Immunity in a bathrobe

Revive the art of ayurvastra in Ayurganic, their line of medicinal clothing

It’s noon in Kerala, and we’re sweating bullets, trying to understand the nuances of ayurvastra— fabric that has been dyed with medicinal herbs to enhance health and beauty. Rajan, who’s explaining this to us, is the sixth generation (on record) of the Kuzhivila family who’s trading in this fabric. Their lineage goes back to the Silk Route, when they supplied rajas with turmeric-dyed cloth. And perhaps this would have been a dying art, if it were not for the curious minds of designer duo Lecoanet-Hemant. The multi-award winning designers, who began their journey as couturiers in Paris, are now refining the concept of ayurvastra, with a line of garments under the label Ayurganic. At their factory in Balarampuram, where the bricks are infused with healing herbs and the walls plastered withneempaint and sandalwood oil, Hemant Sagar takes us through the painstaking process of creating thise products.

From the forest

The first step is to procure GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard) certified organic cotton from Tamil Nadu. Once the swatches are delivered, they’re bleached in a natural aloe vera solution, then dipped in natural gums so they can absorb and hold on to the colour and medicinal properties of the herbs. After dyeing the fabric for a minimum of six hours in ayurvedic herbs, it is cooled, washed and kept in a dark room for a minimum of 15 days. “The longer you keep it in the darkness, the more steadfast the colour and healing properties,” explains Rajan. The processing unit is located in the heart of the Agastya forest, where Rajan and his team source more than 1,200 herbs, used for various combinations that range from immunity, to better sleep, to glowing skin. The water used to dye the fabric is believed to be medicinal as well, to be consumed or bathed in to enhance health and beauty.

Interestingly, we’re told that when the cloth is washed in the nearby Neyyar River, there is an increase in the fish population (because of the various healing herbs).

The challenges

In this world of fast fashion where garments are constructed in as less than a couple of hours, delving in a project such as Ayurganic requires not just patience but also a desire to redefine the industry. Some of the things Sagar and Didier Lecoanet struggle with include the time taken to create the dyed fabric before it’s delivered to their Gurugram atelier, and the fact that production halts during the Kerala monsoon. “The one time we insisted, we got fabric that was incredibly patchy because everything gets mildew,” says Sagar. And because it’s a traditional process, there’s no way to ensure uniformity of colour.

We must credit the designers for their intelligence — by adding a satin weave through the organic cotton, they have made the fabric richer and more pliant. Currently, the garments are only available in one light yellow shade till they can perfect the colour uniformity. The blend for this shade is used to enhance overall health and immunity. Many different herbs (including red sandalwood, sweetflag, vetiver, wild turmeric) are used; however,neemis the main ingredient with 20% concentration.

The inside story

Not many people know that they had begun work on Ayurganic much before Genes, their ready-to-wear collection. Back in their Gurugram home, Sagar recalls how it all started back in 2008, thanks to an eclectic Frenchman they employed. “For three years, he travelled around India, before he discovere dayurvastra . We changed the concept by bringing in certified cotton,” he says. For the first couple of years, they were simply experimenting, until they got a call from the first ayurveda website in Germany (ayurveda-portal.de) who became their partners in Deutsch land. This gave them access to more than 30 top ayurvedic institutes in that country, who loved the garments.

But wellness isn’t just a business deal for them. Outside the work environment, Sagar is usually seen walking barefoot to stay connected to the earth. He also has a healing crystal carafe to charge his drinking water and is into bio-hacking, a light hypnosis programme that you can use for anything — from enhancing well-being or to stop smoking. Lecoanet meditates regularly, and works on three-week detoxes.

Even their 1,00,000 sq ft, five-floor atelier features recycled grey water, and natural light floods the building. It’s a far cry from sleepy Balaramapuram, but a fitting climax, for a brand that creates these easy, elegant and very refined outfits.

The writer was in Kerala at the invitation of Leocanet Hemant

Muslin man

Saiful Islam, a textile revivalist from Bangladesh, tells us how he is working to bring the fine fabric into the mainstream world of fashion

In an irony of the sort that makes us laugh wryly, the British destroyed the muslin trade in Bengal, leaving nothing for the next generation of weavers to resuscitate. Yet, when it comes to its preservation, the West is miles ahead: muslin forms a large part of museums there. Saiful Islam, a textile revivalist who shuttles between the United Kingdom and Bangladesh, discovered this bitter truth, and is now on a mission to revive muslin in its original avatar.

Saiful has made a well-researched film,The Legend of the Loom that takes viewers on a 2,000-year-old journey from the pages of the Mahabharata to the rivers of Bengal, where the cotton plant grew. He has written a tome called Muslin. Our Story and has been reviving this diaphanous material in his homeland from 2014.

He talked about his passion for muslin at the fifth edition of Threads of Tradition, a platform for conversations with experts in textiles, at Taneira in South Extension recently. Muslin saris and copies of his book were put on display at the showroom. Here are excerpts from an interview.

Take us through the work you have done so far?

The story of my film is largely based upon the work I have done. T9fx (a production house) directed it but needed the input as the topic was unknown to it. We wanted to revive muslin, the world’s first global brand, but we wanted to do it in multiple ways. We wanted to tell the story from the way we perceive it should be told: our geography, craft, people, history and portraying the role the West played in its demise. Previously, muslin was never shown from these angles. Normally, craft is seen as a pretty item. It is important to understand it from the sociological and political angles.

How would your describe muslin and its importance from a historical perspective?

Muslin is the most wonderful textile that was ever woven, for its simplicity and demand it generated world-wide. Machilipatnam down South and Mosul in Iraq were the trading places. It was collected there. But when people saw it over there they thought it was made there. However, it was always made in Bengal as phuti karpas, a special cotton plant, grew along the banks of the Meghna and Shitalakshya rivers. We hope its silken threads and traditional weaving process will return; I am hopeful that my work on this painstaking process will soon bring good results.

How do you seek to preserve it for the next generation?

I showed the film to weavers in my homeland. While the rest faltered, only Al Amin succeeded in producing muslin in its pure form. I am only interested in preserving the classics and then we want to see how the market accepts it. Personally, I have revived 15 to 20 Jamdani saris. People don’t know the connection. In India, there are other forms of Jamdani but they are diluted forms.

Were the Mughals the main patrons of muslin?

The demand was more during the reign of the Mughals. However, the Nawabs of Murshidabad and Dhaka were instrumental in patronising it. Muslin was worn by kings and queens and traded from Rome to Indonesia. It was crudely annihilated by the British colonialists in the mid 19th century to support their machine-made clothes. History tells us that the British cut the thumbs of weavers off.

Where do muslin-makers work?

Muslin makers are at Narayanaganj and Roopganj. They mainly work around the coarse, thick version. Muslin was used during the Second World War as bandages, during photo lighting. Some people used them as undergarments for themselves and for babies.

How is it that Jamdani survived but muslin didn’t?

Jamdani survived in the coarse form; it is not in its original refined version. Some weavers survived to take the counts from 400 to 1,000. The maximum count that we have heard of is 1,200. But the maximum I have seen is 650. Jamdani is a form of muslin; in fact it is the main form. When we do it in flowered or figured motifs it becomes Jamdani. Muslin is also in plain, striped and chequered versions. Muslin thread was soft and delicate and spun in a humid environment, from dawn to dusk on river banks.

Which designers have worked well with the fabric?

Aneeth Arora of Pero, has done excellent work. We gave her muslin and it was used in the show we showed in our film. In Bangladesh, Bibi Russell and other designers are drawing their inspiration from their own culture and traditions.

Do weavers in Bangladesh work with real zari or have they substituted it with copper?

Most cases are substitutes because they cannot get pure zari. Demand is for cost-effective polyester or rayon. I have stayed away from zari, because it did not have large usage, but I will use it in its pure silver form later on (in the revival effort).

Ambaram's handloom, baby

July 31, 2018 12:17 IST Ambaram creates hand-woven cotton clothes and accessories for new-borns

One afternoon, SP Arun Kumar chanced upon a pillow at his home in Madurai. It changed the course of his life. “It was stuffed with old baby clothes that belonged to my sister and me,” recalls the 29-year-old. Kumar felt the fabric, ran his hands through the embroidery that his mother had done. “It was unlike anything I saw at the regular textile stores,” he says. “The clothes were simple, made of the softest cotton, and the colours were mild and pleasant.” Kumar, who then worked as a web-designer in Chennai, thought, why not make quality baby clothes? He didn’t like city life anyway and saw the business idea as something that would take him back to his roots.

“My sister Ponmani and I came up with the concept for a line of clothes that are suited for our weather conditions and are kinder on the skin and environment,” says Kumar. That’s how Ambaram came to be. Started in December 2016, the company makes hand-woven clothes for new-borns and babies up to the age of one. According to Kumar, Ambaram means fabric in ancient Tamil.

Kumar says that hand-woven cotton is better suited for South India’s weather. “Knitted fabrics, for instance, are not breathable. Wear them in the hot sun and you can see how the material doesn’t let sunlight in.” Kumar says that nylon and polyester are a big no-no. “Dressing up babies in such fabrics, according to me, is an act of violence,” he feels. “We strive to go the Gandhian way — we source fabrics from Gandhigram at Dindigul and from handloom weavers in and around the weaving clusters of Chennimalai,” he adds.

Ponmani, who holds a Bachelor’s degree in Fashion and Garment Design, patterns the clothes. The Ambaram team is all for no frills — their range consists of off-white jablas with pastel borders and tie-ups, shorts, and nappies. “We wanted to keep off zippers, buttons, and elastic that can hurt baby skin,” explains Kumar. The brother-sister duo is now working on clothes for kids up to the age of five. “We plan to introduce frocks and kurta-pyjama sets with simple thread work,” he adds.

Ambaram’s USP is its gift box — a combination of jablas, nappies, bibs, shorts, a bracelet made of vasambu (calamus root), palm leaf rattle, and a handmade cradle mobile. Kumar sources the rattles from palm-leaf artisans in Thiruchendur and Ramanathapuram. “We wanted to provide an eco-friendly alternative to the flood of plastic toys in the market.”

Most of their orders are online. They market their products on their Facebook page and by word-of-mouth. Ambaram’s unit is at Puliyanur village, Villupuram. “When we first visited the village, we saw most parents there worked in far off places and visited their children only during weekends. Their children grew up with their grandparents and lacked a connect with their parents,” says Kumar. Along with Ponmani, he stared a tailoring school to provide women there an alternative livelihood. “Today, we have a team of three that works for us,” he says. “We hope the unit becomes self-sustainable.”

Empowering

The Elimai line of travel products uses colourful textiles woven by the differently-abled residents of Krupa Home

“The most popular section at the campus of Krupa Home is the weaving room, and almost every resident wants to get in there and spend some time,” chuckles Dr Radhika Soundararajan, coordinator of this 10-acre residential facility for adults with disabilities run by AIM for Seva at Sriperumbudur, near Chennai.

“There is colour, activity, songs and fun at our loom room, and quite naturally, other residents who are usually involved in gardening, marble paper making or agarbatti assembling, also want to sit at this unit. The loom room is always cheerful and filled with positivity,” she explains. There are three looms at Krupa, and four of the residents are trained in weaving with assistance from three helpers.

“We engage the differently-abled residents in hand loom weaving as a therapeutic rehabilitation for their physical, mental, social and vocational abilities. The warp and weft is restricted to creating brightly-coloured rough textiles with check and stripe prints, ” she says.

Even though they were making bags and a few other utility items with the woven textiles, Soundarajan wanted to take it to the next step by developing concept products. “We approached Fariha Begum who had worked with Bhawani bedsheet weavers of Tamil Nadu and created her line of leather bags, Therku. She visited our centre and was excited to see the close knit rough handloom woven by Krupa residents. Based on her suggestion, we decided to launch travel line products,” she says.

“The material woven at Krupa has knots and is uneven and rough. But each knot has a story, and in fact we attach a weaver tag to all the products in the line,” says Soundarajan. Elimai (simplicity in English) offers passport holders, laptop cases, sling and tote bags, shopping bags and book bags.

They are working on adding more utility products in this line. “When we showed the Elimai products (the finished product has been developed by Fariha) to the weavers of our home, they were thrilled by the outcome. They also came up with some suggestions,” she says.

The idea behind Krupa is to provide shelter for differently-abled adults and enable them to be meaningfully occupied as it adds to their sense of self worth and happiness. Residents treat the various units in the facility at Krupa Home like their office and spend the day working; Sunday is their day off. “Sundays are chaotic at Krupa Home. Sundays seem to be boring for the residents. While on other days, there are activities that keep them involved. Everyone here likes go to office even on a Sunday, probably to the loom room,” smiles Soundarajan.

Elimai products are available at AIM For Seva, Mylapore, 10 am to 5 pm, 24987955