When the pandemic struck in early 2020, hundreds of orders from Taneira, Tata Group’s handcrafted ethnic-wear brand, were pending with weavers. A worried lot, the craftspeople wondered if orders would be cancelled and whether they would be paid. Anindita Sardar, Head - Design and Curation at Taneira, and her team assured them that the schedule remained unchanged.
The brand works with a wide network of weavers across the country. “We went ahead with our festive and special collection orders, and even orders that we had placed for general procurement for our stores. We reached out to a few weavers with an advance to help them tide over their immediate needs,” explains Sardar.
Anindita Sardar
The revival story
Taneira came up with an affordable entry-level line, Essentials by Taneira, to make them accessible to more people. The designers worked with weaver clusters in Banaras, Kanchipuram, etc, on these saris. In addition, Heritage, a revival range that featured age-old techniques and crafts such as the adai , jaala and petni techniques, was also launched last year. They are now working with the few remaining weavers of the Udupi coarse cotton sari as part of the series.
From the ‘Essentials by Taneira’ series
As for 2021 launches, Parichay: Song of the Forest was launched earlier this year, featuring the Bopari pallu (a double-sided ajrakh printed pallu ). The Fusion Edit, launched in March, aims at reviving languishing crafts from across the country. The focus was also on blockprints such as the Farad, from Bagru, Rajasthan, which had lost favour. “These are miniature blocks and very few people make these 2x2 inch blocks. Each pattern needs numerous applications to get the colour integration right. The effect is stunning,” says Sardar. The ‘Ayyampet’ saris of Tamil Nadu that feature ikat mushru is another addition to this series.
Updating skills
During the pandemic, weavers were trained by the quality assurance team on ensuring humidity did not affect the saris, working with AZO-free dyes that bleed less, and focussing on packaging. “This is an ongoing training and is an effort to upskill them,” says Sardar, adding that the weavers “were not hesitant to accept the small changes we suggested”.
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