My Style: Re-wearing a short kameez with a lengha

Last month I blogged about two different ways to wear a short kameez featuring my sister and an outfit we reinvented by pairing her short kameez with a new lengha.

This month I finally got the chance to wear my new short kameez outfit re-invention.

The kameez itself was a short fitted top, quite plain aside from some detail around the neck in gold, pink and blue:

It came with plain churidar bottoms in the same shade of blue and the dupatta had a tie-dye effect.

Here's how it looked on a much slimmer version of me, way back in 2008!

I decided on a having a lengha made to go with this, and was initially inspired by the tie-dye theme of the dupatta and was thinking of having something a bit sheer with layers (a bit like my niece's lengha from Rajas and Ranis) or the below outfit from Sonas Couture:

Instead though, after talking it through with the team at Vaneeza's Boutique, we decided on having gold lengha made in jamawar fabric. I wasn't completely sure what to expect, but when my lengha arrived, this is how it looked with the kameez:

Here's a close up:

I liked the fabric choice and the fact it was a solid colour rather than layers and netting, but the fit didn't feel 100% right. Sure, I could wear it how it was and it would look fine...but to me, there was something missing.

Then I remembered something I had stashed away in the back of my wardrobe - an underskirt.

This underskirt was made to be worn with my wedding lengha to give it a bit more volume and it definitely made a difference to my wedding outfit. I just about managed to squeeze into the fitted part of the skirt, which goes down to my knees and then it starts to flare out like a ballerina's tutu. In the photo on the right I'd just taken it out of where it was being stored so it looks a bit flat, I made sure to leave it out before wearing it for an event.

So...this week it was my cousin's walima and a perfect opportunity to wear my reinvented short kameez and lengha!

Here's how it looked with the underskirt:

I liked that overall the full outfit wasn't really heavy, but the added volume still made a big impact at the walima and wasn't too high maintenance. I felt very "swooshy" in it, in a good way.

I did feel a bit restricted sitting in the car though! Here's a few more photos from at the venue including how it looks sitting down, and you can see the panels of the lengha a bit more:

Here's a "before" and "after" pic - what a difference!

What do you think? I'm so glad I had the underskirt to add some volume! Gold is such a classic colour, I could probably pair this lengha with a few other tops in my wardrobe.