[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1623909223597{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text]Lace Making: My fascination for handmade laces started three years back in the summers of 2018 when I searched for artisan groups in India to help us recreate old collected laces and trims from Europe. Until then, my knowledge of high-quality handmade laces possible to accomplish in India was limited only to cotton crochet work. However, to my surprise, we found groups of women based in small villages across different states of Southern India, practicing a variety of high-skilled European lace making techniques. 

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1623043300818{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text]Enameled Jewelry: In the story of my career, I've had much to do with the popularising of fashion jewelry in India.  But that's another story, which I will tell one day.  For the moment, I want to start a new blog series on the various genres of jewelry, not just in India but worldwide.

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1621222940684{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text]Block Printed Ghaggra : Due to the increased flow of trade and immigrants to the Indian subcontinent, the first stitched garment in Indian women's sartorial elegance started appearing as early as the eleventh century, and it was the Ghaggra(a gathered skirt) & Choli( a blouse). This practical and straightforward garment was appropriate for the standards of modesty prevalent at the time. Additionally, it allowed for easy movement during any day job. Before this, the unstitched saree was ubiquitous on the Indian subcontinent. 

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1619985119265{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12" css=".vc_custom_1619981845491{padding-right: 15px !important;}"][vc_column_text]Gara Embroidery A study of textile or craft form becomes doubly rewarding when it amalgamates history and culture, not just from one geography but across nations and histories.  Nothing exemplifies this maxim more than the Parsi Gara. Its intricately embroidered yards of the fabric brings together Persia,  Europe, India, and China.  

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1619725349713{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text]Gota Work or Lappe Ka Kaam

This past year allowed us to work with many embroidery techniques from India, which are traditionally practised as embroideries of gold. A few days ago, when we wrote about one such Embroidery of Gold- Zardozi Embroidery, we received a great response. Therefore we feel encouraged to share more on Indian embroidery techniques from the genre of 'gold.' One such technique is Gota Work or Lappe Ka Kaam. 

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1619207173048{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text]Chikankari Embroidery from India - As a child growing up in Lucknow in the 1960s, I recall being dragged along to the stores when my mother and aunts shopped.  Much to my boredom.  Except when we went to the chikankari shops.  Even as a child, I found the gossamer tenderness and transparency of the craft fascinating, and I'm not alone in this.  In 1903, George Watt described it as "the most artistic and delicate form of the indigenous needlework of India."  Laila Tyabji compares it to a dragonfly wing.  

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1618453133623{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text]Kantha Embroidery: We speak so much nowadays of recycling and upcycling as a means of repairing what we have done to the environment and our ecology through thoughtless consumption. But in several cultures, and particularly Japan and India, upcycling has existed historically. [/vc_column_text][vc_empty_space][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1618453133623{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text][caption id="attachment_3869" align="alignleft" width="300"]Kantha Embroidery born out of Recycling and Upcycling Traditions Sashiko from Japan. So similar to Kantha. Picture Rit Maes[/caption]Japan, of course, has her Sashiko and Boro. And India has Kantha. I recall when my son was born, our Bengali help embroidered his first nappies using soft used cloth and beautiful Kantha, something I still treasure. 

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1616956674552{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text]If there is any embroidery that is solely in the realm of women, it is phulkari, and that too the women of Punjab.  Translating to 'flower work,' it is vital in the history and culture of its state of origin, steeped in its history, its customs, and rites of passage ceremonies. More than any other embroidery of India, it is significant- less for commercial reasons and more for the insight it offers into women's lives historically. 

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1616300712552{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text]Zardozi Embroidery: There is something about embroidery that has held the world in thrall in all of recorded history.  Is it the human urge to beautify and improve? Is it a stress buster? Whatever the reasons, India probably stands at the forefront of the world in terms of both the variety and the complexity of its embroidery traditions. Many of the embroideries found on garments on the international catwalks are developed in India, though this may not be known or acknowledged. 

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern" css=".vc_custom_1615836859728{padding-right: 15px !important;}" z_index=""][vc_column offset="vc_col-xs-12"][vc_column_text]Sustainable Cotton: As I turn through the pages of the book 'A Frayed History. The Journey of Cotton in India'. I find nuggets of great information, which I plan to compile and share succinctly in a series of articles starting with this one. Cotton, the wonder fiber, was at the start of history, found in two parts of the world—India, and Peru, as has been inferred from the study of old inscriptions and arts. Sir George Watt, a Scottish Botanist who worked in India as a reporter on botany, has shared very early research that says cotton was considered sacred in India. In those times, the word used for cotton was 'karpasi.' The sacred threads of a Brahman were made of 'karpasi' to put on over his head in three strings.
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