Nine mistakes I watch brides make in Delhi

I've watched the same nine mistakes play out across a lot of weddings. None of them are about taste. They're all about sequence, pressure and information.

1. Buying the bridal lehenga first

It feels like the natural starting point and it's usually the wrong one. Buy it first and every other decision — the family's palette, the jewellery, the budget left for eleven other outfits — has to bend around it. Decide the budget envelopes and the function list first; buy the showpiece third or fourth.

2. Shopping without the function list written down

Almost every bride under-counts her functions. Roka, mehendi, haldi, sangeet, the wedding, the reception, a pooja, a lunch for out-of-town family. Write them all down with dates and times of day before you buy anything, because a sangeet at 9pm and a haldi at 11am need completely different fabrics.

3. Leaving the groom's side until the end

A made-to-measure sherwani takes as long as your lehenga. Started six weeks later, it finishes six weeks later — except the wedding date hasn't moved.

4. Judging colour under shop lighting

Every shop in Delhi is lit to make fabric look richer than it is. Carry everything to the door. The number of brides who discover their "ivory" is actually pink in daylight is genuinely sad.

5. Buying trims before fabric

Gold is not one colour. Neither is red. Matching from a photograph on your phone does not work — carry physical cuttings of everything you already own, always.

6. Paying the full amount upfront

Once a workshop has all the money, you are last in a long queue. Pay a fair advance, hold a meaningful balance until delivery, and say so pleasantly at the start rather than arguing about it later.

7. Trusting a verbal delivery date

"Ten days, madam" is a sentiment, not a commitment. Get it on the receipt with a name. The act of writing it down changes the date you're given — usually to a more honest one.

8. Shopping on a closing day

Much of Old Delhi's wholesale trade shuts on Sunday; Lajpat Nagar closes Monday; other markets have their own day. On a ten-day trip, one wasted day is ten per cent of your shopping.

9. Buying anything stitched in the last three days

The single most expensive mistake on this list. Anything bought at the end of a trip cannot be fitted, cannot be corrected, and becomes a courier problem across a border. Shop the big stitched pieces in the first half, always.

The thread running through all nine

None of these are caused by bad taste or bad shops. They're caused by doing things in the wrong order under time pressure. Fix the order and most of the risk disappears.