saree aunty: saree lovers

Monday, February 14, 2022

banarasis are good for you : the friday saree

years ago, i fell for the guinness tagline that went, guinness is good for you. i suspect i drink guinness more on account of that line than the taste of the heavy dark stout itself.

guinness is good for you was written in the 1920s when Guinness started advertising for the first time. i'd heard once, in the '70s or '80s an enormous amount of money, effort, and time were spent to change that line, come up with something new. . creatives thought and thought, then went away to far off isles to think some more, free float, brainstorm, crack the big idea. and after all that, they came back with... well, guinness is good for you. and so, the line remained.

i can't substantiate that story, but i just found out that james joyce had suggested changing the line with a slogan of his own, "guinness – the free, the flow, the frothy freshener." but thankfully, that was not accepted. it remained, guinness is good for you.

the best ideas are like that. simple, almost minus any adornment, undeniable.

which reminds me of a conversation i had the other day about these beautiul sarees called banarasis; benaroshi, if you're bengali.

banarasis are handloom sarees from the ancient city of varanasi or benares, with their trademark and fabulous zaree work. they are usually in silk, but you do have fine cotton banarasis too.

beautiful as they are, they have posed a persisting problem for their owners and wearers.

which is, where do you wear a banarasi?

the sarees are inextricably linked to weddings and celebrations. the ;et's overdress moments in our world. the endless occasions that weddings present, special anniversaries, ceremonies for mothers to be, your offspring's rice ceremony or whatever is the special ritual for children in a community. banarasis also find a place in religious festivals like diwali, durga pujo, eid. but mainly, it's weddings.

if you want to wear a banarasi, there has to be an occasion. you just can't wear a banarasi otherwise, seems to be the inherited wisdom of saree wearers everywhere.

you dress up in your lovely blue banarasi with big angoor or grape motifs to a cousin's mehendi. your own wedding banarasi you have worn only once after your marriage, to your brother's wedding. at your friend's sangeet, your sweet but careless aunty dropped food on your pale pink banarasi with silver zaree that your mother had worn for her gode bharai ceremony before you were born.

"i have so many beautiful banarasis, but no occasion to wear them," how many times have i heard that? or, "i know the mauve tissue banarasi is gorgeous, but no, i'll buy this kanjeevaram without zaree, more wearable." or even, "oh, banarasis are too much, too jhatak matak, who wears zaree these days," i feel a bit shaken by that.

when i started buying sarees again, banarasis began to demand and get my attention pretty quickly. my mother was born in benaras or kashi, was that some sort of subliminal tug? i've actually always been dazzled by banarasis. my mother had many of them, from her wedding brocade to these really cool ones in solid glimmering shades – emerald, crimson, ivory – with narrow finely worked borders in contrasting shades. i've worn most of them, always for an occasion of course.

but how do you get the banarasi out of the occasion into the everyday world?

that was the question a girl who loved sarees, – whom i'd just met – and i were pondering a couple of sundays ago. she said, she felt one should simply stop needing a big occasion to wear them.

instead, just wear them whenever one felt like it. as you would wear all other nice sarees.

to visit people, for small dinners, when you had people over. treat the banarasi like any other beautiful saree. and wear it. not keep your banarasis in muslin and mothballs forever, waiting longingly for that one mega wedding or whatever, when you can at last let them come out and breathe.

i laughed.

and i heard something in me say, why not?

we'd invited them for shabbat dinner next week. she said, she'd wear one of her banarasis. and she instructed me, practically, to wear the red brocade banarasi i'd mentioned, a replica of my mother's wedding saree.

it felt like a pact. a solemn giving of word to each other which would lead to greater things some day. it definitely felt heady, like a large swig of dark smooth guinness.

after much thought, i chose a blue green shot jongla or jangla (from jungle) banarasi.

when she walked in, we both stopped in our tracks and started smiling, quite incredulous. her husband exclaimed, "you're wearing identical sarees!"

wasn't exactly the same, but hers had an all over jaal or pattern too, with similar motifs, and the colours were close. it was a classic banarasi from her wedding trousseau. mine had been acquired more recently, for our anniversary a couple of years ago.

she had also worn her saree differently, twisting and pleating the yards of silk deftly, as as she pleased. the sheen of a tightly drawn black belt over the pallu and around the waist firmly brought the traditional jangla to the here and this moment.

we spent a happy friday evening together, not being self conscious at all about all the gold and silk. it felt just right. even the men, dressed casually, seemed to like that little high in the air. a refreshing note to a quiet dinner.

i wished i were tall and slender so i could throw my saree about in that carefree swirl. we posed and took shots. banarasis stepped out of weddings and breathed more freely.

a big idea i felt, had been cracked. just wear your banarasi.

i've never read joyce, but a moment ago considered swiping his "the free, the flow, the frothy freshener" tagline.

but no.

i'll go with...

banarasis are good for you.


bought the jangla from tilfi in december, 2020. it was an anniversary gift from my husband. this picture was taken on our anniversary, the first time i wore the saree. thoroughly enjoyed donning a jangla, lifted the covid gloom. we went to a bar afterwards. no big celebration naturally, this is the wild spread of coronavirus time. the photograph is taken by ferolyn, she's our cook and my main consultant on sarees. she's caught the blue green colour play in this one, so am posting here.

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photos credit ferolyn fernandez

Wednesday, February 9, 2022

it was black this friday : the friday saree

how many sarees do you have? what, you're buying more sarees? where will you where them? you've got to stop buying sarees you know...

has anyone told you such things? familiar, these words?

well, i don't blame well meaning friends and harried husband speaking their minds.

but really.

i don't have to wear sarees to love them. or... do i?

how it happened i can't exactly trace but somewhere along the way, the saree got so left out from the idea of dressing up.

i've never not liked or loved sarees, though it never became my daily dress as it was for my mother and grandmothers. yet for occasions, for special anything, i'd wear a saree. in fact, i'd wear a saree to work when i was twenty one, battling crowded buses, pothole filled roads, the heat and dust and grime of calcutta.

and yet, i lost touch with sarees. the need to wear them waned.

about twenty years ago, it all came surging back, happily.

but where would i wear sarees, here in singapore? okay, sometimes to work maybe. and then? wait for occasions? would the twenty new sarees in my cupboard be able to hold their drama till then?

then it struck me.

i have an occasion every week. in my own home.

shabbat.

my husband and daughter are jewish. along with my brother in law, we observe shabbat every friday evening at home. we all get together and have shabbat dinner. good food is made, alcohol imbibed, we chat and relax, bread is broken, wine blessed, prayers and song fill the evening, plates are filled and emptied, the evening flows by.

shabbat, which means seven in hebrew, is a day to be set aside from the rest of the week. it is a sacred day, the day when after creating everything, god rested. wonderful, i thought, as i pondered this. my way of marking this day... i'll wear a saree every friday.

it's perhaps one of the best thoughts i've ever had. i am grinning as i write that.

this friday, february 4, 2022, i wore a fabulously embroidered black silk from bishnupur in west bengal. it's designed by the tremendously talented sharbari dutta. sadly, she passed away suddenly a couple of years ago. she had made this saree for me, as she knows my uncle and aunt and also about my love of sarees. usually, she designed men's clothes only, for she felt not enough had been done in that area in the context of indian fashion.

every motif on that saree is drawn by her. the chain stitch is fine and detailed. the colours are balanced and surprising... that sudden violet. there's a playful note in the execution.

a saree i've worn many times and it has never failed to delight.

the last time i wore this saree,

it was new year in the jewish calendar.

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my photos credit ferolyn fernandez

Monday, January 31, 2022

maharanis, construction workers, ics officers – a saree wearer's longish ramble

six yards, five and a half metres, sometimes nine yards, of material. you have to wrap it around yourself. tuck here, tuck there, make the pleats, hold the pallu in place. it must be so difficult. one must sit still or move around in luxury cars or palanquins if one is in a saree.

yet a saree has never demanded that. not really, not ever. in fact, if your palanquin is late, you can simply hitch up your saree a little and jump onto a bus.

if the day is windy and the pallu flies, refusing to stay in place, you could hum a romantic song to yourself, or if not in a frothy mood, grab it none too gently and tuck it into the waist band of the petticoat, and carry on with your life. it won’t mind.

or if you’re at a wedding, your saree stylishly sweeping the floor, your pallu long and glittering with zaree and sequins, and someone drops food on it, after the initial shock and the desire to throttle that someone, you can grab a jug of water from the waiter passing by and clean up, then deftly adjust your saree, so the stain is hidden by a pristine swathe of glimmer.

an image stays in the mind. a row of women in brightly coloured, well-worn sarees balancing muddy platters on their heads piled with cement, sand, and other building materials, walking confidently around a construction site.

across india, women working in construction sites, going about their arduous day in mill printed cotton sarees and other hardy weaves. sometimes with their heads covered, because tradition demands it or perhaps because it guards them against the glare of the sun. really, how do these women manage? i can’t stop marvelling.

the vegetable vendor hawking her fresh greens wears it, the cook grumbling about her low wage wears it, the cleaner, the part time bai, the goddess; city women wear it as do women in villages; movie stars drape it, farm workers wrap it, even school girls tuck it in every morning (had i stayed on in gokhale memorial girls’ school, it would have been uniform class nine onward). the saree is everywhere, and perhaps that’s precisely why one doesn’t take note of it, barely notice it. a bit like oxygen.

my mother graduated from frock to saree when she was thirteen. if you think that means she belonged to a conservative family, not really. saree was a sign of growing up maybe but not always an indication that you’d be house bound and restricted now on. all of her and my aunt’s class cutting from college to watch hindi movies was done in sarees. they took a bus from delhi university to connaught place i am sure… most movie theatres were in that posh part of town, the commercial district of lutyens’ delhi, in the mid to late fifties. and my aunt was very fashionable, so it couldn’t have been sturdy cottons only riding those crowded buses.

a saree is ultimately a length of fabric, which you can twist, turn, tuck, pleat, wear as you’d like to, need to, want to. it’s interactive. it’s flexible. it lets you decide.

and women across different cultures and backgrounds, over time, have done precisely that. there are over a hundred ways of wearing a saree. this has been researched and documented. what’s perhaps not documented is that we, each one of us, have our own little take, our own touches and fixes to get the look we want.  our own way of throwing on a saree.

my paternal grandmother in a white tangail with coloured border, ready to go out, her saree or “kapod,” cloth as they’d call it, well starched and worn in the “shadha sheedhe,” the plain and easy, style. this is called the “aatpoure” drape according to several articles on the net, i may have heard the word, but doesn’t register much. shadha sheedhe does.

my grandmothers and great-aunts wore their sarees in the traditional bengali manner, with broad pleats tucked at the waist, a swirl of cloth about the upper body, over this shoulder and that, leaving only the arms visible. one part of the cloth could be easily pulled up and drawn over the head to cover it, as and when needed. the more modern grandmother switched to the current popular style when she went out.

this style – which is perhaps the most familiar look of the saree nowadays, immediately springing to mind when we hear the word – came about gradually during the bengal renaissance period between the 1860s and the early 1900s. along with new thinking in art, education, politics, society, religion, a change in the way fifty percent of the population dressed. naturally, it didn’t happen in a day, but by and by, slowly yet surely, the new drape gained currency.

the british had a hand in this too. managing india, so they could maximise their gains, led to among other things, the creation of the indian civil service (initially known as the imperial civil service)… the highly prestigious ics. they deigned to allow a few indians into this elite cadre. many of the indian ics officers were bengalis, since the brits ruled for more than hundred and fifty years from calcutta. they belonged to eminent families, qualifying for the ics was considered quite an achievement, a reflection of your education, class, intellect. even netaji subhas chandra bose took the ics exams i just found out. he stood fourth, but didn’t join as he had no wish to serve the colonial government. but what’s all that got to do with the saree?

well, the wives of the ics officers were expected to attend social events and parties along with their husbands. this posed a problem. for before that, women of wealthy, upper class families stayed indoors, they didn’t go out and mingle freely with men. it was the custom in bengal, for women, aristocratic or otherwise, to don their saree in that matter-of-fact way i mentioned earlier, without a blouse. no blouse? the dear queen, had she heard of it, must have been most unamused. thoughts of smelling salt from my georgette heyer reading days swirl in the mind. i am giggling as i imagine the imbroglio… on both sides of the story. our patriarchal men would have been most perturbed by the whole thing, deep discussions on shastra and what is the world coming to must have rumbled across the mansions and rajbaris of the great metropolis of the east. wonder what the women thought. anyway, bottom line, this would simply not do if one had to step out of the purdah, or palanquin, and meet members of the opposite sex.    

and so came along the need for a saree drape that addressed all modesty issues and looked pretty and compatible – perhaps even competed – with the gowns of the european women. the saree found a new look, while a shirt-like blouse, with frills and lace, and a petticoat or underskirt became part of the ensemble.

the new drape was a culmination of ideas and accents from several women. first among them: jnanadanandi devi. rabindranath tagore’s brother satyendranath was the first indian ics officer. his wife, jnanadanandini, was a woman with a say in things if i am to believe film portrayals. when she went to live in bombay with her husband, she was impressed with the “bombay dastur,” or the style in which the chic parsi ladies wore their gorgeous china-made garas with jackets and petticoats. it was a take on the traditional gujarati style of wearing a saree with the pallu, the free end, in front.

eleven of the fifteen women who helped draft india’s constitution. all deeply involved with the indian independence movement, as were thousands of other women… hindu, muslim, sikh, christian, upper caste, lower caste, from across india. intersting to see tat be 1947-48, the new way of wearing the saree is adopted by all, whether you cover your head or not. photo courtesy feminismindia.com

jnanadanandini modified it and drew the saree across the bosom, letting it cover the upper body with pleats at the front, then dropped the pallu over the left shoulder to the back, only to bring it up again under the right shoulder. it left the right hand “free for courtesies” says wiki. this became popular and was known as, if i’m not wrong, the “brahmika saree.” the more progressive and educated brahmo women adopted it initially, wearing tailored blouses and petticoats with their sarees.

in the classic movie “sahib, bibi aur ghulam,” set in late nineteenth century bengal, the beautiful and tragic chhoti bahu (meena kumari) is unforgettable in her shadha sheedhe sarees and glittering jewellery, and the fiery jaba (waheeda rehman), a young brahmo woman who is almost an antithesis to chhoti bahu, wears her saree in the modern style, equally memorable. two completely different worlds and mindsets joined by a piece of cloth.

jnanadanandini devi did not, however, add the swishing array of narrow pleats that drop from the waist to the ground in front, allowing for longer strides and easy mobility. that came later with suniti devi, the maharani of cooch behar. it was this addition that set the saree seriously on the path to its modern silhouette.

that final touch by the daughter of philosopher, reformer, and brahmo leader keshub chandra sen, could it have come originally from an ancient unknown woman lost in history? the sculptures in centuries old temples show unstitched garments with those fishtail-like pleats on queens, apsaras, attendants, everyday women, and of course, goddesses.

the altered drape would not only let women go out and be part of the upper crust social set, but seen as a sign of modernity, it would be adopted by the growing middle class in cities. and some day not too far away, it would adorn many of the women who’d march against british rule in india’s fascinating independence movement.

there’s no tyranny of style here, however. even as the modern drape – often called the nivi style, which has its origin some say, in a style from andhra pradesh – got accepted, the older norms stayed alive. those many ways of wearing your saree. gujarati seedha pallu; bengali aatpoure or shadha sheedhe (plain and simple), as my grandmothers called it; the coorg style with pleats at the back; the looped-between-the-legs nauvari of maharashtra; interesting pleat and pallu arrangements of madurai; the kachhora drape of chhattisgarh tribals; the santhal style; andhra, tamil nadu, kerala, assam, punjab, odissa, rajasthan… there are saree drapes from everywhere, sometimes several of them. a blouse was added on at times, or a petticoat, but it really all depended on the saree wearer’s need, her comfort, her way of life.

the cook in kolkata and the part time maid, had a no-nonsense way of winding the yards tightly around themselves, no flyaway loose ends, no sweeping the floor length. it was the busy working woman’s drape.

a photograph i discovered stashed away with a bunch of pictures at the back of a cupboard in my father’s family home. this is most probably a dear great-aunt of mine. i just remember her in her white widow’s saree, the “thaan.” maybe it’s her, maybe it isn’t… that brooch looks stylish and this drape possibly reflects the tweaks introduced by jnanadanandini devi.

for some reason, mrinmoyee in “samapti” and durga in “pather panchali” come to mind, how everyday sarees were in a girl’s life. not getting in the way of scampering about woods, or running through open meadows covered in kash.

i am no newcomer to the saree, it’s always been there; yet, it was only the other day that it struck me the design of a saree is pretty neat. while it looks elaborate and perhaps even fussy in a world of stitched garments that can be slipped on easily, and have a cut and look that’s static, the saree in fact is fluid and amenable in ways most clothes aren’t.

from the plainest to the most ornate and delicate, there’s a hearty can do spirit in it. it can handle situations, it’s happy to deal with life. floating through the saree’s skein of pliable yarn is an undertow of grit, of determination to tackle the day. and of freedom.

which is why, you’ll notice, every now and then, there’s change. a new twist, a new turn. a new generation finds its own relationship with the saree. my daughter isn’t rolling her eyes because i’ve suggested a saree for her graduation ceremony. she’s chosen a plain yellow one, from assam, handspun eri yarn, handloom. she wants to pair it with a blue blouse. the blouse will definitely not look like one of mine. she’s going to wear the saree most likely tied a little higher, coming down only till the ankles, her pallu not as snugly pulled over the upper body as i wear it, and with her favourite black high heel boots.

we are many moons past jnanadanandini and suniti devi’s sensibilities. the sculptures on our temple walls are perhaps wishing they had today’s beautiful blouses to cover their bare torsos. someone’s adjusting and tucking the pleats of her saree somewhere. a pallu is dropping over the shoulder… mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, great-great-grandmother, great-great-great-. how does a piece of fabric shimmy so blithely through so much time?

i feel a tug. must wear sarees more often, i think. but i am in one, i realise the next instant. it’s friday, and these days, i wear a saree for shabbat, the weekly jewish observance at our home. today, it’s a dressy kanjeevaram silk with zaree.

there’s a yell from the kitchen. i lift the saree up a bit and rush across. blood all over the floor, worried faces, the cook has cut her hand. i pull the pleats up and tuck a bit into the petticoat, the pallu of my expensive but not snooty saree is twisted and goes around my waist. time to get to work.

wrote this on april 29, 2019

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sarees tell stories | brushed orange and maroon kanjeevaram from delhi's nalli, circa 2005; yellow eri from kohua d'handloom cafe, guwahati, 2019.

referred to material from this economic times article, the wiki page on jnanadanadini devi and an article in the statesman on the ics.

waiting for my daughter’s first saree to arrive. this photo and the title shot courtesy anjan barua of kohua d’handloom café.

the saree did arrive and my daughter wore it to her graduation, with a blue blouse, silver jewellery, boots on her feet.

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the state of assam, where the eri yarn was handspun, dyed with natural colours, and woven on the loom.


kanchipuram in tamil nadu where kanjeevaram sarees are woven.

(maps courtesy uploaders.)

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Friday, October 2, 2020

time for khadi

the two of us donned khadi sarees and did a happy photo shoot. we were remembering an incredible man and all that he did so we today can be us. to mohandas karamchand gandhi and his ingenious ideas to oppose and take down the oppressor.

a thing for khadi

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photos credit ferolyn fernandez

Thursday, September 3, 2020

checks and no balance from chettinad

it was a couple of years ago i think, that a good friend of mine said, since i loved sarees so much we should go to chettinad together.

chettinad?

i was surprised. what did chettinad have to do with sarees? chettinad was about chicken with a distinct peppery taste, which no matter how many recipes i looked up on the net, i never seemed to get right. it was about food: spicy, aromatic, delicious. it was about the famous chettiars who travelled all over south east asia, trading, lending money, being merchant bankers, and brought back the tastes of those countries to their traditional food.

growing up in the north and east, i’d of course heard of cottons from south india. kanchi cotton, mangalgiri, coimbatore… but never chettinad. my friend smiled at my ignorance, and insisted, i had to see these beautiful handloom cotton sarees. women weaved them usually, and like many of our gorgeous weaving traditions, this too was struggling to survive. though efforts were on to revive it.

she also spoke of the palatial homes of the chettiars, with their magnificent art and architecture, grand belgian glass, italian marble, chandeliers and fine wood work. one had to see those too. in fact, one had to live in one of them. her friend’s family had converted their home to a hotel, as many were doing, so the plan was to go and stay there for a couple of days, eat real chettinad food – the vegetarian fare is fabulous as well, in fact, the chettiars were originally vegetarians i just read – and visit the weavers, buy lots of rich ethnic sarees.

even planning this gave me a high. then as happens with plans cooked up over a nice lunch, it didn’t really materialise. time passed. chandeliers swayed; pepper, nutmeg, cloves, and blue ginger were balanced by experienced hands; yarns were soaked in redolent earthy colours; another saree got woven. and every time my friend and i met, we averred, we must not forget to go on that trip.

a couple of weeks ago, i got a whatsapp message: nowadays have you noticed, how whatsapp messages seem to have hegemony over news of all kinds? from revolutions to religion to good morning wishes to jokes, the whatsapp message delivers all, and delivers them first. this time it was an ad for an exhibition… of chettinad sarees.

a friend of mine, whom i met only once in a while, had sent it. her friends had been to chettinad, and were completely enamoured of the sarees; they were also moved by the plight of the weavers. so they had picked up a handful for sarees and were having a sale. they planned to help the weavers with the profits. since she knew i was sort of fond of sarees – ah, reputation, one must think what one would like to be remembered for – she had messaged me.

i was delighted and showed up early for the exhibition with the friend who had told me about these sarees in the first place. there weren’t too many pieces, but each one was beautiful. too few sarees, too many women… alas. i managed to grab a couple, even as i looked longingly at a few that had already found their takers.

the cotton was slightly coarse in some, finer in others. the colours were unguarded, full, and luscious. a quality of gem stones in them. there was a boldness in the sarees’ demeanour: checks all over in contrasting tones or simple single colour body, edged by border in an off beat, at times flamboyant, shade. well articulated patterns and motifs. a touch of gold here and there. or not. just unusual tones and the elegance of unfettered cotton.

as i clutched my sarees and watched the video on the weavers and the mansions of karaikudi, the main city of chettinad, my mind wandered to streets and temples of singapore, and a story with diverse threads searched for its connections, its warp and weft.

after coming to singapore, i’d heard of the chettiars, a community from india, who were once mainly money lenders. they’d come here early on, soon after the british took over in 1819. they operated from shops on market street, chulia street, and neighbouring lanes. now of course, it’s all spiffy glass and concrete, and you don’t see the kittangis, where they lived and worked. living quarters upstairs, shops downstairs.

the chettiar sat on the floor in traditional wear of white cotton, with his sacred ash markings on the forehead, and his mind alert and sharp; before him a low wooden desk with books and other necessities. the chettiars were known for their financial acumen. the community though hadn’t always been money lenders, they were traders for centuries, dealing in salt, spices, and gem stones. later as the british expanded their trade interests in the region, the wealthy merchants turned to money lending and finance.

the chettiars came to singapore long before the big banks had arrived in the region. back then, they were perhaps the only people ready to offer a legitimate line of credit to small businesses, plantation owners, even larger enterprises. in a way, they were the first bankers and financiers around here.

the kittangis, those unique shop houses, had only men, for the itinerant merchants initially didn’t bring their families over. the sons accompanied their fathers once they were around eight or nine years old. and from that age onward they were gradually trained in matters of business in a sternly disciplined environment.

while they lived away from their ancestral land, the chettiars used their considerable wealth to build beautiful and ostentatious homes there. so they are are often referred to as nattukottai chettiars or "people with palatial houses on the countryside" or nagarathars, city dwellers. looks like, the homes were mainly inhabited by the women of the family, where they in all likelihood perfected and embellished their distinctive cuisine while draped in these gorgeous cotton sarees, just right for that arid, hot part of tamil nadu.

a few years ago, when i went to the sri layan sithi vinayagar temple on keong saik street in the heart of chinatown, i learnt that the temple was built by the chettiars. one of the oldest hindu temples here, on tank road, was built by them in 1859. the chettiars were wealthy, they were hardworking, and they were highly religious. i had of course never connected sarees with these serious men in white.

on a walk in singapore, just off river valley road, i’d come across three roads named after three men of the community. obviously these were people of importance and they must have contributed something to this country to have been honoured so. today, the chettiars who live here are no longer money lenders, they are professionals in various fields, and highly regarded many of them.

the chettinad sarees were getting slightly wrinkled in my hands as i thought about all these things, and women i barely knew smiled at each other and me as well, as we spoke of the karaikudi palaces, the houseproud aachis who cooked wonderful authentic dishes, the women who weaved, their needs, their artistry, their warmth, the weather, a different life far away, its only hint in the colours and fabric we all held close.

some day, my friend and i must go on that trip, yes, we must.

my saree with one thousand aayiram or buttas/motifs within the checks.

picture courtesy uploader

the quintessential checks of chettinad sarees.

wrote this one on november 5, 2018.

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sarees tell stories | turquoise and navy checks with a purplish maroon border; and beige with a thousand red buttas and checks in red and turmeric with a plain turmeric border… two sarees from an exhibition in singapore, november 2018.