Designer Sanjay Garg on growing up in Rajasthan and the juice of childhood memories

The colour palette of turbans and the veils of women, defying the barrenness of the land, is embedded in my DNA

Mita Vashisht (standing centre) in a sari from the Moomal collection; Sanjay Garg shot the catalogue for this collection with women from his circle of friends and family, in Rajasthan (Pic source: Sanjay Garg)

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When I think of summer, my visual memories are all about luscious fruits and colourful home-made drinks. We would gather as a family in the evening, when the sun had exhausted all its fury, and savour aam ras that had been lovingly pulped by the women of the household. This was pure indulgence and a sensory experience but there were other summer staples. Like the kairi panna, made from squashed raw mangoes and spices, a mix that nobody else could quite recreate. Our elders told us it was the best way to refresh and rehydrate ourselves and beat the dry heat of Rajasthan, where I grew up. It was a mix of tartness and fullness, much like life itself. Then there was the buttermilk or chaach and the pickled white onion, which we were told would protect us from the heat wave. The women prepared everything by hand and perhaps that’s the reason why their flavours can never be recreated.

I never knew what a summer vacation was like. I had modest beginnings, growing up in the tiny village of Mukarikpur near Alwar. My father, who owned a shop in the village, never took a holiday through summer. During school breaks, we would visit our grandmother’s house in the vicinity. So, I have grown up amid the harshness of summers and felt every bit of the hard-edged life in a parched terrain that would flare up with the hot sun, that was devoid of greenery, that waited hopelessly for rains. And water was scarce. So, summers taught me how to ration water and manage with just a bucket. We learnt to take showers every alternate day to save water for more important uses. The house had one cooler in a big room around which all of us would huddle for a moment of relief. I remember we would put watermelons in the cooler to preserve them for a longer time.

In 2020, my Moomal collection was a tribute to Rajasthan’s multiplicity of lives across colours, textiles and motifs, explored on poshaks, gathered lehengas, jackets and cholis.

I remember the smell of flowers and glasses of cold Rooh Afza served at a summer wedding. The baraat was the most fun part, it would last a day and night. It could have been at anyone’s wedding in the village but my younger brother and I would be there. And as much as one can dance, we danced.

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Then there were the sandstorms. We would take a piece of linen cloth, soak it in water, wring it and wrap it around ourselves to stop the sand from scraping our skin. As the summer breeze blew past us, the moist cloth would cool us down. In the village, there were hardly any green patches or spaces where we could find some shade and while away time outdoors. Our only luxury was visiting Jaipur, which was lush with gardens and water reservoirs. If we were in Jaipur, we knew we were in a happy place.

In fact, it is water that has shaped the clothing of Rajasthan. I understood why we developed a minimal weaving tradition because cotton is a water-intensive crop. And you cannot use baoli water for producing cloth when it could sustain many lives. When I was working with weavers of Chanderi sarees in Madhya Pradesh, they would require plenty of water for dyeing. This wasn’t possible in Rajasthan. In my family, women started wearing saris from my mother’s generation. Traditionally women wore ankle-length skirts because they were very airy and easy maintenance. It is because Rajasthan got most of the base fabric from other states that it developed its own tradition of surface ornamentation, be it tie-and-dye, embroidery or the metallic shimmer of gota. That’s why we are a craft-heavy state. And the sheer colour palette of turbans and the veils of women, defying the barrenness of the land, was embedded in my DNA through all those summers. These nourished my imagination of textiles, patterns, culture and colours.

In 2020, my Moomal collection was a tribute to Rajasthan’s multiplicity of lives across colours, textiles and motifs, explored on poshaks, gathered lehengas, jackets and cholis. The peacock, a central motif, dances amidst graphic lines of textile and embroidery. Interpreted from folk, its form and layout draws from oral traditions, representing the importance of this language, one unstudied, yet significant.

I grew up in the presence of folk through my surroundings, customs and music. Rajasthan has very strong classical roots in music. Till today, I go back and forth between both, appreciative of their distinct role and value. The aesthetics of clothing in Rajasthan are built upon layers of colour and texture. Bold and unapologetic, it’s one where fineness does not equate to sophistication. I respect and love it.

Sanjay Garg is founder of design label Raw Mango

(As told to Rinku Ghosh)

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