Tag: indiantextile

06
Apr

आठवण | Retrouvaille

Posted by / Handloom, Sustainable Fashion

A window to Indian sensibilities around sustainable practices, Vaishali S’s new flagship store interiors are an intracultural homecoming that brings a raw essence to the room.

Within the doors and windows of the reminiscent interiors are held narrative allegories of rebirth. Vaishali S built this store much like her eponymous label, with scrupulous detailing and a personal touch to each sculptural silhouette.

Doors from the abandoned dumping grounds of Saki Naka and Jogeshwari picked to give these pieces of wood meaning again, transform the unpurposed slabs into a layered family of benches, doors and window frames is a responsible effort that draws tenacity to the store.

To glimpse through the kaleidoscope of these stories would be akin to an autobiography of the store doors:

‘I remember everything. Every single family that has made its humble abode within my confines, and the tear as I was pulled away from my ancestral home. The bumps of the truck dislodged me, and there I was, stripped of all meaning, lying at the bottom of a dumping ground.

I didn’t feel sorry for myself, I only felt the loss of a home. This raw emotion settled into my surface for decades like water seeping into crude wood.

Then, I was picked up and brought back to life. As I survey the grandiose of the Kalaghoda precinct, I feel like a humble passenger in the train of life, sitting next to a colonial Englishman smoking a pipe, but I remember everything.

I remember with fondness the families that closed me into their hearts while building a home for themselves. I hope that when you come to visit, you will sense nostalgia in this simple villager in your midst.’

The ancient craft of handloom weaves everything together here, brings back fusion in texture, an orchestra of form. Shaded in copper-bronze, rock, mud, and wood, the color palette of these interiors is an uninterrupted flow of hue, that has come together guided by coincidental intuition.

This dedication to earthen furniture paints a village scene enhanced by mogra garlands that line crude edge surfaces, draped over the ethereal forms of homegrown fabrics. Each piece has a beautiful choreography that naturally coincides with the ensembles and the art. From the chair that has a grandmother’s lap thread loop around its wooden base to the simple handloom threads crisscrossing across space, the atmosphere created is one of nostalgia, but also of rememorizing a childhood home.

Inside the doors of Vaishali S flagship store, this artistic resonance is absorbed into hand-polished cow dung and mud walls. This perspective of keeping the interiors cool is an age-old technique taking root in the concrete city. A wall with repurposed wood turned into lamps kept integral to the unpolished façade; frames the soul of Vaishali S within its intrinsic storytelling.

The depth to each upcycled piece is a beeline to the zero-waste concept that the label has been inculcating into ensembles since it’s conception. The unspooling thread of Vaishali S store interiors is a journey to the ancestral secrets of sustainability, written with simple words, narrated aesthetically.

24
Feb

Kalanamak: An ode to lost yields

Posted by / Handloom

A plowed field lit up the runway in white lines, looking as much like a neon zebra crossing as a raw plantation of rice. This 21st-century requiem to an ancient crop was a unique touch to Anurag Gupta’s ‘Kalanamak’ collection at Lakme Fashion Week Spring-Resort 2020.

Kalanamak is one of the finest rice in India, grown at the foothills of the Terai belt in Siddarth Nagar for centuries. It is fabled that when Buddha was passing through the Bajha jungle, he was stopped at the Matha village by the people to whom he gave the rice he was carrying as ‘Prasad’. This tale is so integrated into the culture that Anurag Gupta, as a child thought it was a common children’s story. It was only later that he discovered the stories he grew up listening to are losing their polish, much like the raw black husk of the rice is dying into ignorance.

It was a personal journey to then inculcate elements of this profound history of farmers and of his community into the Khadi collection. Motifs of rice sheafs adorned white floating garments, a lightweight soliloquy to the ironic endeavor laden with struggle.

Returning to our roots with an emphasis on Khadi, contemporary silhouettes lined the show, going street with crisp lines, balancing chic with a sartorial approach. Transported to European ease with the effortless, intriguing frames, the garments created a sophisticated niche with stalks of rice and local embroidery edging the flow of asymmetrical hemlines.

The revival of ‘Kalanamak’ in the unpolished threads of Khadi stands in solidarity with the depth of thought that has gone into each design, from the hues of a clear blue sky and minimal lines of a khet on a basic, breezy canvas.

Anurag Gupta as a label brings the artistic expression of today to the tales of the past, cultivating a profound appreciation for the black pearl of Uttar Pradesh.

15
Jan

A wrinkle in time: Ambi by Sujata Pai

Posted by / Uncategorized

Ambi by Sujata Pai has a distinct quality of making unique and cherished sarees from the rich heirloom of India. Her vision to showcase Indian textiles with a different eye is threaded through a needle passing through the time it has taken to inculcate this skill into a community of weaver families.

The simplicity of this concept is that it’s homegrown, tracing our roots back to ancient folklore and fables. These are etched into the motifs that are typically used in Ambi sarees- mango motifs, to follow the name, peacock feathers on a breezy pallu, elegant paisley pattern, lotus, and animal motifs. Her home base being Chennai, she herself is a voyager, setting up her printing in Delhi, and empowering weavers from all across the country with specialized local skills that make them unanimous experts in the craft of a particular weave.

The ancient weaves that have traveled from as far as the Byzantine empire are seen in Ambi’s one of a kind piece, embroidered with zari from Kutch mud plains of Gujarat. Ambi brings together fabrics and weaves of fine artistry and craftsmanship with a beautiful movement that creates a singular element to diversity. From the Banaras tradition to mulberry silkworm that has woven light as air Maheshwari silk, the sarees are a poetic eulogy to lost crafts.

The sunsets of South Indian hills fall over one fabric that takes to the Gota Patti work of Rajasthan sand dunes, and in the magic of the desert night, slip to the Bramhaputra with Muga Buta silk, the identity of Assam for a new dawn.

This journey of fabrics is seen in every piece by Ambi, cherishing crafts long borrowed from the 20th century France, antiques of Bali and even so far back as the Persian dynasties, breathing innovation in these threaded creations.

Woven seamlessly into one piece, the fabrics are intuitively in tandem, a dance of hues and patterns that carry the remnants of age-old heritage.

07
Jan

Kaarigar ke Kalam se

Posted by / Standard

Once framed as the dying art of India, hand block printing has recently gone through a renaissance period, making it to the haute couture boutiques. It is gaining popularity through the fusion of the detailed symmetry of yesteryears and the silhouettes of urban chic ensembles.

At Navya, the past and the future are threaded together; Indian culture edging onto western styles, flourishing in the essence of individuality. Amita Adlakha, the founder of Navya, believes that on Chanderi silk and pure cotton, the added hand embellishments of sequins and beads make the artisans valued work stand out in synchronization with the hand-printed work.

Navya as a brand, endeavors to adorn the hues of Indian artistry, to gather the handmade stories of hand block printing, imprinting them with fresh perspectives.

The recognition of an age-old craft gives the admirer a bright outlook, a better understanding of where this evergreen art comes from.

A collaboration of the old with the new is what Navya stands for. ‘Navya’, a word for this nouvelle mode, suits the brand perfectly as it embodies the technique which has it’s rooted in the salt marshes of Kutch, adopting it on bold and modern silhouettes of today.

Dipped in ink of indigo and iron blend, this printing showcases poetic equilibrium. Using an incredible variety in a single form, their handcrafted design placements create a symphony of lightly layered prints and dark block imprints.

Bringing back to life local Rajasthani craft, Navya’s design philosophy suggests a vibrant outlook to a classic style.

06
Jan

Requiem for tomorrow: खणं

Posted by / Standard

As a culture that has it’s depth and meaning in textiles, we tend to dismiss fashion as haute couture nonsense. Little do we know where it comes from.

In small villages in Maharashtra and Karnataka, local experts in ancient art, are weaving Khunn to create styles that aim to boom internationally. From a fabric that every home in these regions has seen, Vaishali S Studio creates innovative forms with a global appeal.

While we sit in our off the counter, mass-produced lives, she’s bringing back local style, nonchalantly disregarded. Using a sharp needle and wit, she revives Khunn, recoining elegance in thread work. The beauty of the fabric is in imprints narrated in a vocabulary of sun, stars, animals, and diamonds. Homespun threadwork is rhythmic, a clock turning back time, breathing life into this dying fabric with each handloom’s motion.

Taking this textured design, Vaishali S Studio gives it a signature touch: wearable art. Building a new-age sensibility, they intellectually shape silhouettes to change the way your wardrobe designs your lifestyle. Beyond aesthetic, drapes and folds in sheer grace, defines the architecture of their garments.

In global identities that we forge so easily, our individuality is often left stranded. And subtle art is never fanatic; it aims to merge, to blend the traditional into a worldview that attracts a wider audience.

Vaishali S Studio is making a humble attempt to give voice to old local stories in a world where everything is freshly trending. In this endeavor, each feather-light thread becomes heavier, not as a burden but as a memory, Khunn, becoming a requiem for tomorrow.

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