the fashion of hemlines were long!) and wished it was long - it was too short for me! Eventually I didn't wear it at all and actually ended up selling it online, I didn't think it suited me and thought there was no point in it taking up wardrobe space.

For anyone who wants to know about this outfit and where I ordered it from, I don't have specific details as a friend of mine ordered it from India. I do know that the tailors are called Hafeez and that they were based around Delhi area.

So this is the original design that I sent to India, which I think is from Sonas Couture but I'm not 100% sure, although I do remember this being a popular design which was copied by a lot of online sellers.


Below is the dress that I got, which was actually a pretty decent copy, although one of the reasons I got it so cheap was the work was a lot more cheaper, being mostly french knot threadwork, beading and sequins. The colours were pretty spot on though and the shape of the dress was good, although the bust area wasn't perfect but it looked better on.


Here's a few close ups of the dress - it was pretty full of work and really heavy because there were motifs and a heavy hemline on the front and back. It was also pretty tightly knit, in all the years I had the dress the work didn't really get messed up, surprisingly enough. It also helped that the dress itself was made from georgette rather than the usual chiffon material sellers often use, which meant the fabric was a little sturdy.




I haven't got a picture of myself wearing this outfit because I only tried it on a couple of times, and while it didn't look quite as good as it did on the model in the picture above, it was really flattering. It was pretty slimming on as well, although I do remember wishing I could get it made longer!

THE GOOD: The price - at the time of buying this outfit, I bought another 4 and paid £250 for all of them, so this worked out about £60-70 because it was the heaviest outfit. I may have gotten a discount because there were so many outfits, but there would be no way I'd ever get a dress like this for this price!

THE BAD: The bust, I really wasn't a fan of it. I didn't get a lot of choice at the time of ordering in terms of making alterations, and because it was done through a friend who had to shout down details over the phone to India, I didn't want to confuse or complicate things so I didn't make any changes at all. I don't really tend to go for outfits which emphasise the bust area too much, it did fit pretty well and I always like to make sure something is tailored to my body properly, but I didn't think this was a an amazing shape on me because I'm more straight than curvy in terms of body shapes!

THE UGLY: Squeezing into the outfit a few years after I bought it, and realising I wasn't a size 6 anymore!

OVERALL: I got a pretty decent deal with this outfit, and although I didn't end up wearing it, it was pretty beautiful to me when I got it. I loved (and still love) this colour combination and would still wear them as a formal even now. I remember looking into getting a jamwar or brocade fabric skirt or sharara made for this outfit, so that I would give a really flowy look to the outfit but in the end I didn't because I decided not to keep the outfit.

It's nice to look back at outfits I've had in my wardrobe and see how far fashion has come, and also the idea of ordering from India and Pakistan. Nowadays I do a lot more online shopping and I have more of an experienced eye when looking in the shops and online, although I don't think I did too badly with this one!

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