E is for ...Elegant ... n ... Evidence

 

All this month I am writing about elements of Indian textiles, a quick but captivating dive into the saree specifically, a garment worn by Indians for five millennia. Come with me into the elegant, complex and utterly fascinating world of yarn and thread, of skills and techniques of dyeing and printing and embroidery, traditions unchanged for centuries. Of sumptuous finished fabrics that not only make a fashion statement, but also constitute our cultural and political identity.

E is for Embroidery

Today I'm exploring - not a specific saree as such, but one of the ways Indian textiles are embellished, i.e. embroidery. As with the weaving, design, dyeing, printing traditions, the embroidery techniques employed have also evolved over centuries and each region/state has its own unique styles and motifs, often linked to specific communities. Not attempting to be exhaustive, that would be an endless list and probably can be a subject in itself for A-Z (Ari embroidery to Dabka, Chikankari to Mukaish, Lambani to Zardosi) so no, I'm just going to talk about a couple of major traditions only. 

Copper, bronze and bone needles have been found in various Indus Valley Civilisation sites dated roughly to 2500 BCE. While the saree and dhoti are essentially unstitched lengths of fabric, there is enough evidence that stitched garments were also in use and the IVC peoples were conversant with garment construction. 

The oldest embroidery tradition can be traced back to around 1st century CE, to the Kantha embroidery from Bengal, a folk style quilting technique based on the simple running stitch. Old sarees and dhotis, softened by many washes over years of use, were layered and stitched together to form shawls and coverlets. The borders of the sarees were used to edge the finished product for decoration and durability.  In modern times, the Kantha or running stitch is combined with other ornamental stitches and used as embellishment for sarees, and also other textiles. 

Chikankari is an exquisite embroidery style associated with Lucknow in the Northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It has a repertoire of 35-40 decorative stitches that includes shadow-work on the reverse of the fabric. Delicate and refined, it was brought to India from Persia by the Mughals in the 16th century and flourished under the patronage of Indian royalty. Nur Jahan, the consort of the Mughal Emperor Jehangir, was said to be a particular fan of the style. As with other Indian textiles, chikankari also declined under colonial rule, but was revived in the twentieth century. Its authenticity is now protected from imitations by a GI tag and it is one of the most well recognised in India and abroad. 

Apart from the above, there are a zillion others - the Kutchi embroidery from Gujarat, Kashida embroidery from Kashmir, the Shisha or mirrorwork embroidery from Rajasthan, the Lambani tribal embroidery from the Banjara or Gypsies of India, so many more impossible to list here. Watch a video on artisan creating a piece with Ari embroidery below:

And here is an embroidery map of India, gives an idea of the different regional styles.

Image credit

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Did you know how ecofriendly the traditional  Indian textiles were/are? The weaving, dyeing, printing and finishing techniques all used natural materials with least damage to the environment.  

Thank you for reading. And happy A-Zing to you if you are participating in the challenge. 

A-Z Challenge 2025