Namaste Beautiful Joys!
Have you already taken a look at the new 100% cotton collection? The patterns and patterns we have designed for you are unique, but the fabric we have chosen, and that you have already come to know and love, is rich in history and meaning.
The cotton plant grows only in tropical and subtropical regions, particularly in Southeast Asia and the Near East. The fluff around the seeds of the flower, called cotton wool, is collected to produce plant fibers.
Cotton weaving in India soon became an art, handed down from generation to generation: it fascinated royal families who began to surround themselves with textile artisans, and then also conquered the Western world. But that's not all: the fabric was a very powerful symbol in pre-industrial Indian society and not even the advent of capitalism changed its vision.
Even today, in fact, the most valuable traditional clothes are kept aside or given as gifts on the occasion of ritual festivities. This is because the fabric carries with it the symbol of the wearer's status, a magical function that affects the wearer and proves to be a pledge of future protection.
The coarser fabric, with a sparse weave and large knots, called Khadi, is considered more permeable to the spirit and essence and for this reason it was used by the caste of priests to "trap" the divinity, but being careful of contamination: during meals, for example, it was tied around the head to avoid contact with impure food.
Our Khomal cardigan is a nod to the highly symbolic Khadi fabric.
At the same time, the densest and tightest fabrics were highly appreciated not only for their aesthetic qualities, but also because they were considered capable of repelling malignant contamination.
The Indian Muslim community also adhered to this vision of the fabric and the need to avoid contamination: unlike Hindu thought, which sees impurities as a deterioration of the moral essence of the individual, they are seen as distractions of the faithful from prayer.
Colour is also an essential component of the quality of the fabric: red, which evokes blood and danger, enhances the role of soldiers and the power of female essences (women wear red dresses and draw their skin with red henna at weddings and fertility festivals).
When English fabrics and garments invaded the Indian market, thanks to their aesthetic and economic properties, the Swadeshi nationalist spirit that awoke at the turn of the 1800s and 1900s also promoted a recovery of the art and craftsmanship of weaving as a symbol of India's cultural and moral rebirth.
Gandhi himself appealed to home-weaving, handicrafts, as a creative act and defended it against the consumption of foreign products that impoverish and despoil the men and women of India: women were thus reintegrated into the country's production process and their primitive status was reconfirmed, at the same time, according to which the duty of a wife is to weave, while that of unmarried women is spinning.
In this black-and-white photo by M. Burke-White, Gandhi reads cross-legged near the spinning wheel in the foreground, a symbol of the struggle for independence.
According to Gandhi
"It's a shame to dress up in the latest creations of Regent Street when your neighbours' weavers and spinners are starving."
In the 1920s, Gandhi developed the theme of spinning as an act of prayer in atonement for individual sins and a source of new life for the community, insisting on the sanctifying properties that simple home-woven cloth conveyed to those who wore it.
Even today, the ideology is also alive in the consciousness of those who wear elastic saris or jeans on a daily basis.
Buying a garment made by our friends and collaborators Indian artisans does not only mean taking possession of a unique and artistic garment, but also helping the small community that produced it and enriching our spirit with the creative intent and positive energies that the hands of the craftsman have transmitted to the fabric.