The poppy organza gown

This one is not a costume. It is Ramya Krishnan posing for a camera in front of a mottled grey painted backdrop, turning and swishing the skirt. The footage went round in September 2026. Nobody has reported what the shoot or the occasion was, so we are not going to name one.

What we can name is the gown, because the label is confirmed. It is Rahul Mishra's yellow silk organza and tulle gown, hand-embroidered all over. Pernia's Pop Up Shop lists it at ₹2,99,300. When this page was built the listing showed it as sold out, with a "Show Interest" button and an eight-to-nine-week made-to-order lead time, so treat that price as a guide and ask the store. Rahul Mishra's own online store does not carry this piece, so Pernia's listing is the one we price against.

It is worth saying how we know, because floral gowns are everywhere. Line the retailer's front shot up against our frames and the flowers sit in the same places. There is a dusty-pink poppy high on the right of the bodice, with its green stem running down to a closed bud. Small blue and pink forget-me-nots are scattered along the sheer neckline. An orange poppy sits at the right hip, with a red one lower down on the left. It is the same gown, flower for flower.

On her it reads like this: a pale butter-lemon column that flares into a full, swinging skirt. The whole base is covered in clear sequins that flash as she moves. The yoke is sheer, cut high and round at the neck, with the armholes cut in, over an opaque lemon slip. The poppies are raised, built from layered sequins and threadwork rather than printed, in red, tangerine, dusty pink and a bright fuchsia, with fern-green stems and seed-pods between them. Her hair is pulled back into a high, full ponytail, with small white floral studs at the ears.

Two things we are leaving off. The studs are too small in every frame to shop from, and her feet are never in shot.

Below is the real gown at its listed price, and under it the one piece we picked ourselves. We searched hard for sparse red poppies on a pale lemon ground and the high street does not make it. Our pick gets the colour of the base and the big-bloom, long-stem feeling right. Its honest gaps are written on its card.