Styling Young Love in 'Saiyaara': An Ode to Middle-Class Dressing With Krish and Vaani

To every generation its own love story, and to every generational love story, its own aspirational style. If Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (1998) was about “C-O-O-L” necklaces and DKNY athleisure, if Dil Chahta Hai (2001) and Hum Tum (2004) ushered in a new kind of haircut into the zeitgeist, if Bunty Aur Babli (2005) popularised the signature short kurti and patiala salwar look, if Yeh Jawani Hai  Deewani (2013) made famous the cobalt blue sari with ruffled, gold trimming, then Saiyaara works on a more subtle, grounded, but equally persuasive pitch.

Styled by Sheetal Iqbal Sharma—also the man behind the costumes of Gangubai Kathiawadi, Animal, Pushpa 2, and Chhaava—Saiyaara follows Krish (Ahaan Panday) and Vaani (Aneet Padda), early twenty-somethings who fall heart-first in deep love. 

Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter India, Sharma clarifies the vision behind the styling, noting, “In the past few years, so many debutantes have been launched, and the films might have done well, but the styling was over-the-top, brand-first, with clothes shipped from London or Dubai. Nothing was relatable. What we have noticed is that people want to see themselves in the films they see, either because they have worn something they have seen on screen, or because their boyfriend or girlfriend dresses like that. That was the main motto.” 

For this, Sharma and his team scouted colleges in Mumbai, like KC—from which Sharma graduated—and HR to see what young girls are wearing. He noticed a sharp shift from his college-going years, where girls dressed “like Preity Zinta in Lakshya (2004). That bohemian look was in.” What he noticed now, instead, were cargo pants worn with a kurti, knee length denims with a sleeveless Indian top. “A lot of mix and match was happening. Gen Z is looking for comfortable clothing. I could never imagine going to class in track pants the way kids these days do.”

There was no pressure of styling a “Yash Raj Film”—shorthand for a certain kind of slick, unattainable urban aesthetic gold standard from the studio era. In fact, director Mohit Suri insisted on a look that was casual. “In my first round of styling Vaani, I brought in tank tops, spaghetti tops, and shrugs, like an upper middle-class Khar-Bandra girl, but Mohit was not able to relate to the character in these clothes. We even tried adding colour to the hair. We did about 20 to 25 rounds of trial for both characters,” Sharma notes. They went with Padda’s natural curls, calling in celebrity hair stylist Hakim Aalin to hone that look, of hair gently falling over the ears, and celebrity makeup artist Mickey Contractor, to complete the clean look with eye-liner. 

Sharma and Suri opted for “negligible” styling, “simple, real, but fresh”, not burdened by the desire to be aspirational. That it was a Yash Raj Film, a Mohit Suri musical, was enough aspiration already. The clothes had to fold into, not build on that aspiration. 

With this as the template, Sharma styled Vaani’s graph that aligns closely with her narrative arc. When we first meet her, she is dumped on the day of her marriage. “Since she is getting married to a South Indian Iyer, she has come dressed like a South Indian bride, sort of. It shows the mentality of a girl who changes herself for a man. Notice that her parents come in the traditional Punjabi salvar kameez,” Sharma notes. 

Dressed like someone “who will never stand out in a crowd, unlike Krish”, she is wearing her jeans, kurti and rugged, boyfriend denims in the beginning. When she gets comfortable with Krish, when she gets comfortable in her job, the sleeveless tops come out. “As the ‘musician girlfriend’ —a type—she now has the confidence to wear tunic dresses, shorts, etc.”

Even as she was opening up, Sharma was careful about the limits of this transformational arc. Can she turn into a glamorous siren? In the song ‘Tum Ho Toh', when running into an empty beach in Alibaug, she undresses to jump into the sea. “What she is wearing is not a bikini but just an undergarment. It should not look planned, but feel like lovers experiencing a moment spontaneously. When such people strip down in the moment, andar bikini thodi hoga (there won't be a bikini)?” Sharma notes. 

What also trails her throughout is her backpack—even on her wedding day—which has her diary where she furiously transcribes the world. “We avoided that tumbler of water, because that might have become gimmicky.”

The Sonata wrist watch and dainty jewellery was part of Sharma’s own storytelling—the backstories he creates for characters, which does not necessarily show up on screen. “If you see her mother, she is the kind who would have said “Gale mein kuch pehen le, kaan mein kuch pehen le.” (Wear something on your neck, your ears) It might be her mother’s watch? There is a middle-class-ness to these details, where her mother would have walked into a Shoppers Stop selling ‘16-18 karat jewelry’ for 2-3k or Westside. That is also where we shopped for Vaani’s character. Even the denim we bought from Westside, not even Levis.”

The look was completed with her “PT white shoes. Those are not distracting—subtle and correct, her comfort place, but there is always something missing in it.”

With Krish, Sharma and Suri were trying to bring out the rugged look of a boy burdened by the death of his mother and his father’s alcoholism out of Ahaan, who “has this Bandra-vibe, very charming, a sweet boyface with droopy eyes.” They decided to stay away from certain stereotypes like the leather jacket, while leaning into others, like the tattoos. “We initially wanted the whole hand to be tattooed, but then it would not be relatable, and very Goa-wannabe.” Small etchings like the teddy with a crossed eye, or a strip chevron on his arms sufficed. Nothing on his chest, his neck. 

His wrists are full of braided leather bracelets and charms. Sharma’s storytelling fills the blanks. “He might have gone to Anjuna beach in Goa and bought these things because all his friends did that, and it was considered cool. As he matures these become lesser. Ditto with the rings on his fingers.”

If Vaani’s wardrobe told a story that arced towards comfort, Krish’s was towards lightness. “From deep, harsh colours like brown and black, he moves to whites and off-whites, and linen shirts as he falls in love.” When he becomes a popular star, Sharma styled him taking notes from K Pop stars—another cultural pole star for Gen Z— with cropped jackets and cargoes, but all monotones.

And finally, in the end, when these two arcs meet to get married, it is not a marriage of colour and Punjabi excess but pared-down pastels. “What we wanted to show in that moment was the subtlety and small joys of a man supporting his lover. This was not going to be that loud, Punjabi post-credits wedding song,” Sharma notes.

What should stain memory is not what they are wearing necessarily, but the fact that Krish helped drape Vaani’s sari. An aesthetic so nimble that it congeals onto scenes, without drawing too much attention to it, to float with a fragile grace between beauty that demands your attention and beauty that helps lubricate it through the film’s pungent motions.