T he white interiors of charming Kingsley get their touch of colour from the traditional weaves displayed inside the sprawling boutique. While Kanakavalli’s Kanjeevarams have always been there, there’s a new addition — handwoven saris by Pradeep Pillai.
There are subtle hues of beige and white, vivid shades of lime green, rani pink, indigo, and unusual combinations that fuse blue and crimson with burgundy or rust with burnt orange. “After a point, it gets difficult naming colours,” smiles Pillai, who’s displaying nearly 350 saris in Kingsley. He adds, “I prefer working with mostly neutral shades such as black, grey, beige... Some designers use bright colours for saris, and after six months say it’s last season. The concept of fashion has never gone well with me because I believe the sari is a product that you should keep wearing.” For, the more you wear, the softer it gets, he says.
Fondly holding up a khadi sari, he says, “Normally, saris in the market use Chinese warp and desi weft. But, when I create saris, both the warp and west are desi. These saris fall well. Chinese yarn is flimsy, but people use it because it requires less effort.”
Among the range he’s brought are desi tussars from Nalanda in Bihar, linen cotton and cotton-silks from Andhra Pradesh. The saris sport motifs ranging from kolams and abstracts to newsprint and barcodes.
An alumna of the 1999 batch of NIFT, Pillai started out working with embroidery, khadi and home furnishings in Ahmedabad. He moved to Delhi for a project that required him to work with weavers. After the project concluded, the weavers wanted Pillai to continue working with them, and he did.
It’s been eight years since Pillai designed his first sari. “It was a Bawan Buti sari I created while working with artisans in Bihar,” he recalls. The designer also works with weavers in Madhya Pradesh.
For Pillai, the clusters he works with are like family and he is happy that the wages for weaving have gone up. Things have improved in the last decade, and better pay also means the younger generation stays in the business of weaving and does not migrate to the city seeking odd jobs, he says. “At one time, there was the fear that the art of weaving would die because the artisans were giving it up due to lack of a decent pay structure. Thankfully, with the recognition they are receiving now, that scare is gone,” he signs off.
