About Pardesifashions.com

Pardesifashions.com is based on the experience of the owner of this website.

Starting out as a little girl growing up in Berkeley California, she always was proud of her Indian heritage. Her parents made it a point never to let their second generation Indian-American children forget about their roots in Kerala province in India. They’ve always had a distinct connection with their motherland thanks to the frequent visits of their grandmother from India.

An Indian graduate student

After grandma passed away, the founder of this website spent several years in India as a graduate student.

She saw firsthand the tremendous amount of cultural diversity the Indian subcontinent actually possesses. It really blew her mind because in the eyes of many Westerners and outsiders, India is a monolithic culture.

“mini countries”

Little do people know that this part of the world is actually of subcontinent, and just like any other continent, it’s composed of many different “mini countries”.

Little do people know that this part of the world is actually of subcontinent, and just like any other continent, it’s composed of many different “mini countries”. Inside each of these mini countries are not just geographic delineations, bureaucratic departments, or efficient government operations. Instead, these geographic divisions actually accompany matching cultural differences.

Sound and look very different

For example, if you were traveling through northern India, the people there sound and look very different from people from the very tip of southern India.

Not only is this difference manifest in the way people look physically, as well as how they dress, but it also impacts their language, dialect, and most importantly, their food choices. Make no mistake about it; southern Indian cuisine has its own distinct personality compared with other parts of India. Northern India, by and large, has always been the western face of Indian cuisine, fashion and culture. This is why when people visit India for the first time, they’re really blown away by the internal diversity of the subcontinent.

Falling in love with Sari

Firsthand experience

They experienced this firsthand when they sit down to eat. Eating some curry from the south is going to be a very different experience on many different levels from eating the same dish from a northern location. That’s just how diverse India is, and the author of this website saw this all firsthand

Loving India

She fell in love with the sari because the sari embodies everything that is different, unique, yet at the same time, the same about India. In other words, people from northern India love the sari as much as people from southern India.

Celebration of sari

While they have different design preferences manifested in a wide range of colors, cuts, designs and other external expressions, the same core internal love for everything about the sari informs these individuals. This is why this website really is a celebration of the sari, both as an idea and cultural concept, as well as a connection to something greater and bigger.

More than the culture

It’s a framework

The sari is not just a dress worn by women of a certain culture tracing from a certain time in history. It is more than that. It is a framework. As such, the different changes and concerns people may have from different places, different backgrounds, and different historical epochs can be read into this communal cultural product to produce an amazing range of looks and experiences.