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  Talking saris: Quirks, comfort, importance & memories

Talking saris: Quirks, comfort, importance & memories

Published : May 5, 2016, 3:17 am IST
Updated : May 5, 2016, 3:17 am IST

I make no bones about my unabashed admiration for handloom weavers, handblock printers and craftspersons.

Meeta Pandit in her Bomkai
 Meeta Pandit in her Bomkai

I make no bones about my unabashed admiration for handloom weavers, handblock printers and craftspersons. It is my endeavour to highlight the fruits of their genius and the toil that comes with the turf at every opportunity. With the fashion industry making inroads on the international circuit, instead of trying to make western formals and pret popular, the designers would do well to dip into this rich and vibrant legacy to benefit from it and in the process, inject it with a fresh lease of life. And this is no charity. The designers will find the weavers more than willing to adapt and act as cornerstones of strength to walk beside them in the march to put India on a far more rooted fashion map, chartering a course that is unique as it is socially responsible.

Let us not forget that in the erstwhile situation, the weaver embodied in himself both the roles of the creator of the design and the artisan who did the actual weaving. And even till date, the traditional weaver’s sense of juxtapositioning of colours, designs and aesthetics remains very rooted and could teach some of the fashion gurus a thing or two about balance and aesthetics!

Taking the weavers along was the focus of the symposium held under the aegis of Six yards and 365 days, a Facebook group launched by writer and poet Sunita Budhiraja, who also announced the launch of four chapters across India — Mumbai, Bhubaneshwar, Kolkata and Hyderabad. This symposium took another leap forward by making a large number of the members come out of the virtual world and into the real world draped in the best of saris and that I think is its greatest achievement.

The symposium was addressed by a glittering array of speakers who traced the history of unstitched garment and the way forward for bringing the younger generation within the ambit of wearing the national dress. The speakers included danseuse Shovana Narayan who spoke about the history of the saris and her own experiences with its generational legacy, stylist Ashwini Narayan who embodied the quirky and youthful element of the sari with her interesting drape and shared tips as to how to achieve it. Dancer Sharon Lowen, who is a confirmed votary of the sari, spoke about the comfort factor and weather friendliness of the sari and shared some special sari moments. Former bureaucrats Sujaya Krishnan and Vijaylakshmi Chhabra spoke about the inspiration they derived from wearing saris on a daily basis.

The renowned Hindustani vocalist Meeta Pandit also regaled the audience with a special composition Rangi saari gulabi chunariya re on the sari. Much to the delight of the audience, Sunita also made a presentation of some of the unique and distinctive saris posted on the page by members as they attempted to name the styles of the pieces on view and their unique points and see if their saris had made it to the list. I am happy to report that many of the saris designed by me made it to the list.

I have to doff my metaphorical hat to Sunita for making this dream come true by linking so many people by this wonderful initiative which I am convinced will go a long way in making women look at the sari with a new respect and regard for all the gnarled hands that worked incessantly for creating that dream that we drape. A drape that we have all grown up with, but are opting to wear more and more infrequently. Sunita takes the effort to not only wear it, but also take pictures and shares the stories with us in her attempt to inspire us all in her charming and understated manner. She feels that the group has fast emerged as kind of emotional support system for the women as well. “There are so many women who have almost forgotten what it is to receive a compliment, for their lives end within the four walls of their homes and the forum has helped them with positive strokes to celebrate themselves not as vanity symbols but as people who are worthy of being appreciated.”

Culturally speaking, in the sari-wearing areas of the Indian sub-continent, practically every woman no matter what her age has some special “sari moments” where the sari plays a pivotal role at the memory level. Be it the mothers’ saris, grandmothers’ saris, or their own saris given by someone special, worn for a particular occasion, bought from a particular place the list is endless as are the tales connected to the sari.

It is a shared dream to see increasing number of women wear woven saris on a day-to-day basis and we tell all our friends to don them and not wait for some ceremonial occasion. So many of the women happily announced that they were sporting saris more often after joining the group – this to my mind was the one thing I was dying to hear!

Dr Alka Raghuvanshi is an art writer, curator and artist and can be contacted on alkaraghuvanshi@yahoo.com