Creative Designs

A handful of designers is spending hours researching the right fabric, restoring ancient weaving traditions that have long gone out of use and mixing innovative indigenous materials to come up with fabrics that are not just easy on the eye but comfortable too.

8220;We read up on mashroo and used the same principle to develop a textile of our own. Though the top has a silky sheen, there8217;s a layer at the bottom that8217;s cotton. It lends itself easily to fashionable treatments without compromising on the comfort factor,8221; says Firdos, a NIFT Chennai graduate. Now Firdos and Mishra are in the process of patenting the technique.

This is not the first time the Mumbai-based duo has experimented with fabrics. For one of their early collections, they had got weavers from Bhagalpur to weave together leather and tussar silk to come up with a breathtaking new texture.

Bangalore-based Deepika Govind went a step further and decided her designs would see more than a whiff of success. At the India Fashion Week a couple of years back, Govind used aromatherapy on silks, lending them fragrances of tea tree oil, pine, lavender and rose.

Ever since, Govind has been working with muga silks and ikats to come up with new blends that are mostly eco-friendly. One such novelty was when she mixed modal, a cellulose fibre from the bark of trees, with Indian silks to come up with a series of pure silk blends, which are softer and more supple. Another cellulose fibre, tencel, was blended with khadi silk to make it easier to drape and stronger. Govind8217;s new collection will have bamboo and soya bean lycra. 8220;All my experiments were born out of a need to create textiles that are versatile and user-friendly. As I explored various weaves, I developed a strong bias for eco-friendly fabrics,8221; says Govind.

Delhi designers Rahul Jain and Gunjan Arora had their eureka moment when they were tidying up their studio. 8220;We were casually piecing together some loose bits of thread when Gunjan said we could make something out of it if we put them all together. In the end, it turned out to be a bigger project than we thought,8221; says Jain. Last season, the two put up a collection that used Wonderweave, the fabric that came out of that venture. 8220;It was quite successful. We created a scroll out of it and painted on it. After we showed it in Delhi, we were invited for an exhibition in New York too,8221; says Jain. Wonderweave is now in the process of being patented.

For many of these designers, high-end fashion is also about being eco-friendly. 8220;In today8217;s day and age, we cannot afford to be indifferent to our environment,8221; says Mumbai designer Anita Dongre, whose organic line Grassroots used fabrics developed from indigenous products. 8220;Be it the raw material, dyeing, finishing techniques, everything was completely environment-friendly. We used organic cotton and vegetable colour dyes,8221; says Dongre. Right now, she is working on ways to make the fabric softer and lighter.

Designer Anuradha Vakil too has been at work in her Ahmedabad studio, trying to blend the techniques of Odissi patachitra and Andhra kalamkari. 8220;I work with artisans from those places and then try and put the two techniques together,8221; says the designer, fresh from her success as a costume designer in Sanjay Leela Bhansali8217;s Saawariya. The result is a stunning piece of work that Vakil calls the 8216;Kalpavriksha8217;. 8220;As a designer, you can8217;t pass up the temptation of creating something enduring. At the end of the day, the buyer, both Indian and international, is looking for a piece that will give him the best of our tradition, fashion trends and comfort,8221; she says.

So the next time someone gripes about the lack of creativity among Indian designers, may be they should show off a mashroo tunic or a wonderweave scroll.