Saturday Night, Sabyasachi Hosted an Opulent, Color-Filled Diwali Party

Upon entering Sabyasachi Mukherjee s opulent West Village store on Saturday night, which he opened to much fanfare a year ago, guests were greeted with fragrant garlands of fresh Indian jasmine and Dom Pérignon champagne.

The immersive labyrinthine space was a fitting backdrop for the designer s celebration this year of Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights. Between tall, stained oak archways, banquet tables were piled high with florals, porcelain, and bronze animal figurines. Male servers in bold black eyeliner and hot pink headwraps passed trays of delicious samosas and cheese puffs.

A dress code befitting of the evening also came into fruition: "Frida Kahlo meets the Prince of Calcutta" was the theme, as guests reveled under the chandeliers in their fine jewelry, pashmina shawls, and embroidered saris. Among the designer s illustrious friends who tuned out were Martha Stewart, Sarita Choudhury, Eugenie Niarchos, Fernando Jorge, Megha Kapoor, Jamie Creel, Marco Scarani, Carlos Mota, and Pamela Golbin.

"Frida has been one of my life s biggest inspirations," Mukherjee told Vogue. "A lot of what I do keeps coming back in many different multicultural ways, so we re celebrating her and we re celebrating Diwali." Indeed, his store was transformed into "Frida Kahlo’s Garden" complete with a beguiling array of decadent desserts, chocolate, and caviar.

The Diwali party capped off a weekend of other Diwali galas in the city, as the festival is a five-day-long symbolic celebration of the spiritual victory of light over darkness, good over evil, and knowledge over ignorance. Around the world, people gather with loved ones, light candles called diyas, go dancing, and set off fireworks.

Other guests at the Sabyasachi affair included Roopal Patel, Priya Chatterjee, Chiara Ferragamo, Delfina Forstmann, Nick Forstmann, Andrea Franchini, Malina Joseph Gilchrist, Maryanne Grisz, Anjali Kumar, Ucha Meirelles, Nolan Meader, Alvise Orsini, Aziz Osko, Tina Radziwill, Ayesha Shand, and Prince Dimitri of Yugoslavia.